Harvard law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz says Trump's indictment doesn't pass the Nixon test.
"There's not enough to justify this," Dershowitz said Friday during an appearance on Newsmax's "The Record With Greta Van Susteren."
"It doesn't meet what I call the Richard Nixon standard, which was very clear obstruction of justice, destroying evidence, paying bribes. This is too close a case to bring against the man running for president, against the incumbent president.
"The only exception to that was two paragraphs and we're going to have to hear an exception from Trump's lawyers or from Trump as to how we can justify having shown to somebody who doesn't have security clearance allegedly some information about a plan to attack Iran. He may claim he didn't show it to them, just kind of waved it in front of them as part of bragging but that's something that will have to be explained," he added.
Nixon was never formally charged with a crime although a grand jury planned to charge him with bribery, conspiracy, obstruction of justice, and obstruction of a criminal investigation related to a break-in at the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee in 1972.
As Congress prepared to impeach him, Nixon announced his resignation on Aug. 8, 1974.
Former President Donald Trump on Thursday was indicted for allegedly mishandling classified documents at his Florida estate.
The prosecution marks the first time in U.S. history that a former president faces criminal charges by the federal government he once oversaw. He faces the possibility of prison if convicted.
Dershowitz told Newsmax the indictment could be potentially serious on two charges.
"The material about simply possessing classified material is not a damning argument, we knew it was coming," he said.
"There are two damning paragraphs, just two: paragraph 34 and paragraph 35 where they have tape recordings of the former president basically acknowledging that some of the papers that he possessed and showed to a writer. ... When you have a tape in the voice of the defendant himself it's hard to dispute, so I think this is a serious indictment on these two charges. Everything else I think was exactly what we expected."
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