- According to The NYT, Trump suggested that he trade Mar-a-Lago containers for documents regarding the Russia probe.
- Trump’s aides did not submit their proposal to the National Archives because they knew it would be rejected.
- According to the newspaper, Trump repeatedly deferred responding to the agency’s requests for the boxes.
In late 2017, former President Donald Trump proposed the idea of exchanging the White House files to Mar-a-Lago with “sensitive” documents regarding the FBI investigation into Trump’s 2016 campaign ties to Russia. According to The New York Times.
As the National Archives pressed Trump to return the scores of official documents that were being stored at his Mar-a-Lago estate in South Florida and not in their possession, the former president — still smarting from the Russia probe — was frustrated by the government agency’s refusal to disclose documents that he felt would back up his claims, per The Times.
Trump said to his advisors that he would give to the archives, in order to get access to those documents. According to the newspaper, the boxes of materials were stored at Mar-a-Lago.
The proposal was rejected by his advisers. However, it was one way in which the former President repeatedly delayed calling the archives to request that they turn over documents from his private residence.
Trump’s first day in office raised concerns about Trump’s habit of bringing documents into his bedroom. Near the end of his term, however, people who knew the facts spoke to the Times to say that locating files in the residence area became a problem.
Top White House officials knew that certain files were being stored in locations they weren’t intended to be.
Gary M. Stern, National Archives general counsel told Trump’s representatives that Trump had left the Oval Office and asked them to return the files.
Stern and Mark Meadows, the former White House Chief of Staff, had a series of discussions about the files. He was joined by three White House Counsel’s Office attorneys.
Per The Times Stern was pushing for missing boxes through September 2021. Trump, however, informed Meadows that they had only newspaper clips and no other personal items.
Meadows relayed Trump’s message to Patrick Philbin, a former White House lawyer. Stern then received the message.
The archives said that newspaper clippings and article prints were considered presidential records that had to be submitted to the agency.
Eric Herschmann, an ex White House advisor, warned Trump at the end last year that he might run into significant legal problems if the documents that were requested by the Archives weren’t handed over to him, according to The Times.
The former president informed advisors that the boxes were his, and Stern agreed to review the files in December 2021. According to the newspaper. Stern was then informed that the boxes were available for retrieval.
Stern claims that no Trump representative told Stern that there were classified documents in the boxes.
The archives opened the boxes and realized they were seeing them in a space not suitable for high-level documents. According to the newspaper, they quickly moved the boxes to safer zones so that the files could be closely examined.
In August, the FBI executed a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago to search for classified documents that it believed Trump had taken to Mar-a-Lago following his departure from office. The Department of Justice is currently investigating Trump may have broken three federal laws relating to the handling of classified information, including the Espionage Act.
Trump has been obsessed with the Department of Justice investigation into campaign ties between Russia and Trump’s first presidential election. He has repeated this obsession. So calledThe probe was a hoax meant to harm his presidency.
