On August 8, 2022, Donald Trump was in possession of classified documents he had removed from the White House when FBI agents executed a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago. Team Trump insisted that his vast presidential powers made the entire scandal moot, though, claiming days after the search that he had a “standing order” during his presidency that the documents were “deemed to be declassified the moment he removed them” from the Oval Office. There is no evidence that this “standing order” actually existed, and Trump’s attorneys avoided saying anything about it in court.
Within a few weeks, the former president offered an inventive new twist on the argument. In a September 2022 interview with Sean Hannity, Trump explained he may not have any physical proof of his automatic declassification process because “if you’re the president of the United States, you can declassify just by saying ‘it’s declassified,’ even by thinking about it.”
Even for Trump, this assertion of magical mental-declassification powers was bold. It was so bold, it seems, that even Trump himself didn’t believe it in July 2021. On Wednesday, CNN reported that federal prosecutors investigating Trump’s handling of sensitive documents have obtained a recording of Trump talking about having a classified military document in his possession:
The recording indicates Trump understood he retained classified material after leaving the White House, according to multiple sources familiar with the investigation. On the recording, Trump’s comments suggest he would like to share the information but he’s aware of limitations on his ability post-presidency to declassify records, two of the sources said.
Journalists have not heard the tape, but multiple sources said it’s an “important” piece of evidence in Special Counsel Jack Smith’s probe, per CNN:
Prosecutors have asked witnesses about the recording and the document before a federal grand jury. The episode has generated enough interest for investigators to have questioned Gen. Mark Milley, one of the highest-ranking Trump-era national security officials, about the incident.
The recording was made during a meeting between Trump and people helping his former chief of staff Mark Meadows write his memoir. (Meadows did not attend the meeting himself.) According to the New York Times, one of two Trump aides at the meeting, Margo Martin, “routinely taped the interviews he gave for books being written about him that year.” (It’s the latest of Trump’s repeated issues with audio recordings.)
Meadows’ book includes a passage that describes the Trump meeting, as the Washington Post reports:
“The boss leans back in his chair, dressed in a sport coat and a crisp white shirt that’s open at the neck. He looks at least twenty pounds lighter than he was in office,” Meadows’s book says. “The president recalls a four-page report typed up by Mark Milley himself. It contains the general’s own plan to attack Iran, deploying massive numbers of troops, something he urged President Trump to do more than once during his presidency. President Trump denied those requests every time.”
It seems Trump may have been confused about what he had in his possession. CNN was told that the document wasn’t actually produced by Milley. And former military officials told the Post that Milley never advocated for attacking Iran, but the Pentagon would outline various options for responding to foreign adversaries with the pros and cons.
So don’t stress about Trump casually discussing a document that may have outlined plans for starting a war. The point here is that Trump getting caught on tape lamenting his lack of post-presidential declassification powers severely undercuts the arguments he was making publicly just a year later. Though he could argue that, much like those of Santa Claus, presidents’ magical mental powers only work when you believe.
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