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Having been impeached twice during his presidency, Donald Trump has now been indicted twice in its aftermath … with additional charges in other cases likely to follow.
According to a federal indictment unsealed on Friday, Trump has been charged with 38 counts of seven different federal crimes: Willful retention of national defense information, the corrupt concealment of documents, conspiracy to obstruct justice, withholding a document or record, concealing a document in a federal investigation, scheming to conceal documents and making false statements and representations.
He faces up to 100 years behind bars if convicted on all of those charges.
Trump’s indictment marked the first time in American history a former president has been charged with a federal crime. It also marked the first time a sitting president’s Department of Justice (DOJ) has indicted his top political rival in an upcoming election.
Trump will appear in federal court in Miami, Florida at 3:00 p.m. EDT on Tuesday to be arraigned on these charges. Ironically, he will appear before judge Aileen M. Cannon, whom he appointed to the bench in 2020.
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The federal indictments (.pdf) against Trump come just over two months after he was indicted by New York district attorney Alvin Bragg on charges related to payouts to multiple mistresses during the 2016 presidential campaign. Trump is also facing a criminal investigation in Georgia over allegations related to the 2020 election – as well as an ongoing DOJ inquiry into the January 6, 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol.
As he did the last time he was indicted, Trump broke the news on his own terms – on his social media platform, Truth Social. Throughout the day on Friday, he used his account to push back at the allegations.
The investigation into Trump is being led by special prosecutor Jack Smith. Separate federal investigations into the handling of classified documents are underway involving current U.S. president Joe Biden and former U.S. vice president Mike Pence.
Trump made it a point to highlight the investigation into Biden.
“Biden moved his boxes all over the place, including to Chinatown and up to his lawyer’s office in Boston,” Trump wrote in one post. “Why isn’t deranged Jack Smith looking at that? Also, I supplied them openly, and without question, security tape from Mar-a-Lago. I had nothing to hide, nor do I now. Nobody said I wasn’t allowed to look at the personal records that I brought with me from the White House.”
In another post, Trump specifically went after Smith – accusing him of being an integral cog in the 2013 scandal at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) involving Lois Lerner.
(Click to View)
Lerner admitted in May 2013 that her agency had inappropriately targeted limited government groups for additional scrutiny in the years leading up to the 2012 election. She claimed this “error in judgment” was confined to low-level employees in Cincinnati – a statement which later turned out to be false. Eventually (and infamously) Lerner invoked the Fifth Amendment when called to testify about the mushrooming scandal before the U.S. Congress – which had previously been assured by the agency that no such discrimination had taken place.
Smith was head of DOJ’s public integrity unit at the time, and emails released in the aftermath of that scandal showed him attempting to launch investigations into the alleged “misuse of nonprofits for indirectly funding campaigns.”
“This is the man who caused the Lois Lerner catastrophe with the IRS,” Trump wrote, referring to Smith. “He went after evangelicals and great Americans of faith. The United States had to apologize, and pay major damages for what this deranged lunatic did. He had a unanimous loss in the Supreme Court. His wife is a Trump hater, just as he is a Trump hater — a deranged ‘psycho’ that shouldn’t be involved in any case having to do with ‘Justice,’ other than to look at Biden as a criminal, which he is!”
As news of the indictment broke, Trump remained the runaway frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination – with 53.2 percent of likely GOP primary voters supporting his candidacy. Florida governor Ron DeSantis was second with 22.4 percent support.
No other candidate was drawing more than five percent of the vote.
DeSantis has been relentlessly criticized by Trump throughout the course of this campaign, but he came to his rival’s defense in the aftermath of his federal indictment.
“The weaponization of federal law enforcement represents a mortal threat to a free society,” DeSantis tweeted. “We have for years witnessed an uneven application of the law depending upon political affiliation. Why so zealous in pursuing Trump yet so passive about Hillary or Hunter? The DeSantis administration will bring accountability to the DOJ, excise political bias and end weaponization once and for all.”
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THE INDICTMENTS …
(Via: U.S. Department of Justice)
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR …
Will Folks is the founding editor of the news outlet you are currently reading. Prior to founding FITSNews, he served as press secretary to the governor of South Carolina. He lives in the Midlands region of the state with his wife and seven children.
