Special Counsel Jack Smith and his team of prosecutors have reportedly been given some explosive information by an aide to Donald Trump concerning the former president’s possible indictment for inappropriately obtaining classified documents.
“One of former President Donald Trump’s long-time assistants told federal investigators that Trump repeatedly wrote to-do lists for her on documents from the White House that were marked classified, according to sources familiar with her statements,” ABC News reported on Monday.
As it was described to the network, “the aide, Molly Michael, told investigators that — more than once — she received requests or taskings from Trump that were written on the back of notecards, and she later recognized those notecards as sensitive White House materials — with visible classification markings — used to brief Trump while he was still in office about phone calls with foreign leaders or other international-related matters,” the report continued.
On August 8, 2022, the FBI conducted a search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate and found notecards containing classification markings. Sources close to Michael told investigators that these materials had not been taken by the FBI.
When Michael returned to her office space at Mar-a-Lago the next day to organize her belongings, she noticed the documents underneath a drawer organizer.
She then handed them over to law enforcement on that same day, according to ABC News.
Michael reportedly told federal investigators that she had become anxious about the previous president’s reaction to requests from the National Archives for the return of all government papers he was storing at Mar-a-Lago.
She declared that Trump’s statements were easy to refute, according to the sources.
Furthermore, it is alleged that when Trump found out that the FBI wanted to interrogate his assistant, he informed her: “You don’t know anything about the boxes.”
ABC News noted, adding:
Trump pleaded not guilty in June to 37 criminal counts related to his handling of classified materials, after prosecutors said he repeatedly refused to return hundreds of documents containing classified information ranging from U.S. nuclear secrets to the nation’s defense capabilities, and took steps to thwart the government’s efforts to get the documents back. Trump has denied all charges and denounced the probe as a political witch hunt.
As ABC News previously reported, Michael is believed to be the person identified in special counsel Jack Smith’s indictment as “Trump Employee 2,” described in the indictment as someone who handled many of Trump’s White House-era boxes at Mar-a-Lago and who provided Trump with photos of those boxes that were then included in the indictment.
A spokesperson for the former president said that what sources allegedly told ABC News — via what the spokesperson called “illegal leaks” — did not have “proper context and relevant information.”
The spokesperson also said: “President Trump did nothing wrong, has always insisted on truth and transparency, and acted in a proper manner, according to the law.”
Smith’s team submitted a substantial court document at the end of last month detailing an update on Trump’s confidential documents matter.
The document highlighted that the grand jury in Washington D.C. completed its work the prior week.
“The disclosure of the grand jury’s completion on Aug. 17 was tucked into a footnote of a larger filing Smith’s lawyers submitted to the federal judge in South Florida who is now overseeing the indictment against the former president and co-defendants Walt Nauta and Carlos de Oliveira,” The Messenger reported.
Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee and the federal judge who is managing the case, has asked Smith why a grand jury in DC was used in the classified documents case instead of one that was assembled in South Florida, which falls under her district.
ICYMI: Gen. Mark Milley admits he ‘never received an illegal order’ from Trump
