how many impeachments? bogus investugations? tax harrassment? homes raided. spied on by the fbi?
WTH is going on with Presidents and classified docs?
- Thread starter lawpoke87
- Start date
This kind of stuff has been going on since at least Nixon, I'm betting. Probably longer, as far as taken to a non SCIF standards place, being mixed in with other documents, etc.
So you think Biden and Trump should be in jail? Why didn't you mention that when it was Trump who was the only one culpable.
Once again, why didn't you mention that when it was just Trump's ass on the line.
This will be an absolute sh*t storm if true.
amp.washingtontimes.com
Republicans demand to know if Hunter Biden lived at Delaware home where classified docs were found
Republicans on the House Oversight Committee on Friday demanded answers about whether President Biden’s son Hunter was living at and conducting business deals at his father’s Wilmington, Delaware, home while classified files were there.
amp.washingtontimes.com
No need to. We weren’t having an absurd discussion that someone is not guilty because the documents were in his locked garage that countless people have access to.
Thanks for evading the subject. I get tired of people refusing to blame their own party, but coming out swinging when it is the other party's fault. The main issue here, if you are going to follow the letter of the law, is they both should be in jail. That's not going to happen. If so, many presidents would be in jail, Bush, Carter, and Obama included.
But there is provable intent on Trump. Much less provable against Biden. Biden volunteered these actions on the documents found by his own lawyers. Trump defied repeated requests and made a search warrant necessary. That is the main difference.
1). Nothing. I say should be interpreted as defended Trump. I’ve stated numerous times his actions should preclude him from running for office again
2). There are a few other differences btw.
Biden has apparently had possession of classified documents in multiple locations for the past 6 years
One of those locations it appears a drug addict with foreign ties may have lived.
Biden went on national television and asked how anyone could be so irresponsible as to have possession of classified materials….while he had possession of classified materials.
2). There are a few other differences btw.
Biden has apparently had possession of classified documents in multiple locations for the past 6 years
One of those locations it appears a drug addict with foreign ties may have lived.
Biden went on national television and asked how anyone could be so irresponsible as to have possession of classified materials….while he had possession of classified materials.
This is so true. Biggest reason I don’t care for politics.
I get tired of people refusing to blame their own party, but coming out swinging when it is the other party's fault. The main issue here, if you are going to follow the letter of the law, is they both should be in jail. That's not going to happen. If so, many presidents would be in jail, Bush, Carter, and Obama included.
I get tired of people refusing to blame their own party, but coming out swinging when it is the other party's fault. The main issue here, if you are going to follow the letter of the law, is they both should be in jail. That's not going to happen. If so, many presidents would be in jail, Bush, Carter, and Obama included.
a.)So. Trump had them at maralago for close to four years probably, with no need of them staying there, and not even locked up. You don't think he started hording them during the last few months in office do you? He has been doing this since the beginning of his presidency.
b.)Trump was likely showing documents beyond Kushner's low clearance level from the start. He(Kushner) had personal and family business with the Chinese. Greed is just as dangerous as a drug problem. We have no evidence that either is true at the moment.(Kushner or Hunter)
c) I already said this was a bad look for Biden. But it essentially plays no part in who is going to get punished and how.
I have no idea how long either Trump or Biden had them. Biden was obviously longer but the extent remains unknown.
No clue who were shown any of these documents. I wouldn’t exclude Hunter from the greed aspect either btw. He made millions from overseas actors. I qualified my statement “if Hunter lived there”. There appears to be documentation he may have but I don’t believe anyone should be jumping to those conclusions just yet. That said, a drug addict with unsupervised access to classified material with questionable foreign contacts could be problematic for whomever allowed such access. At that point you would have the illegal taking of classified docs plus allowing someone with that background free access to the same. Hopefully that didn’t occur.
I wanted Trump to be immediately barred from ever holding public office again. If the above scenario is true what shall we do with Joe?
Let’s wait and see what the facts are before we assume the White House press office is telling the full truth. I suspect not.
Part right, I think.
If this had been found in March of 2017 I doubt we'd ever have heard a word about it. Similarly, if Trump let the Archives take what they wanted from Mar-a-Lago as soon as they asked the first time, we'd probably never have known about that either.
When Trump left office and stonewalled the National Archives and tried to keep things when the Archives knew he still had stuff, he forced it into a huge issue. And that is a huge issue, all of his own stupid stubborn making.
