Trump is 'one step closer to jail' after 'incriminating and idiotic' Fox News interview: Morning JoeMSNBC's Joe Scarborough expressed astonishment at Donald Trump's "incoherent" interview on Fox News.
The former president sat down with broadcaster Bret Baier, who challenged him to explain why he had not returned classified materials to the National Archives until the FBI seized them, and the "Morning Joe" host said Trump didn't do himself any favors by insisting he had been too "busy" to sort through the tranche to separate out his golf attire and other personal items.
"Yeah, none of that is going to hold up in court," Scarborough said. "It was incoherent. I must say, incoherent, incriminating and stupid. I say that by saying Donald Trump actually wants people to believe that in his transcript, he is looking at a document and telling an aide, 'I can't declassify this now, I could have when I was president of the United States, but I can't now.' Later in the interview, why, in 2022 -- he lost the election in 2020, in 2022, why did he hide the documents? Because he had golf shirts, clothing, pants and shoes inside cases with nuclear information, war plans against Iran, and some of America's greatest vulnerabilities, all in there with Mar-a-Lago golf shirts."
The ex-president always seems to be held to a different standard legally, Scarborough said, pointing to a Washington Postreport that showed the FBI resisted investigating his role in the Jan. 6 insurrection, while Trump complains that he is being treated unfairly.
"There is a double standard," he said. "There's one standard that every government official is held to, who would immediately be, you know, arrested, then there's the standard they held Donald Trump to. Dragged their feet for over a year, and the FBI dragging their feet, not even wanting to get these documents on nuclear secrets, not even wanting to go in to see all the boxes that he had, and Donald Trump saying, 'Oh, it's worse for me, this has never happened before.' Of course, it never happened because, again, he lost in 2020. In 2021, he is still lying. In 2022, he is still lying about having some of the most government secrets."
"Any member of Congress, from Ted Cruz to Bernie Sanders, that got briefed and took three documents -- not all these boxes, not thousands -- but took three classified documents would get a call the next day from the FBI or they'd show up in their offices," Scarborough continued. "It'd be immediate. I was talking to a CIA analyst over the weekend who said if he mishandled one document, though he was a career CIA guy, he would lose his job that day. Might not get arrested for one, but they'd be there knocking on his door the next day. They give Trump years, year and a half, he keeps ignoring them. Now he goes on TV."
"We've sort of summarized Donald Trump's interview with Bret Baier last night as incoherent, incriminating and idiotic on so many levels," Scarborough concluded. "Talk about how he keeps putting himself one step closer to jail every time he does one of these rambling interviews."
Trump should cop a plea if he were a 'normal defendant' -- but he's 'every lawyer's nightmare': legal analyst
Donald Trump's lawyers might want to discuss a plea agreement with the former president after he handed prosecutors "powerful evidence" in an interview on Fox News, but it's far from guaranteed that he would accept the terms.
The former president defended his possession of classified materials and refusal to return them to government custody, and former U.S. attorney Barbara McQuade told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" that his comments to broadcaster Bret Baier could help prosecutors prove one of the most difficult element in the crimes for which Trump has been indicted.
"I think it's very powerful evidence," McQuade said. "I think the hardest thing to prove in most cases, but especially a case like this, is willfulness. For most crimes, ignorance of the law is no defense, but for certain crimes, including mishandling classified information, there is an additional level of willfulness that is proving what you did was illegal and you knew it was illegal. So that little clip where Donald Trump explains about his understanding that he can no longer declassify documents after he leaves the White House says he understands what it means to handle classified documents. He knows that these are regulated by certain laws. For him to say at trial, if there were to be some defense that the government has failed to prove the requisite intent, they'll play this tape. I think a jury will find beyond a reasonable doubt that he absolutely knew what he was doing was illegal."
Trump's attorneys can't be happy with his decision to give the interview or the statements he made, and McQuade said they should consider resigning from the case.
"You have a client who won't listen to you, which is every lawyer's nightmare," she said. "Maybe you dissect it for him and explain to him in very gory detail exactly how harmful that was. These are the elements of the offense, this is what government will have to prove at trial. When you say these things, this is evidence that they will play in court. Perhaps that is one way."
"I think any normal defendant, any normal lawyer would absolutely be talking about a plea," McQuade added. "I can't imagine the government is going to agree to the kind of conditions that Donald Trump would want in exchange. They are going to want prison time because anybody else would get prison time or they'll want, which the Justice Department permits, an agreement not to seek higher office. He's just not going to agree to those kinds of things. Maybe as we get closer to the date and he realizes that serious prison time is at stake, those things may look far more attractive than they do now."
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