The discovery of secret government documents in his estate has legal repercussions for ex-US President Trump. According to his own statement, charges were brought against him. A special investigator has been investigating the case for months.
According to media reports, ex-US President Donald Trump has been accused of handling secret service documents. “The corrupt Biden administration has informed my lawyers that I have been charged, apparently with the false secret documents affair,” Trump said on the online platform “Truth Social”.
As the broadcaster CNN reports, he faces seven charges in the process. A confirmation from the US Department of Justice was initially not available.
Subpoena in court in Miami
Trump, who plans to run again in the 2024 presidential election, said he was summoned by a court in Miami on Tuesday. “I never thought it possible that something like this could happen to a former President of the United States,” he wrote.
Several US media had previously unanimously reported that prosecutors from special counsel Jack Smith’s team had informed Trump’s lawyers that the ex-president was a personal target of their investigation.
The US Department of Justice appointed the independent special counsel in November to outsource the politically sensitive investigation into Trump. On the one hand, Smith takes care of the investigations in connection with secret government documents. Second, it addresses Trump’s role in the storming of the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 and his efforts to influence the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.
A committee of inquiry had recommended criminal investigations to the Ministry of Justice. Among other things, he accuses Trump of rioting, obstructing a public process and conspiring against the US government. However, the Committee’s recommendation is not binding.
FBI found documents in raid
The FBI seized around 11,000 documents, including many with classified information, during a raid on Trump’s private home in Mar-a-Lago, Florida last August. Trump took the documents from the White House to Mar-a-Lago at the end of his term in January 2021.
The fact that the Republican kept the documents in his private home long after he left office could have made him liable to prosecution. For months, the National Archives tried to get papers from Trump’s administration. Trump’s lawyers had finally handed over documents – but by no means all of them, as it turned out during the FBI search of the Mar-a-Lago property.
Secret government documents from his time as Vice President under Barack Obama were also found on US President Joe Biden in premises where they should not have been kept. Here, too, an independent special investigator is active. In Biden’s case, however, there are significantly fewer documents. According to the White House, Biden has also not refused to hand over documents.
Already several investigations against Trump
Trump is already the first ex-president in US history to be indicted: In March, prosecutors in Manhattan charged him with paying hush money to porn actress Stormy Daniels before the 2016 presidential election.
In the state of Georgia, the public prosecutor’s office is also investigating Trump for possible election manipulation. In another case, Trump has already been prosecuted – at least indirectly. His real estate group was fined in New York for tax fraud, among other things. The ex-president was not personally accused.