A 37-count criminal indictment against Donald Trump for retaining classified government records and conspiring to prevent their return to U.S. officials was unsealed Friday.
The charging document was made public a day after the former president was indicted by a grand jury in U.S. District Court in Miami.
Among other allegations, the indictment says that Trump showed classified documents to other people in the summer of 2021, after leaving office.
Follow our live coverage of Donald Trump’s indictment in the classified documents case.
One of those documents was a “plan of attack” that he said was prepared by the Pentagon, while the other was a classified map related to a military operation, the indictment alleges.
Also charged in the indictment was Trump’s valet, Walter Nauta, who faces several of the same charges as his boss, with whom he allegedly conspired to keep classified records and hide them from a federal grand jury.
The FBI raid of Trump’s Florida home last August discovered hundreds of classified documents, which he had failed to turn over to U.S. officials despite months of efforts to recover them.
Former U.S. President Donald Trump is seen in Midtown on April 03, 2023 in New York City. Trump is scheduled to be arraigned tomorrow at a Manhattan courthouse following his indictment by a grand jury.
Gotham | Gc Images | Getty Images
The indictment says Trump was aware of the highly sensitive nature of the documents, quoting him at one point as saying: “As president, I could have declassified it … but this is still secret.”
Trump, who is seeking the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, and Nauta are due to be arraigned in Miami on Tuesday, the day before Trump’s 77th birthday.
He and Nauta each face a maximum possible sentence of 20 years in prison if convicted of the most serious charges, which are conspiracy to obstruct justice and counts related to withholding and concealing the government records.
Special counsel Jack Smith is due to make a statement on the case at the Department of Justice on Friday at 3 p.m. ET. Smith is continuing to oversee a separate criminal investigation of Trump for his efforts to overturn his loss to President Joe Biden in the 2020 election.
Thirty-one of the counts accuse Trump of willful retention of national defense information. He is also charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice; withholding a document or record; corruptly concealing a document or record; concealing a document in a federal investigation; scheme to conceal; and false statements and representations.
Trump was put under criminal investigation in the spring of 2022, after the FBI was notified that classified documents were found in the 15 boxes of government records he gave to the National Records and Archives Administration after months of effort by NARA to recover documents the agency believed were missing.
By law, presidents must give NARA all government records when they leave office.
The indictment notes, “As he departed the White House, TRUMP caused scores of boxes, many of which contained classified documents, to be transported to The Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Florida, where he maintained his residence.”
“TRUMP was not authorized to possess or retain those classified documents,” the indictment says.
DOJ presents photos of classified documents found at former President Donald Trump’s Mar-A-Lago residence.
Source: DOJ
Trump later suggested to any attorney that he lie to the FBI and a grand jury by saying that he did not have the documents they were seeking, and directed Nauto to move boxes of documents to conceal them from Trump’s own lawyer, the FBI and the grand jury, the indictment alleges.
Trump also is accused in the indictment of suggesting to his lawyer that the attorney hide or destroy documents, that he gave the FBI and the grand jury only some of the documents he had kept while claiming he was fully cooperating.
And Trump caused a certification to be submitted to the FBI and grand jury, falsely representing that all documents had been produced when he knew that was not true, according to the indicment.
The indictment estimates that Trump’s trial would take between 21 and 60 days.
DOJ presents photos of classified documents found at former President Donald Trump’s Mar-A-Lago residence.
Source: DOJ
Earlier Friday, two of Trump’s lawyers resigned from representing him in the classified documents case, and in the criminal investigation involving the 2020 election.
Trump was indicted by a New York state grand jury in late March on charges of falsifying business records related to a $130,000 hush money payment his then-lawyer Michael Cohen gave porn star Stormy Daniels shortly before the 2016 election.
Trump has pleaded not guilty in that case, which is set to go to trial next March in Manhattan Supreme Court.
Read the indictment against Donald Trump
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