The secret military plan that former President Donald Trump appears in a leaked audio recording to boast about keeping after he left office is not one of the documents included in his federal indictment, according to a new report.
The Defense Department memo on Iran was not one of those Trump is accused of willfully retaining under the 31 counts in special counsel Jack Smith's indictment under the Espionage Act of 1917,
CBS News reports citing an unnamed source.
The 37-count indictment against Trump includes 31 counts of willful retention of national defense information without direct references to the exact subject matter in the documents, but the source told CBS the Iran memo alluded to by Trump in the leaked audio is not even alleged to be willful retained unlawfully by Smith's indictment.
"This is why I always caution to wait, just little while, before rushing to judgment on matters reported by the media or announced by the government," legal expert Mark Levin tweeted in response to the CBS report.
The media, he added, "have been using CNN's receipt of an audio allegedly of Trump discussing Iran, which is mentioned in the charging document against Trump, but apparently is not actually charged against Trump — or something like that. This is at a minimum very curious."
The purported document might not ever been received by the government, sources told CBS News.
But Smith referenced the content of the leaked audio tapes in the indictment, describing allegations Trump is on tape allegedly sharing national defense information to someone without proper security clearance.
"It is like highly confidential, secret," Trump says in the leaked audio tape, according to myriad reports. "This is secret information. Look, look at this.
"See, as president I could have declassified, but now I can't, you know.
"Isn't that interesting?"
Trump and his backers said the audio can be exonerating.
"What did I say wrong in those recordings?" Trump said in Concord, New Hampshire, on Tuesday. "I didn't even see the recording. All I know is I did nothing wrong. We had a lot of papers, a lot of papers stacked up. In fact, you could hear the rustle of the paper. And nobody said I did anything wrong.
"Other than the fake news, which, of course, is Fox, too."
Trump attorney Alina Habba condemned the "political demonstration of corruption" on Newsmax's "Rob Schmitt Tonight," saying the indictment and the complicit media are waging an election meddling campaign to try to stop Trump before 2024.
"They take cuts and pieces, just like the indictment," Habba told host Rob Schmitt on Tuesday night. "They put it together and they make the American people believe the story, like la la land, that they create.
"It's not in fact. There's no two sides. It's just one side. It's pieces."
Habba noted Trump saying "off the record" in the audio clip shows the leak came from the Justice Department, because that writer would not have violated that trust.
"They wouldn't do that," Habba said. "There has to be some evidence that came from the DOJ. Why? Because they're losing.
"They're losing in the polls. They're losing in the media, and they're losing this case."
Levin expressed outrage about the weaponization of justice and the complicity of the media.
"We know nothing about the context of the audio," Levin tweeted Tuesday. "Nothing. We are fed exactly two minutes via CNN, a favorite state-run media outlet. We know no more or no less than they tell us.
"And the multiple felonies committed by the regime in leaking the tape will be ignored. Felonies committed in pursuit of Trump are no longer felonies. The 'justice system' is dead. The Democrat Party owns the federal government."