The language is partisan, but, if you can make the translation to neutral language, this analysis is the best I’ve seen on the FBI’s position after the Mar-a-Lago raid. It’s all about the socks. OK, OK.
FBI’s Mar-a-Lago Raid Unravels like a worn out sock!
Diane Marshall, The Marshall Report, Aug. 18, 2022
(https://diannemarshallreport.com/fbis-mar-a-lago-raid-unravels-like-a-worn-out-sock/)
Thanks to past Court case rulings on National Archives documents and materials, it appears President Trump has every right to decide, just as he has stated all along, what is classified and what is to be declassified!
According to the Bill Clinton “Sock Drawer” case, where audio tapes were found filed between socks, it’s all personal property. Case 1:10-cv-01834-ABJ Document 13 Filed 03/01/12, JUDICIAL WATCH, INC., Plaintiff, v NATIONAL ARCHIVES AND RECORDS ADMINISTRATION, Defendent.
This is fantastic. Records removed by President Trump are left to the sole discretion of the President. President Trump set a trap that will ultimately cost Bill Clinton. Thank you to the corrupt democrat FBI pic.twitter.com/tjhnqWxWsM
— • ᗰISᕼKᗩ™ • (@kingojungle) August 18, 2022
So it appears that once the President uses executive privilige to declassify a document, or any material such as audio tapes, the Court has Ruled that, once declassified, it becomes the personal property of the President. So any documents President Trump had in his possession or in Melania’s wardrobe, is his own personal property, as well as anywhere on his person or property.
It appears the FBI is in some serious doo doo right now. They should know these protocols. That is their job and the protocols for present and former presidents are available on-line so the FBI should have looked at all of that first and it is obvious they either didn’t, or did and chose to ignore it all. After all, fake news is above the law and they must have been relying on the wrap-up smear to have some magical effect.
It was Judicial Watch who went to court to demand the tapes be given to the National Archives and Records Administration, so the American people could hear them. In his case titled Judicial Watch v. National Archives and Records Administration, it involved an effort by the conservative watchdog to compel the Archives to forcibly seize hours of audio recordings that Clinton made during his presidency with historian Taylor Branch.
It was U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson in Washington D.C. who presided the case and rejected Judicial Watch’s suit by concluding there was no provision in the Presidential Records Act to force the National Archives to seize records from a former president.
Hello? Let’s say that again…”There is no provision in the Presidential Records Act to force the National Archives to seize records from a former president!”
Jackson’s ruling — and the court case itself, gave credence to many breeches the FBI made in their decision to raid Mar-a-Lago and seize anything they wanted, even passports and hand written notes. This was a huge violation of civil rights and a huge violation of personal property of a former president, let alone it was not done with protocols with secret service agents who are there to guard and protect the President.
There are specific protocols for FBI to follow that deal directly with Secret Service who are provided for life to protect the former president. The biggest screw up of the FBI was ignoring the fact that it is at the president’s discretion as to what are personal vs. official records and that decision is to be upheld and it is solely his.
Besides Judge Jackson’s decision she referred to the rules and protocols of a President’s Executive Privileges, as they are stated in the government protocols and archives.
In Judge Jackson’s decision from the 2012 Clinton Case, she stated, “Since the President is completely entrusted with the management and even the disposal of Presidential records during his time in office, it would be difficult for this Court to conclude that Congress intended that he would have less authority to do what he pleases with what he considers to be his personal records,” she added.
So there you have it… Trump’s personal records are what they were looking for and now that they have them… the FBI is not looking so good, and neither is Garland, the snake who ordered it to be done, nor is Biden looking any better and who knows whose bright idea this was beyond pudding head Joey? Whoever is making the Joe clone walk, drool, and mumble…that one very much miscalculated.
The judge noted a president could destroy any record he wanted during his tenure and his only responsibility was to inform the Archives.
You can read the full ruling here: File: memorandum opinion.pdf
That defendant was the same Justice Department that authorized the raid on Trump’s estate. You can read their arguments a decade earlier from the hearing transcript here: Hearing Transcript.pdf
JUST THE NEWS SAID that Kevin Brock, former assistant FBI director for intelligence, that the bureau’s search warrant was overly broad and went beyond what the FBI manual for agents recommended. “Specificity is important in order to protect fourth amendment rights from exuberant government overreach designed to find whatever they can.” He also said he did not believe DOJ and FBI had authority to criminalize the retention of presidential records.
Brock said, “The warrant “apparently makes a novel legal assertion that any presidential record kept by a former president is against the law. You have to wonder what the other living former presidents think about that. They have the right and, apparently, clear desire to remain silent.”
Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch who lost the Clinton sock drawer case, said he believes Jackson’s ruling could have a profound impact on the coming legal battles over the Trump search. Fitton stated, “The government, the lawyer for the Archives, said, ‘You know what? If documents are in the former President’s hands, where they’re presumptively personal, we just, you know, we presume they’re personal.’”
Fitton also added, “The Justice Department previously had told us in response to a question about Bill Clinton: ‘Tough luck. It’s his.’ But they changed their mind for Donald Trump? The law and court decision suggests that Trump is right. And frankly, based on this analysis, Trump should get every single document they took from him back. It’s all personal records.”
So, YES, the president can declassify documents, and there isn’t a set protocol they have to follow…
The U.S. classification system has three levels: top secret, secret and confidential.
“That is based on the level of damage that its release would cause to the national security of the United States,” Kel McClanahan, executive director of the National Security Counselors, said. “When you classify a document, that means that only people with a security clearance equal to the classification or higher can read it.”
The president “doesn’t have to give any reason for declassifying” information. He can just say, ‘I decide that this should be declassified,’ and it’s declassified.