Biden probably was a lot more cooperative after he left office in 2016, but apparently was ridiculously sloppy. It's really alarming that it took nearly 6 years to find this stuff. Not the kind of stuff you put in boxes that don't get looked at for 6 years. I think an investigation into how and why it happened is absolutely warranted, and I hate that either of them have been this irresponsible.
As an example of how mishandling classified documents isn't by itself a crime, I'll give an example that happened recently in my office building. A guy was hand carrying some highly sensitive classified documents in the lobby of our secure building. He had the appropriate coversheets and everything so that passers-by with no need to know would not see the documents. Nothing wrong so far.
Then, a fire alarm went off. Not really knowing what to do, he took them outside with him into an area open to the public. Still had the coversheets on and everything so nobody could see. But that is very much against the rules and is considered mishandling of classified documents. In the event of an emergency, he's not required to secure the documents in a safe before evacuating, but he can't take them with him. Leaving them on a coffee table in the secured lobby would have been the correct thing to do, and then pick them up on the way back in. Counterintuitive, but that's what you are supposed to do.
He immediately reported to security that he had them, and as soon as the area was deemed safe, he took them back in and put them in the appropriate safe.
He was not charged and still has his clearance, even though the letter of the law was broken. It was clearly a simple mistake made in a highly unusual situation.
Bottom line, intent matters more than anything else.
I don't.
Great, I don't think either should run again. Trump for obvious reasons. Biden, mainly for the reason that I think his senility/dementia will be much worse by the end of this term, and I don't want him in there for the second. Make them both an example by punishing them against being able to run again. Send Trump to jail for his intentional attempt to keep the documents, and forced search warrant to get them back.(if we even have all of them)
Bring on the election!
If Biden rented Hunter a house with classified material present I think there has to be more punishment than you can’t run again in two years. If Hunter didn’t have unsupervised access then I’m good with the you can’t run again line.
You’ll get no argument from me that family members meddling in foreign affairs is bad public policy. But you don’t get to make up facts. Kushner had a provisional interim Top Secret/SCI clearance when he joined the White House. That’s normal and routine. And it’s the highest clearance level you can obtain. What he lacked was endorsements on the SCI side too technical to really merit discussion. He did have Yankee White which is basically everyone with a clearance with access to the President. Air Force One pilots, the Chef, those in and out of the Oval. While his application was waiting full adjudication, there were some security lapses with other personnel, both political and career, inside the White House. As a result, Generally Kelly downgraded a large number of persons by job title but not function. That caused Kushner to get lowered to Secret, something TSA bag screeners with felony convictions get. The President ordered his clearances restored which they all eventually were, minus certain SCI caveats for things like the President’s daily brief and other IC documents because of concern by those agencies that his foreign business dealings were impermissible entanglements. Even the President does not have unfettered access to all SCI caveats (and the info that is available within those compartments. He might know we are working on hypersonic aircraft but he won’t have access to plans and details etc) and so such firewalling by the CIA was routine in nature. He simply didn’t need to know what we are doing in Chad or Mali or Indonesia that morning. Or what people were saying behind Xi’s back. So he didn’t get to know. I lost track of this story in 2019, so if that changed later, my bad. But the hubbub about his clearance is something that comes up every admin and we can discuss with every senior political official with no experience getting such access. Starting with Ben Rhodes and Karl Rove.
And you are right, the records handling problem is a problem for every admin. They are tired, overworked and working in what they imagine is a secure facility. So they get sloppy. And many are politically skeptical of the military and IC and have contempt for their caution or have the ego to think that the rules don’t apply to them.
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I had forgotten about the clearances being restored.
I don't think that was appropriate, but had forgotten that fact, until remembering it as I read you outlining it.
Don’t get hung up on intent. It does not matter with this crime.
As for what Trump intended. I have no idea. Or interest in defending what apparently happened here. What I suspect happened, which is only discussed in a glancing fashion in a couple of places, is that he took stuff he wanted to keep where he clearly had performed well and he wanted a say on how those issues were covered in his museum. He has supposedly made public comments about the political bias in the national archives and how the Nixon and Reagan libraries spent a large part of those museums discussing Watergate and Iran/Contra and not discussing things like opening up China and ending the Cold War. The Nixon library once his family ceded control of it changed considerably. So the theory goes, he was using those records in negotiations for concessions on how he would be portrayed in the museum. Which is childish but understandable. And fits his know behavior pattern concerning public perception of him. How he did it was likely a now unprovable crime.
