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So how do we introduce this? Do we say, basically, the latest in an occasional series on Trump indictments?
Indictments 2.0.
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From New York Times Opinion, Im Carlos Lozada.
Im Michelle Cottle.
And Im Ross Douthat.
And this is Matter of Opinion.
As you can tell, Lydia is not with us this week. She is off reporting in Chad. And we are appearing a little earlier than usual this week because, as you may have heard, Donald Trump has been indicted, again. And we, your dedicated podcast hosts, read all 49 pages of the federal indictment. After getting through it, I felt like I actually did get some new insight into how Trump operates and what makes him tick. Well get to our takeaways in a second, but first, who wants to give us a rundown of whats actually in the indictment?
Oh, please.
That would be Michelle.
Oh, please allow me to do this.
Michelle, step into the breach.
So for those keeping score at home, again, this is the second criminal indictment. In March, Trump was indicted in New York for allegedly falsifying business records. That was on state charges. This time, its federal. It is for allegedly holding on to lots of classified documents after he left the White House.
So were talking about documents that contain military secrets, intel secrets, nuclear secrets, both regarding the U.S and other nations. Its not just that he held on to these. Its that he allegedly actively conspired to hide them once the Justice Department stepped in with its very polite subpoena, suggesting that it might be best if he handed these over.
So, as the prosecution lays out, he was going through boxes, conspiring with an aide, lying to his own lawyers, and at one point, even suggesting that his lawyers remove evidence that might be extremely unfortunate if it was found. So, as shocking and unbelievable as it is, its also kind of like, yeah, here we go again.
Well, I was interested that you started out, Carlos, saying that you felt like you maybe had learned something new about our glorious, exiled emperor, Donald Trump, because with all due respect to the importance of American national security, this is an absolutely hilarious indictment. I feel like everything, the image of the boxes, the photographs of the boxes piled in the Mar-a-Lago bathroom alone is going to go down in history alongside the photo of Trump with the fast food buffet in the White House as sort of
It has launched 1,000 memes.
But to me, of course, this is the Donald Trump that we know, right? The Donald Trump who wants to keep the boxes because theyre his boxes, has no concept, obviously, of the national interest, sort of national security, apart from his own sort of role as capo di tutti capi at the White House. He doesnt separate sort of the public interest from his own interest. He seems to have also had some scores to settle, right? He held on to documents related to things he was still mad about, which is something very relatable to me. What do you hold on to?
Who among us?
Anyway, so Carlos, whats new here? What did you learn?
Well, I mean, first off, I got flashbacks to a lot of similar past Trump actions, and let me cover that first before I get into what I thought was novel. First, Trump has been very cavalier about national security secrets and classified information in the past. He was when he was president. There was that famous meeting in the Oval Office with Russian officials where he revealed that the United States was getting intelligence from an ally about the Islamic State. So that was very familiar.
The way he talked to his lawyer was extremely familiar. When he tells the lawyer basically, look, take these documents youve found, go back to your hotel, and if you see anything really bad, just kind of pluck them out. He didnt say pluck them out. He made kind of the hand motion of plucking them out. And that reminded me of Michael Cohens memoir about working for Trump he was Trumps fixer and lawyer when he says that Trump would often just kind of imply instructions, leave plausible deniability for kind of illegal acts and kind of like a mob boss.
Its so Cosa Nostra. It really is. Its just like, dont say it. Just imply it.
Except that the one thing that distinguishes Trump from the true mob boss is that he has so many of these conversations himself, right? Like a really effective mob boss, its three layers away. And part of whats fascinating about Trump and this isnt just true with mob bosses, right? When presidents want to do borderline illegal things, which other presidents besides Trump have done, theyre usually trying to insulate themselves or find fixers and so on, and Trump does that, but he also just does it himself. Anyway, but Carlos, Im actually really curious what was surprising?
It gave me some insight into what Trump means when he says that his next administration, his next presidency would be a time for retribution, because the way that he very deliberately used one document to strike back at Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, who he felt was getting good press and was trash talking him in sort of books and articles that were coming out, shows you that hes not just careless and reckless with classified information.
He doesnt just like to show hes cool and has access to this cool stuff, but that he is holding on to these things in part to use them, to use them against enemies. And those enemies are not foreign enemies, are not the usual people you think about when you think about national security secrets. Theyre about his own political enemies or domestic enemies. And to me, that question sort of why is he holding on to this was answered in that moment.
I agree with you, Carlos, that, yes, hes not just holding onto them the way he holds on to other souvenirs that he likes to show off, which is obviously always
Fake Time Magazine covers.
Exactly. I mean, that is one reason why hes holding onto them, but yes, he also has scores to settle related to Russiagate, related to, presumably, January 6. I think the Milley example is striking because the reality was that throughout Trumps presidency, his generals constantly put one over on him, right? Trump would announce were pulling out of Syria, and then the generals would Im exaggerating for effect here, but move six submachine guns and one Navy SEAL out of Syria and tell Trump that it had been accomplished, right?
