Attention to the Unseen

Rolling Stone reports: Allen Weisselberg, the Trump Organization’s finance chief, will say in Manhattan court Thursday that he conspired with several of the ex-president’s companies when he pleads guilty to state tax crimes, two sources familiar with the case tell Rolling Stone. As part of Weisselberg’s plea deal, he has agreed to testify against The Trump Corporation and the Trump Payroll Corporation at trial, which is scheduled for October. If called to the witness stand during trial, Weisselberg will provide…

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Insider reports: The Georgia prosecutor pursuing one of the most high-stakes investigations in US history built her career by successfully using racketeering charges, typically employed against organized crime, to convict Atlanta public school teachers for conspiring to alter student test scores. Those RICO cases, and a key hire of a racketeering law expert to her staff, offer a window into how experts believe she is likely to build any criminal case against Donald Trump and his allies in connection with…

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Scott R. Anderson writes: No criminal charges have yet been filed against Trump or anyone else in relation to the Mar-a-Lago files. But if and when that happens, Trump’s declassification defense is unlikely to solve his or his associates’ legal problems. While Trump could have declassified whatever he liked while president, his apparent inability to produce any credible evidence that he actually did so is a genuine problem—particularly against the backdrop of an incumbent president who clearly sees the documents…

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Paul Rosenzweig writes: Donald Trump is making a serious mistake. The FBI’s execution of a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago is, he apparently thinks, of great political benefit to him. Perhaps so—I am not one to judge politics. But public reports also suggest that he may accelerate his re-election announcement in response to the search. Trump seems to think that running for president makes it less likely that he will be prosecuted by the Department of Justice. That’s wrong. The more…

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The New York Times reports: Two of the laws referred to in the search warrant executed this week criminalize the taking or concealment of government records, regardless of whether they had anything to do with national security. And laws against taking material with restricted national security information are not dependent on whether the material is technically classified. Mr. Bolton, who served as Mr. Trump’s third national security adviser over 17 months, said he had never heard of the standing order…

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Politico reports: Two top House lawmakers Saturday asked the nation’s intelligence chief to review potential damage to national security stemming from former President Donald Trump’s storage of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. “Former President Trump’s conduct has potentially put our national security at grave risk. This issue demands a full review, in addition to the ongoing law enforcement inquiry,” wrote House Intelligence committee chair Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and House Oversight committee chair Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) in a three-page letter to…

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The Washington Post reports: A Trump adviser said the former president’s reluctance to relinquish the records stems from his belief that many items created during his term — photos, notes, even a model of Air Force One built to show off a new paint job he had commissioned — are now his personal property, despite a law dating to the 1970s that decreed otherwise. “He gave them what he believed was theirs,” the adviser said. “He gets his back up…

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Renato Mariotti writes: Former president Donald Trump’s stubborn refusal to return highly classified material forced the Justice Department’s hand, resulting in the execution of a search warrant at his residence. But while it is possible the DOJ merely wanted to retrieve and secure the material that Trump refused to give back to the government, if they decide to press forward with charges, their case looks quite strong. The government initially treated Trump with kid gloves when he took government property,…

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The New York Times reports: Former President Donald J. Trump’s claim that he had declassified all of the documents that the F.B.I. seized in the search of his Florida home last week — including those marked as top secret — has heightened interest in the scope of a president’s power to declassify information. On Friday, Mr. Trump’s office claimed that when he was president, he had a “standing order” that materials “removed from the Oval Office and taken to the…

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Quite the buried lede >> Trump tried to intimidate the Attorney General, getting an aide to contact DOJ to send Garland a message: that "the country is on fire"—enraged by the search. Trump disclosed it! The guy is still tampering w/ investigations & obstructing justice! pic.twitter.com/ktgBt8c6TY — 🇺🇦Paula Chertok🗽🇺🇦 (@PaulaChertok) August 13, 2022 The New York Times reports: At least one lawyer for former President Donald J. Trump signed a written statement in June asserting that all material marked as…

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Politico reports: A search warrant newly unsealed on Friday reveals that the FBI is investigating Donald Trump for a potential violation of the Espionage Act and removed classified documents from the former president’s Florida estate earlier this week. A receipt accompanying the search warrant, viewed by POLITICO in advance of its unsealing, shows that Trump possessed documents including a handwritten note; documents marked with “TS/SCI,” which indicates one of the highest levels of government classification; and another item labeled “Info…

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The Washington Post reports: In the minutes after an armed man in body armor tried to breach an FBI field office in Cincinnati, an account with the suspect’s name, Ricky Shiffer, posted to former president Donald Trump’s social network, Truth Social: “If you don’t hear from me, it is true I tried attacking the F.B.I.” The Shiffer account appeared to be one of Truth Social’s most prolific posters, writing 374 messages there in the past eight days — mostly to…

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Politico reports: As news broke that the FBI had searched Donald Trump’s Florida home, MAGA loyalists and even some of the former president’s potential 2024 rivals rushed to a full-throated defense of the former president. But not every Republican joined the chorus. While the FBI search has given a jolt of energy to the conservative base, the issue is proving to be more complicated in pivotal battleground races that could determine control of the chamber — places where Republicans had…

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The New York Times reports: Amid a deepening swirl of federal and state investigations, former President Donald J. Trump has hired a high-powered Atlanta lawyer to represent him in an inquiry into election interference in Georgia. The lawyer, Drew Findling, has represented an array of rap stars including Cardi B, Gucci Mane and Migos, and is known by the hashtag #BillionDollarLawyer. But he has not been a fan of Mr. Trump; in one 2018 post on Twitter, after Mr. Trump…

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Politico reports: The Justice Department official who oversaw the investigation of Hillary Clinton’s handling of classified records says there’s simply no comparing the search of Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence to the case against the former secretary of State. “People sling these cases around to suit their political agenda but every case has to stand on its own circumstances,” said David Laufman, who led the Justice Department’s counterintelligence section until 2018 and is now a partner at the firm Wiggin and…

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