Trump Demands Smith Turn Over Documents With ‘Evidence Of Collusion’
On Tuesday, former president and current GOP frontrunner Donald Trump’s legal team filed a motion in the Mar-a-Lago documents case alleging bias against Trump from the federal government and demanding that Special Counsel Jack Smith hand over materials containing supposed “evidence of collusion.”
In the motion, Trump’s legal team argues that the intelligence community, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) and Smith are all biased against Trump, while also demanding that the judge compel Smith’s team to hand over documents related to the case as they are required to by law.
“The Special Counsel’s Office has disregarded basic discovery obligations and DOJ policies in an effort to support the Biden Administration’s egregious efforts to weaponize the criminal justice system in pursuit of an objective that President Biden cannot achieve on the campaign trail: slowing down President Trump’s leading campaign in the 2024 presidential election,” the motion stated.
The legal filing went on to point out that Trump is being forced to fight the biased cases against him while also battling in the GOP primary, noting his massive landslide victory in Monday’s Iowa Caucuses.
“The patent absurdity of the Office’s efforts is illustrated by the fact that, while working toward a historic landslide victory in the Iowa caucuses yesterday, President Trump was also preparing to bring to Your Honor’s attention today the record of misrepresentations and discovery violations that have marred this case from the outset and illustrate that the Office has disregarded fundamental fairness and its legal obligations in favor of partisan election interference,” the motion continued.
Trump’s legal team also pointed to new evidence obtained via several Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, declaring that the information revealed “that politically motivated operatives in the Biden Administration and the National Archives and Records Administration began this crusade against President Trump in 2021.”
The evidence uncovered through the FOIA requests, alongside evidence found in the more than 1.2 million pages of discovery, reflects “close participation in the investigation by NARA and Biden Administration components such as the White House Counsel’s Office, as well as senior officials at DOJ and FBI,” the filing added.
Trump’s legal team then argued that evidence proves collusion between Smith’s office and “the White House, DOJ, FBI, and NARA to use the Presidential Records Act (‘PRA’) as a law enforcement tool” and to exploit “grand jury procedures, in violation of due process, other constitutional rights, and the executive privilege.”
They are also seeking records related to the Department of Energy’s June 2023 decision to move to terminate Trump’s security clearance, pointing out that these documents “are relevant to the issue of whether any possession of allegedly unclassified documents in 2021 and 2022 was ‘unauthorized.’”
Trump’s legal team are ultimately demanding that Smith’s office disclose “all evidence relating to what the Office previously described to the Court as ‘temporary secure locations’ at Mar-a-Lago, Bedminster, and Trump Tower and related SCIFs at ‘offsite locations,’” as well as “Communications with prosecution team members regarding the underlying investigation by members, relatives, or associates of the Biden Administration” — as these materials are “discoverable because they support President Trump’s defense regarding the politically motivated nature of the prosecution.”
Citing previous statements made by President Joe Biden that he would ensure Trump could not become president again, the motion argues: “This sequence of events supports President Trump’s defense that the charges against him are politically motivated.”
The Mar-a-Lago documents case is scheduled to go to trial on May 20, though Trump is seeking to push the date back until after the 2024 presidential election.