When I mentioned intent earlier, I didn't mean "end" intent. Like, it doesn't matter if Trump wanted to sell stuff to North Korea or if he just wanted souvenirs for his museum. Either is intent to mishandle classified docs.
What matters is if you meant to take the documents or divulge the information, for whatever purpose.
On that, Trump is in hot water. Biden probably less so from a criminal perspective, but it reflects really poorly on his professionalism that it took 6 years to uncover this stuff and it was in his friggin' garage. It's negligent to a really alarming degree.
One little juicy tidbit that isn’t being discussed that is likely spin is all this emphasis on the former aides and current staff fully cooperating with authorities. Clearly they want to avoid the optics of a raid, but also is the possibility of the Hunter prosecutors seeking investigative warrants for those locations, that info leaking and trickling up, so they are cleaning out the closets before the FBI guys discover those documents. The train leaves the station if the discovery happens that way. And somebody leaking all of that to CBS to cover themselves.
I believe that is part of it. But I think there are more nefarious intents also on his mind. Getting himself out of a bind as far as debt goes, and making more money, those are things that lead him to keeping some of those documents. These are reasons to put him in jail. And if he wants to improve his legacy using those documents as bargaining chips, that should put him in jail as well. You can't keep top secret documents for personal gain, President or not.
Intent should determine the punishment, not the guilt.
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The criminal statute in question does not contemplate intent, even though Comey wrote that element into the statute for Clinton now complicating prosecutions unnecessarily probably for decades. The statute says “intentionally or with gross negligence” which means to lawyers, anything above gross negligence which means actions without intent where an ordinary person would act reasonably under the circumstances.
In both instances, reasonable people don’t withhold classified document after formal demand, or transport/store them unsecured for years.
Example: I go into the SCIF i work in each day and I have two identical briefcases. One I use as a gym bag to carry my swim trunks to the lockerroom inside the Top Secret gymnasium in the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency or wherever I work. Another I use to take unclass stuff home with me. I put some docs inside what I think is my gym briefcase to drop off the docs to my colleague later that day when I walk that way to the pool. But I mistakenly put the docs in my unclass bag which unknown to me contain control protocols that will alert security authorities to their removal once outside a secured area. I get stoped in the parking lot at lunch where I look into my bag and find my fatal mistake. I’m going to have employment problems and will likely get charged. It’s negligent for me to have two bags like that because it’s foreseeable that confusion could happen. It’s gross negligence to leave an area without checking your bag. But I never intended to compromise the docs and they in fact were not compromised. That might weigh in sentencing for sure, and might weigh a little in whether I get charged, but if you work at the level of the White House, it will not weigh at all.
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Agree that gross negligence is probably good enough. Trump is definitely there with intention, Biden may very well be there on gross negligence, but we'll need an investigation and some more details to really know what happened and why.
All I really meant to point out was that mistakes are "okay" legally speaking, if they are honest, as in my example where someone walked out in public with an SRD document outside a lock bag during a fire alarm. If Trump had returned the documents and made a thorough search as soon as he was asked, there would be no issue here. Similarly, if Biden had found these things during an inventory a couple months after leaving office and returned them then, there would be absolutely no issue here.
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I'm not sure if your example would rise you getting charged. Probably having a problem with your clearance and employment. But that's where "gross negligence" gets tricky. Different people will have different ideas on what is reasonable and what is negligent. Nobody thinks that having TS/SCI docs in your gym bag is okay, and it certainly looks really bad for you if you are caught that way. But if you explain what happened and there are no other red flags or past infractions, nothing comes up on a search of your home, and it is verified that you do for some reason have two identical looking bags and a history of using them in the manner described, I highly doubt they prosecute. You'd just be told that you were incredibly stupid and probably lose your SCI, maybe your whole clearance.
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That’s an actual case with the facts slightly changed for demonstration purposes. He went to prison. Then went to work in the North Tower doing corporate security …
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Fair enough.
My example is real as well, and absolutely nothing happened. There's a fine line somewhere between "honest mistake" and "negligence" that can be rather muddy at times, and inconsistently applied. Because for any mistake, you can go back and find some reason why it never should have happened and say it was negligent.
