Document investigations
Conservative US Senator Graham: “If Trump should be impeached, there will be riots in the streets”
Lindsey Graham (right) and Donald Trump (left) on board Air Force One in September 2019
© Jim Watson / AFP
Did Donald Trump Endanger National Security By Taking Home Secret Documents? This question should clarify US secret services. A conservative senator warns that if there is an indictment, there will be a risk of “riots”.
So far, there hasn’t been much in his almost seven-year political career that has permanently reduced Donald Trump’s popularity: neither the Russia affair, nor the two threats of impeachment, nor his role in the Capitol storm in January 2021. Also the raid on his property in Mar-a -Lago is no exception. Although the ex-president probably kept dozens of secret documents there and thus probably committed a serious crime, he can still count on the support of his party friends and voters.
Secret service intervenes in investigations
According to current surveys, 59 percent want to the Republicans that Trump will also run as a candidate in the next presidential election in 2024. That’s a comfortable majority that should secure him the Republican nomination. Unless the investigation into his taking of secret documents leads to serious legal consequences. How sensitive the topic could become for him is shown by the entry of the US secret services into the investigation, as US media reports. This should clarify whether there were any national security risks from the storage in Trump’s Mar-a-Lago mansion in Florida, it said, citing a letter from US intelligence coordinator Avril Haines.
At the end of last week, the US Department of Justice in Washington partially made public the basis on which the ex-president’s living quarters were searched on August 8th. This revealed that Trump had previously returned numerous confidential, classified, and top-secret documents to the National Archives. Since Trump kept the documents in his private estate until then, he could have broken the law.
The document, which was released in part, shows that confidential and sometimes even top secret documents were found in 14 of 15 boxes with documents that Trump sent from Mar-a-Lago to the National Archives in January. 184 documents were classified – 67 as “confidential”, 92 as “secret” and 25 as “top secret”. There were handwritten notes on some – probably by Trump himself.
Reason for Donald Trump crackdown
Investigations revealed that classified documents, which appeared to include national defense-related information, were being held at an unauthorized location at Trump’s home. The FBI argued there was reason to believe other classified documents were at the property. That’s why Trump’s villa was searched.
“The Department of Justice and the Office of the US Intelligence Coordinator are working together to facilitate a classification review of relevant materials, including those found in the search,” Haines wrote, according to Politico magazine. The secret services could deal with the question of the extent to which unauthorized persons had access to the documents in the villa. Haines is an intelligence coordinator in the government of Trump’s successor, Joe Biden.
Meanwhile, after the new details became known, Trump again called for independent oversight of the investigation. The US government should not look further into the documents until an independent examiner is appointed, his lawyers said in a motion. Already last Monday he had filed a lawsuit in a court in the US state of Florida to defend himself against the actions of the authorities. A judge announced on Saturday that she wanted to use a special representative. She also ordered the US Department of Justice to tell the court what other items had been confiscated during the FBI raids in early August.
Trump considers law enforcement’s actions to be politically motivated. On Saturday, he again described the searches as an “unprecedented, unnecessary and unannounced break-in” at his home in Mar-a-Lago. “This attack was made for political purposes just before the midterm elections (and 2024, of course!),” the 76-year-old wrote on the online platform Truth Social, which he co-founded. The fact that investigators search the house of a former president is considered a unique event in US history. The publication of essential procedural documents, even if largely blacked out, is unusual.
“It’s just a matter of getting him”
Speaking on Fox News, the pro-Trump US news channel, conservative Senator Lindsey Graham warned of riots if Donald Trump is impeached in the case. “If he’s prosecuted for improper handling of documents, there will be riots in the streets,” the Republican said on Sunday Night in America.
In any case, Graham believes that the former president is being measured with double standards. “Most Republicans, myself included, are under the impression that when it comes to Trump, there is no law. It’s just about getting him.”