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15 comments
I was listening to 560 AM WVOC a little while ago as I ran some errands. I do this, not because the content was anything great, but because I enjoy the nostalgia of AM radio, with its static, fading, etc. Mark Levine, the ultimate whining joo of the universe was on. He was whining about poor, poor, pitiful, Trump. “The Democrats are so mean to him. Everything he does, he does for us. Boo f-cking Hoo! He could spend the rest of his life in jail. Oh, Boo Hoo.”
I am no fan of Biden or the Democrats whatsoever, but nothing in real life will happen to Trump. He plays for the same team as the Democrats. He works for the same people they do. This is all a giant dog and pony show, to keep the peasants focused on the show, now ehat Trump’s real bosses are preparing to do to us.
…not what…
If he crosses Putin he will either fall off a balcony or be poisoned.
God bless America!
FOX and FITS, two of a kind.
Yep, both in the business of supplying disinformation to the MAGAs in service to the GOP. Fits should stick to investigatory journalism–that he actually is good at.
Notice how the politicians Will Folks hitches his wagon to end up totally disgraced by their actions and crimes?
Deflecting to Biden or making up things to attack Federal prosecutors ain’t gonna help. Trump admitted on tape that what he was doing was illegal and he still kept break the laws.
Twice impeached (with Republicans refusing to hear any evidence of his crimes then) and now twice indicted with 72 felony counts against him.
Might as well go ahead a swear Biden in for another term.
I feel the need to issue a correction to some of your assertions above. Biden didn’t indict Trump. The Democratic Party did not indict Donald Trump. In fact, No politician indicted Donald Trump. A grand jury of regular, everyday citizens of Florida (aka GOP Cesspool Central) who reviewed the evidence indicted Donald Trump. Trump will receive a jury trial where a second panel of jurors, where he and his attorneys will have input on those chosen to sit on his jury. The judge is also more than likely going to be a Trump appointee. You and your GOP brethren can sit here all day and continue to try and justify Trump’s criminality all you want, but the ONLY person who got Trump indicted was Donald Trump himself. My God man, he stole top secret documents regarding this nation’s security and y’all are treating it like it was his right to steal and possibly sell this intel to the highest bidder. He then had his lawyers lie to the FBI and National Security folks that he didn’t have some of these documents. He did. That alone is consciousness of guilt and enough to convict him. Why did he have to lie? Oh right, that’s his default setting. Over 30,000 verifiable lies were told by Trump while president. Maybe next time the GOP shouldn’t pick the biggest criminal and liar in the bunch but nah, it’s a freaking cult and Fits nonsense above demonstrates.
Freedom from Consequences is not a protected Constitutional Right.
“President Joe Biden’s prosecutors”
Will being a disingenuous numpty again and counting on his audience not knowing any better.
lol
Republicans can’t open their mouths or type a single sentence without misrepresenting the truth or out right lying.
It was Grand juries, made up of regular Americans from all over the social spectrum, who indicted Trump.
Not Biden, not Democrats. Trump is so obviously guilty and admitted it on tape.
I can see how Republicans would want to ignore the actual indictment and instead weakly cry about (lol) Hillary (she must be having the biggest laugh of her life right now) or Biden or whatever crap they can make up.
I don’t know what I find more disturbing:
the fact that one of our two primary political parties has become such a cult that they will not stand up to a man, who by his own admission took and held sensitive highly classified government documents which contained information on our nuclear capabilities, the nuclear and military capabilities of our allies and enemies, and our plans for a possible attack on a foreign adversary, refused to return those documents when asked do so, lied about having them, asked his lawyers to lie about his having them; and has yet to say what he planned to do with them or who he has shared them with;
or
the fact that one of our two primary political parties has become such a cult that they will not stand up to a man who they say without notifying anyone declassified government documents that contained highly sensitive information on our nuclear capabilities, the nuclear and military capabilities of our allies and enemies, and our plans for a possible attack on a foreign adversary; and which our enemies would literally kill to have access to; so that he could use those documents and the information they contained for his own private purposes.
Either way, this country is in deep trouble.
Here’s why it matters–and why it’s espionage-https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/575384-cia-admits-to-losing-dozens-of-informants-around-the-world-nyt/
???? ??? ??!
Lock him up!