If there’s a difference in your example and mine and the White House example it’s the nature of the possible compromise. An SRD document likely isn’t compromising human or signals intelligence capability. It’s a big deal and a bad habit and it makes it difficult to stop others from doing the same to sell it to the Chinese. Walking out of the White House or a SCIF with a doc that could have put human sources at risk, end decades of effort to establish a gathering capability, reveals diplomatic processes or how we map foreign military bases would get you charged. It’s just too risky and it’s a working environment where mistakes cannot be tolerated.
No, we don't usually deal with humint or sigint. Mostly S, some TS, but the big thing is around here is RD, which is the strongest possible category and must be treated like TS. It can include nuclear weapons designs. I am not sure what exactly what was in the document brought out of the building, or what other caveats there might have been, but CNWDI or NOFORN is common as well.
It’s a federal crime to remove from secured areas nearly all of the documents we are discussing. What you are describing simply doesn’t happen. Unless you tell an aide to go into a secured area, disable security controls, upload the document from a secured server onto an unsecured server, then have that person email it to you so god knows who has a copy forever. You know something “extremely careless” but not criminally negligent.
Then why is it that we at least hear about Presidents & VP's looking at top secret document's away from the White House when they are not 'on campus' from time to time. I would assume that happens to Generals occasionally, and members of Congress less occasionally. My assumptions are probably out of ignorance outside of the President & Vice President. Maybe hollywood has influenced me on the Generals & Congressional members.
Presidents and some cabinet members, including the Vice President, have secured areas, called SCIFs or Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities built in their homes or even the homes of relatives. Parts of Marine One and Air Force One are secured. They frequently have SCIFS built at considerable expense where they vacation. Which often explains why they vacation in the same place repeatedly. In some cases on foreign trips, SCIFS are built in hotels sometimes years in advance of the visit when an embassy or DHS SCIF is not available. In all cases, including the President, it would be unusual for a political appointee to be in these areas without an IC observing. Family members would never be allowed in these areas. There are protocols for transporting classed documents but they don’t authorize viewing SCI material outside a SCIF. That’s the whole reason for designating information SCI.
And though slips do occur, and idiots talk to their wives, or even talk about it in the middle of the 1960 TV debate to score points that Nixon can’t respond to, then sheepishly lie that they forgot the info was classified, most of these people are patriots and are very careful what they discuss. In fact, it’s a crime for them to discuss topics that are classed they are briefed on even if the subject and the info exchanged in the conversation are open source like the news. So the idea that General Mattis goes home and talks with his mom about that day’s secrets just doesn’t happen. Most of the time, if they have been briefed correctly and are following the rules, they can’t even answer basic questions about what their wife saw on the news, if they have been read in on classed info concerning the topic. Wife: “Honey, what’s this I hear about some country launching missiles over Japan? Your Mom is on the phone and wants to know which country is shooting them off ” General who just came out of a classified briefing knowing full well CNN has been talking about North Korea shooting off a missile over Tokyo for the last six hours “I’m sorry, honey I can’t answer that.”
That’s what made the Clinton thing so infuriating to some people in the IC. She couldn’t be bothered to follow the rules and go into the SCIF. Despite ridiculous expense and carefully tested methods. Instead, she sent others in to download the material and email it to her. She belongs in prison and the only conceivable reason she wasn’t charged presumably is because everyone thought she would be President in a few weeks. And she nearly was, whereupon she would have presumably engaged in the same behavior, this time with secrets a Secretary of State isn’t allowed to see. Funny how our system works right in the end.
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Members of Congress don't actually have clearances by and large, and they would certainly never have sensitive documents like that at home.
The ones that need it as a part of their job, like on the intelligence committees and such do get them, but your average Congresscritter is uncleared.
I wouldn't know for sure, but I would imagine Air Force One is considered secure enough for TS transport if not open discussion. And I doubt any Presidents are taking this stuff into random hotel rooms while travelling. That would be crazy. Taking work with them on the plane and having some secure area nearby that they can work on it probably happens fairly regularly though.
A few very important people have been able to get SCIFs built as a part of a residence from what I've heard, but you have to be a pretty big fish.
Edit, having read HuffyCane's post above:
Taking work into a hotel room while traveling would be crazy IF it hadn't had a room converted to a SCIF over the course of the previous year or so. I meant just into a regular room.
I wasn't referring to Mattis or anybody else going home to discuss it with anybody, I was referring to it being in an area she(his mom) could get to it if she really wanted to. But if scifs are commonly close by to almost any area at home, in hotel, at vacation spot, etc where documents are taken, then that would eliminate easy access by a family member.
