Trump's Weekend Rant Made Him Sound 'Guilty And Scared,' Ex-Prosecutor Says

Former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance suggested Trump's remarks in Arizona were telling.
LOADINGERROR LOADING

From a former federal prosecutor’s perspective, ex-President Donald Trump sounded pretty desperate over the weekend as he railed against the investigation into his possession of classified documents.

At a rally in Mesa, Arizona, Trump accused former President George H.W. Bush of taking millions of documents to a former “bowling alley/Chinese restaurant,” in an effort to defend his own decision to hide hundreds of classified government documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort.

“In my experience as a prosecutor, people say stuff like this when they’re guilty & scared,” tweeted Joyce Alene, who was the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Alabama from 2009 to 2017.

Last week, Trump filed an emergency request asking the Supreme Court to intervene in the case, a move which Alene predicted was “due to fail” in an analysis posted to her Substack.

Beyond the ongoing litigation, Alene said she expected more developments this week following a report that Justice Department officials believe Trump has additional documents in his possession.

“Keep in mind that in order to get a search warrant, DOJ must present a judge with probable cause to believe that either evidence of or fruits of a crime will be found in a specific location to be searched,” she wrote. “That would explain why DOJ is reportedly questioning witnesses about what Trump kept at his Bedminster and Trump Towers offices.”

Another report by The New York Times over the weekend suggested that when Trump was being pressured by the National Archives to return classified documents last year, he suggested offering them in an exchange. Trump reportedly wanted to trade the files in his possession for materials he believed the archives had that would show he had been wronged by the FBI investigation into his 2016 campaign’s ties to Russia.

Alene called it “extortion-y” and noted how it was another piece of evidence suggesting Trump’s criminal intent.

“Not even Trump’s minions were foolish enough to raise the ‘deal’ with government officials, but, along with reporting Trump packed up boxes himself, it goes a long way towards establishing Trump knew what he had and knew he wasn’t entitled to have it,” she wrote. “And all of this makes it still more likely that DOJ is going to have to prosecute the former president, whether it wants to or not, unless it wants to let the rule of law die on its watch.”

Popular in the Community

Close

What's Hot