This is a new pitfall for the Republican billionaire, who dreams of regaining the American presidency in 2024. Donald Trump announced, Thursday, June 8, to have been indicted by federal justice for his management of the White House archives. “The corrupt Biden administration informed my lawyers that I have been charged, presumably in the bogus case of the boxes”he wrote on his Truth Social network.
The former president said he was summoned to federal court in Miami on Tuesday, June 13. This is the first time in US history that a former president has faced federal indictment. In March, he had already been charged by the justice of the State of New York in the case of the purchase of the silence of an actress of X movies in 2016.
This time, he is accused of having kept whole boxes of documents, including some classified ” top secret “, after leaving Washington in early 2021, and refusing to return them, in violation of federal law. According to several American media, he would face seven charges, not yet made public.
Donald Trump, who for the moment is well ahead of the other candidates for the Republican nomination, has always defended himself from any embezzlement and presents himself as the victim of a “political persecution”. “I never imagined that it would be possible for such a thing to happen to a former president of the United States”he castigated Thursday, denouncing “a dark day” for the country.
Some 11,000 documents seized
“How could the Ministry of Justice indict me when I did nothing? », he wrote again Monday on Truth Social, when his lawyers were received by officials of this ministry. This meeting was seen as a signal that an indictment was imminent after months of investigation, culminating in the spectacular search of his Florida home in August 2022.
In the United States, a 1978 law obliges all American presidents to transmit all of their e-mails, letters and other working documents to the National Archives. Another law, on espionage, prohibits anyone from keeping documents classified as confidential in unauthorized and unsecured places.
Leaving the presidency to settle in his luxurious residence in Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump nevertheless took entire boxes of files. In January 2022, after several reminders, he agreed to return 15 boxes, containing more than 200 classified documents. In a letter, his lawyers then assured that there were no others.
After examination, the federal police, however, estimated that he had not returned everything and that he still kept a lot in his club in Palm Beach. FBI agents went there on August 8, 2022 and seized around 30 other boxes, containing 11,000 documents, some of them very sensitive, on Iran or China.
Forcefully denouncing a media operation, his lawyers strongly criticized the FBI for publishing, according to them unnecessary, a photo showing seized documents stamped with the words “Top-Secret”scattered on a carpet with a floral pattern.
Attempts to minimize his conduct
To silence accusations of conspiracy, Attorney General Merrick Garland in November 2022 appointed a special prosecutor, Jack Smith, to oversee this investigation independently, as well as another into Donald Trump’s role in the the assault on the Capitol, January 6, 2021.
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Another special prosecutor is investigating in parallel classified documents found earlier this year in a former office and at the home of Democratic President Joe Biden by his lawyers. These embarrassing finds, along with others from ex-Vice President Mike Pence, allowed Donald Trump to downplay his conduct, even though Joe Biden has always cooperated with the judiciary, voluntarily returning the documents, in much smaller number.
The Republican tribune also used the discoveries at his rival to rally his supporters, who, each time justice strikes him, close ranks around him. This was particularly the case in April, shortly after his indictment by the justice of the State of New York. It was the first time in American history that a former president faced criminal charges.
A Georgia state prosecutor, who has been investigating Donald Trump’s pressure to try to change the 2020 presidential election for months, is due to announce the results of her investigations by September.