Makes me wonder why he(Biden) didn't have a scif in his Delaware home, or Trump at Mar a Lago especially. Trump should definitely have had one at Mar a Lago while in office, considering how much work was supposedly happening there. But I doubt Trump would have abided by keeping those documents in a scif even if it was only down the hall.
On a side note, I wonder if there was anybody in Biden's Think Tank that had security clearance of any sort. Wouldn't answer most of the questions surrounding the documents being their and it's legality. But it might provide some insight as to some of the reasoning of why they were there.
A SCIF was constructed at Mar-a-lago. Biden had three as VP, iirc. They were dismantled upon their leaving office. Not only is the construction of these classified, but the materials are pricey. They were repurposed elsewhere. Not just to protect the secrets of how they are built but to save money. I have been in private homes in Texas, California and Florida that used to contain SCIFs. It requires substantial modifications to the homes. The deconstructing of these facilities underscores the culpability here. They knew when the SCIF was taken out, they should have been certain nothing marked classed remained.
The cool ones are the portable ones now. It usually flies in the second plane that is identical to Air Force One that carries the Beast and all the luggage and support folks.
Maybe Trump did keep them in the scif, just so he could feel 'important' as he entered it. I'll bet late at night he entered the scif alone a couple of times, for an ego boost.
The entrance was constructed within view of the Ballroom. Many speculate for just the reason you suggest. So guests eating dinner would see him enter and ask the staff what he was doing. I don’t know.Maybe Trump did keep them in the scif, just so he could feel 'important' as he entered it. I'll bet late at night he entered the scif alone a couple of times, for an ego boost.
I do know that there isn’t anything special in most of them. It typically looks like normal office space with some specialized communications attachments to normal computer terminals and teleconferencing facilities. It usually needs a coat of paint, smells like BO and hasn’t had a decent janitor in awhile since Top Secret janitors are tough to employ, it doesn’t get cleaned professionally often, it’s cleaned by the users who just want to go home. No windows. No plants. No joy. Folks that work in them all day their entire career all deserve medals.
Sort of.
That pesky Constitution thing butts in and darn if it doesn’t work well. The whole separation of powers thing and budget authority problem.
Congress writes the laws and pays the bills for the Intelligence Community.
So those laws say that Members of Congress by the mere virtue of holding office are fit to receive information without being cleared. At what level and when they are “need to know” is a debate that goes back to the late 40s and involved guys like a Senator from Mass who wanted info on missiles a week before his televised Presidential debate. And got the briefing and leaked it intentionally on his way to becoming one of our most beloved Presidents.
So they do not need a clearance, just like the President, but who decides who has need to know can vary based on who you ask and the issue. Congress always says they decide. And the leadership controls that. The agencies sometimes say they decide, but they are obviously very careful what they give out no matter what and how because some of our worst breaches have happened through Congress.
The Congressman themselves are often clueless on issues and rely on staff. The staff must all be cleared and few are. They don’t get interim clearances and it’s usually one or two per member at most and few of those can view SCI material. Conversely, there’s probably 4500 SCI authorizations amongst the 1.5 million or so TS clearances in the executive branch maybe more. I don’t know. Because so few staffers are cleared the members work cooperatively with the agencies and rely upon them for full briefings in decision making. The Intel Committees especially. The problem with this system is a lot of Congress types are veterans and some worked in the military industrial complex. So they assume the IC works the same way and it’s absolutely doesn’t. And that leads to friction.
You saw that played out dramatically in Charlie Wilson’s War when Charlie asks for a briefing from a CIA field operator in Pakistan and is initially told he can’t be told the information. And Charlie pushes right past him and says he’s entitled to the briefing. And in theory, he was, as House Intel Approps Subcommittee Chair.
The reality is that maybe 100 members of Congress need access to classified info, they get it, and the others are too busy getting re-elected to care and most don’t want the hassle. They want to focus on bringing home the bacon and looking good on TV. And anything happening in a SCIF isn’t doing either, unless you are John McCain.
It will be interesting if the Dems win back the house and they attempt to strip members they say shouldn’t be presumptively cleared to receive info due to J6.
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I was glad to see McCarthy not give in on a couple of committee appts that the opposition in the Republican party wanted. There would have been clearances given to those two that could have been dangerous. It would have been like giving Omar or Cortez those appt.