Trump repeatedly said were going to leave Afghanistan, and of course, it only happened under Joe Biden, who, whatever his other faults, is much more likely to actually do things than Donald Trump. So I dont think its a surprise at all that Milley specifically, but also the generals writ large, would be sort of a source of Trumps his unhappy memories of his presidency. I think the question of revenge, though, gets to this question, which is that a lot of Trumps presidency was just about saying things and not doing things, right?
And so, in a way, his idea of revenge is, its an open question whether its about saying things or doing things. Is President Trump in his second term going to successfully prosecute the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, or is he just going to write a lot of nasty tweets about him? And this is the question that sort of hangs over the whole Trump phenomenon.
I mean, my view of the indictments is that were sort of moving were assuming that there may be a third indictment in the state of Georgia related to Trumps election interference, his calls to Georgia State officials demanding that they discover extra votes for him. And to me, it seems like in these indictments, were moving through different phases of the Trump presidency.
That the first indictment, the New York indictment, was sort of absurd liberal prosecutorial overreach directed against Trumps sleaziness. And thats one story of the Trump administration. Trump is sleazy. Liberals overreact, violate their own norms in trying to go after him. This one, this indictment is more the sort of Coen brothers burn after reading black comedy, where the stakes are a little more real. Youre actually dealing with national security secrets and so on, but Trump is still fundamentally behaving as a somewhat venal and absurd figure.
And then if we get a third indictment, that will be closer to the genuinely sinister aspect of Trump, where his venal absurdity leads him to be willing to have a constitutional crisis to steal an election he didnt win. So were sort of moving through were recapitulating the whole Trump presidency through these indictments. Its very, very entertaining.
And along the way, were kind of looking at what hes done to the Republican Party because whatever you think of the first indictment in New York, which I was not that crazy about, this one
Not your favorite indictment.
No, my favorite indictment is Georgia. I have ranked my indictments on a little chart in my room, and Im clicking through them
The indictment does not exist yet. Thats your favorite?
Yeah, the indictment to come, but
Thats resistance liberalism at its finest. Its always the next indictment.
But the question here is, how is his party responding, the party that he has captured, that he has traumatized. And so far, if you look at the Republican contenders, with a couple of exceptions, its kind of weak. I mean, Chris Christie has come out swinging. Mitt Romney, in Mitt Romneys usual role, has come out saying this is disgraceful. Asa Hutchinson, who nobody even knows who he is, but hes running for president as well, has said these should be taken seriously.
But everybody else is pretty much like, nah, big deal. Guy stored some documents in his toilet. Does it really matter? I mean, he didnt really sell them to the foreign forces that be, so do we really care? I mean, whats the big deal? Which, I think for the party of law and order and the rule of law, is pretty fantastic.
Its not just the party of law and order and the rule of law. Its also the party that, for a long time, has painted itself as stronger on national security than the Democrats. And thats where looking into the specifics of what these documents are, is vital. I mean, I love burn after reading. But this is more than just like we need to talk about the security of your shit, right? This is US nuclear weapons program information. This is defense capabilities of the United States and other countries, vulnerabilities of the U.S and its allies to attack, plans of retaliation in case of foreign attack. At least from the description in the indictment, this is very high level material.
The description provided by the National Security of States.
Of course. I mean, just of course. And so, again, its not just that Republicans may be hypocritical when it comes to being the party of law and order, but also as the party of national security.
Yes, I mean theyre completely hypocritical. I think thats perfectly obvious. The sort of considered Republican view, to the extent that you can say one is considered, is that once Hillary Clinton was let off the hook for her Homebrew server that effectively created a zone of non-prosecution that encompasses Trump, I think its pretty clear that what Trump did is more prosecutorable. Thats not the right word, but you know what I mean.
Prosecutable.
Prosecutable thats an even better and actually existing word in the sense that Trump was repeatedly told, please dont do this or you will be prosecuted, and continued to do it, which is different.
And continued to scheme very aggressively to make
Yes, very aggressive.
sure it didnt get done.
Aggressive scheming that he did not successfully conceal. So I think this does clearly go further than the Hillary example. But that is sort of the Republican theory of the case, basically, that
But her emails.
Well, I mean, you guys dont think, right? I mean, it was good, right, that Trump didnt prosecute Hillary Clinton for the emails. You guys agree with that, right?
So what youre saying is manslaughter is exactly the same thing as first degree murder.
Interesting.
People are prosecuted for both, though, Michelle.
It is an inexact analogy, Ill grant you. But its like in for a penny, in for a pound. Once youve kind of let something slide, you might as well let everything slide, no matter how hard theyve tried to cover it up or scheme or lie or ignore subpoenas, that sort of thing.
The irony of the Hillary example is that in the indictment, isnt there a moment where Trump is saying, like, gosh, Hillary did it right. She got some lower level person to scrub the 30,000 emails. And yeah, and I should have someone to do that for me.
That was clearly his underlying message, is why arent you doing this for me?
But that, again, gets to his failure as a mob boss, which is that hes always trying to do things himself.
