Former President Donald Trump's lawyer sparred with NBC's Chuck Todd over the alleged mishandling of classified documents and the Department of Justice's pursuit of an obstruction angle that "just isn't there."
Speaking on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday, Jim Trusty, Trump's lawyer, got into a disagreement over the facts of what constituted a breach of the Presidential Records Act and the circumstances surrounding Trump's cooperation with the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).
As the interview began, Trusty argued that Trump was innocent regarding the DOJ's "politicized" investigation and his client's handling of 300 classified documents discovered at his Mar-a-Lago home during a raid on Aug. 8.
"They don't respect any privilege that President Trump holds and is desperately trying to find an obstruction angle that just isn't there," Trusty told Todd. "This has rotten underpinning in terms of bureaucrats being politicized, followed up by an all too eager DOJ to criminalize something that's not a crime."
Trusty later in the interview pointed out that while the DOJ is conducting a criminal investigation, "under the Presidential Records Act" — which Trump maintains gives him the "right" to possess such documents — this "is a noncriminal statute."
At one point, Todd pushed back, alluding to President Joe Biden's handling of documents, stating, "Is your defense that, 'Hey, we think other people broke the law. So let us break the law?'"
"No. Of course not. Of course not." Trusty replied.
"I mean, I just think," Todd said, "that doesn't seem to be a good defense."
"Chuck," Trusty replied, "the point of it is not to say that somebody else broke the law and we did, too; it's OK. It's to point out that the common denominator, whether you're talking about New York, Georgia, or DOJ, is differential treatment for President Trump than anybody in history."
Trump's lawyer maintained that under the Presidential Records Act, no president or vice president should be prosecuted criminally. However, as a sidebar, Trusty alluded that there were top secret government documents about Ukraine found at the Penn Biden Center on Nov. 2 as well as nearly 1,850 boxes of Biden's Senate papers given to his alma mater, the University of Delaware.
"And to sit there and whitewash Delaware and to wonder aloud about 1,800 boxes that are in the Delaware University that Biden put there, I mean, we are shut out from information about a much more egregious and intentional violation of the Presidential Records Act by Joe Biden, and perhaps, even having documents that relate to Ukraine of all places. That's pretty scary stuff," Trusty said.
"Now, I'm not saying anybody should be criminally prosecuted if you're a president or a vice president for having some of these documents in your possession or having people transport them to your home."
Journalist Max Blumenthal reported on Twitter: "When classified docs on Ukraine were moved to Penn Biden Center, it was headed by [Michael Carpenter]. Carpenter went on to the Burisma-funded Atlantic Council, and is now U.S. ambassador to the OSCE [Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe]. He's at the center of a vast neocon patronage network hellbent on war with Russia."
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