This Time It's Obvious - Donald Trump Is Guilty Of A Crime

Donald Trump has been guilty of several crimes, including fomenting an insurrection and trying to overthrow a fair and legal election. So far, he has not been charged with any of those crimes -- at least not yet.

But I don't see how he can escape being charged with this latest crime -- the theft and possession of top secret government documents.

A few days ago, with a legal warrant, the FBI went to Trump's home at Mar-A-Lago. They were looking for government documents, including top secret documents.

When the FBI search happened, Trump whined that it was just another witch hunt. He tried to gain sympathy and even began to fundraise off the search.

But he has a huge problem. The search was successful! The FBI carted away many boxes of government documents, and at least 11 batches of documents were top secret.

Trump's first attempt to weasel out of this was to claim the FBI didn't allow anyone to see what they were doing, and had probably planted incriminating documents. That was quickly revealed to be a lie. Trump's own attorney admitted that she witnessed the search. Nothing was planted, and she received a list of everything that was taken.

Trump then tried to say the warrant and search was not necessary -- that all they had to do was ask for the documents. That's another lie. They did ask for all government documents that he had taken. And when they originally went to Mar-A-Lago to get the documents, he only provided some. Even though he said he gave them all, there were 15 boxes that he had hidden, and did not provide. When they learned he had additional documents, they requested them. Trump did not respond. Then they issued a subpoena for the documents. Trump did not respond. It became obvious that a warrant and search would be required.

Trump has also claimed that another president took documents. He said President Obama took 33 thousand pages of documents (some including nuclear secrets) and moved them to Chicago. That was another lie. The National Archives said they moved those documents to Chicago and continue to oversee them. President Obama never had possession of the documents.

Trump's latest dishonest attempt to cover himself is to claim that the top secret documents were declassified by him, and that the moment they left Washington they were automatically declassified. But declassification doesn't work that way. While the president can declassify some top secret documents, he cannot do so secretly. There is a process that must be followed and other citizens must be given access to the declassified documents.

Trump will now probably claim he didn't know removing and hiding government documents (even those not secret) was a crime. That will be another lie. Trump signed a law early in his presidency that made that a felony worth five years in prison.

I honestly don't see how Trump is going to escape being charged with a crimes this time. He did take the documents (including top secret documents) and they were found at his home. His crime is obvious to everyone this time, and charges must be filed. Failure to charge him with a crime will mean he is above the law. In a constitutional democracy, no one is above the law.