What a sad day for America. On Thursday evening, President Trump stated that he had been indicted in the federal criminal investigation related to his handling of classified information. Trump, who will be 77 years old next week, stated that he has been ordered to show up at the Federal Courthouse in Miami on Tuesday at 3 PM. According to ABC News’ Katherine Faulders, Trump seems to be facing seven charges, including willful retention of national defense information, conspiracy, a scheme to conceal, and making false statements and representations.
“The corrupt Biden Administration has informed my attorneys that I have been Indicted, seemingly over the Boxes Hoax, even though Joe Biden has 1850 Boxes at the University of Delaware, additional Boxes in Chinatown, D.C., with even more Boxes at the University of Pennsylvania, and documents strewn all over his garage floor where he parks his Corvette, and which is ‘secured’ by only a garage door that is paper thin, and open much of the time,” Trump wrote on social media.
According to a source from NBC News, having seven charges does not necessarily mean there are seven separate counts, as there could be multiple counts associated with each charge. Despite his repeated claims of innocence, Trump has called for the investigation to be halted due to allegations of bias on the part of the prosecutors.
The former president alleges that the investigation against him was started with the intention of derailing his presidential campaign, which he announced on November 15, 2022. Currently, Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis are leading the Republican Party presidential primary race, while all other candidates are polling poorly.
In May 2021, the National Archives informed Trump that they were requesting around 24 boxes of records to be returned to them in accordance with the requirements of the Presidential Records Act. Later in 2021, the National Archives cautioned Trump that they could involve prosecutors or Congress if he continued to withhold the documents. Eric Herschmann, a former lawyer for the Trump White House, also warned Trump of the potential serious legal consequences if he did not comply.
In January 2022, officials discovered hundreds of pages of classified material in about 15 returned boxes. Federal law enforcement was notified of the discovery, and further investigation revealed that there could be more materials that had not been surrendered. As a result, a criminal investigation was launched.
In May 2022, a subpoena was issued by a federal grand jury for extra classified documents. A few weeks after the subpoena was issued, the DOJ paid a visit to Mar-a-Lago and Trump’s legal team signed a statement in writing stating that all classified material had been given back. During the summertime, investigators interviewed members of Trump’s staff and also requested surveillance footage from the property.