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Lets take a quick break here. When we come back, well talk about the consequences for Trump and for the country from this indictment.
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And were back. So these indictments of a former president are, to use a vastly overused word, unprecedented, but so is the fact that this indicted former president is a candidate in the next presidential election. And so far, as Michelle said, theres been sort of a meh reaction among a lot of his challengers. What does that say to the two of you?
I think that with the Republican field, this just sort of cements the reality that the sort of Ron DeSantis strategy is to hope that things like this indictment contribute to a general exhaustion with Trump and a desire not to do it again, rather than some dramatic Republican voters turning on him. And so everything that DeSantis and others who actually want to win the Republican nomination are trying to do is premised on that strategy. But that strategy does involve, essentially, a tap dance where you minimize the significance of what Trump has done.
How is that strategy consistent with DeSantis and others going out and saying that this is this grave miscarriage of justice and weaponization of justice in America, et cetera, et cetera?
Because I think DeSantiss strategy is to say, look, the liberals are out to get Trump, and the liberals are terrible, and we all agree on that. The problem is that Trump is giving them too many opportunities and making it too easy for them. And this is where the deep flaw in the DeSantis strategy may be, that its impossible to make a subtle argument against Donald Trump. But subtly, the point would be, look, arent you a little bit tired of the liberals always having these opportunities? I wont sleep with porn stars. I wont store documents in my bathroom. I wont hire people who I then decide are terrible and so on. Vote for me.
Just reading the indictment gave me a game of Clue kind of vibe. When you mentioned the bathroom, Ross, its the valet with the boxes in the storage room, right? Or its the lawyer in the hotel room with the folder.
With the folder.
It just seems so comical and reckless. Yet at the same time, the indictment is trying to make it extremely serious and premeditated. And one of the things that struck me as different from past investigations is that they try to make very clear that Trump understood what he was doing and had clear knowledge of his wrongdoing, right? At first, it seems like theyre just being annoying. And they cite all the times during the 2016 campaign when Trump was explaining why we have to take classified information seriously. We cant have someone in the Oval Office who doesnt understand the meaning of the word classified.
But in the Mueller report, they bent over backwards to give him the benefit of the doubt. And now thats not the case at all. Theyre making it as clear as they can in the indictment that Trump knew exactly what he was doing. And its more like the January 6 report, which goes out of its way to say Trump knew that he had lost. He knew that everything that was coming up was not making his case, and he kept saying it anyway. So this feels like its kind of learned from Muellers mistakes and adopted more of a January 6 model.
And its not going to make any difference to his voters. So the interesting thing will be, are we going to see a third indictment as this goes along? And will he just be doubling down every time? And I think the answer is yes from everything weve seen. I mean, the great thing about being a demagogue is every time you wind up in trouble with the system, your response is, its because the system is corrupt, and theyre out to get me. So I think this is a very serious case. And I dont actually think it will make much I dont think itll make any political difference.
Well, itll make a difference. I mean, look, these things hurt Trump as a general election candidate, I think, in pretty obvious ways. Multiple indictments does not help you win over the voter who, lets say, swung from Obama to Trump and then back to Biden, right? That voter is not going to be excited about voting for the guy who has been indicted three times.
But another core question, though, is just the logistics of all this. And were not legal experts, but this is also uncharted territory, so even legal experts are uncertain, right? How fast does this prosecution actually happen? It seems like they have Trump dead to rights in a way that would normally occasion some kind of plea. But the politics of pleading guilty seem to be a little dicey for Trump.
But then theres the other question of does this actually yield jail time if convicted, right? I believe that David Petraeus, with his showing classified elements to his mistress scandal, I think he got two years of probation and a fine. Is that correct?
Well, Ive repressed that whole episode.
Well, Trump gives us the highly comedic version of this, but Donald Trump is certainly not the first high placed official to have some trouble with classified documents.
It just never occurred to me that people do jail time.
It doesnt? So that doesnt occur to you, OK. So if he doesnt
It never occurs.
If he thinks hell never do jail time
You mean for this or for any of this?
For this.
Well have to see about
How about your favorite nonexistent indictment?
I will have to see how the Georgia indictment goes, but I actually just dont think for this one, I dont think hes going to see jail time. I think theres vanishingly little chance.
OK, so you think its some kind of Petraeus-style sentence.
Of course, if he winds up convicted
Petraeus, for the record, was fined 40 grand and two years probation.
Yeah, OK, so thats the Petraeus sentence.
Hes not allowed to store sensitive documents in his john anymore, how is that?
OK, OK.
Slap on the wrist type thing.
So a slap on the wrist. So thats not that politically damaging in the end.
Yeah, although he said even if hes convicted, he will stay in this race. What was that he said this past weekend?
Thats the biggest applause line he gets.
Either the Communists win or we win. Its the final battle? Hes just so grand with all of this.
And one of the big moments when he got the most applause when he was speaking in Columbus, Georgia was, theyre not really coming after me. Theyre coming after you. Im just the guy standing between you.
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