Prosecutors rebuke Trump’s claims for dismissal in docs case
WASHINGTON — Federal prosecutors on Thursday drew sharp distinctions in the classified documents investigations of Donald Trump and President Joe Biden as they urged a federal judge to reject the former president’s claims that he was the victim of a vindictive and selective prosecution.
Trump’s lawyers told U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon last month that the felony prosecution of Trump should be dismissed in part because he had been charged with illegally retaining classified documents while numerous other public figures also investigated for the potential mishandling of sensitive records, including Biden, had either not been prosecuted or faced much less serious criminal cases.
But special counsel Jack Smith’s team, in a court filing Thursday responding to that argument, said Trump’s conduct “went much further” than that of the other officials he identified and that none of them “is alleged to have willfully retained a vast trove of highly sensitive, confidential materials and repeatedly sought to thwart their lawful return and engaged in a multifaceted scheme of deception and obstruction.”
That scheme, prosecutors added, “included not only Trump’s own repeated efforts to stymie the investigation, but his recruitment and direction of his subordinates to join in the conspiracy repeated efforts to stymie the investigation, but his recruitment and direction of his subordinates to join in the conspiracy.”
Trump and his lawyers have seized on the findings of a different Justice Department special counsel Robert Hur, who said in a report last month that his team had uncovered evidence that Biden, as a private citizen, had willfully retained classified information but that the evidence fell short of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt — the standard required to bring a criminal prosecution.
Cannon on Thursday evening scheduled a hearing for March 14 to hear arguments on several of the Trump team’s motions to dismiss, including Trump’s claim that he was entitled to possess the documents under the Presidential Records Act — an argument that prosecutors have vigorously rejected.
Prosecutors on Smith’s team acknowledged though there are “superficial similarities” in the cases, they stand apart in meaningful ways, including Trump’s “extensive and repeated efforts to obstruct justice and thwart the return of documents bearing classification markings.” They cite the Hur report as noting Biden, by contrast, alerted authorities to the presence of classified documents, willingly returned them, consented to searches of his homes and otherwise cooperated with the investigation.
Smith’s team also says though they gathered “powerful” evidence that Trump willfully held onto classified records from his presidency at his Mar-a-Lago estate, including showing them off to others while commenting about their sensitive status, the Hur report showed that such evidence against Biden was insufficient to establish criminal intent.