Trump legal team hands over classified item to Justice Department: Report
Misty Severi
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The legal team for former President Donald Trump handed over a classified folder discovered at Mar-a-Lago to the Justice Department on Friday. The team also turned over a computer belonging to a current Trump aide.
Trump attorney James Trusty delivered the folder to federal agents and claimed the documents had been copied onto the laptop of a current Trump aide, unnamed sources told ABC News.
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“It is customary in circumstances such as this for investigators to search the computer to see if classified material is still on that computer,” John Cohen, former acting undersecretary for intelligence at the Department of Homeland Security, told the outlet.
“They will also seek to determine if classified material was transmitted electronically to other computers or devices via that computer,” he said.
The folder was discovered in January in the main complex of Trump’s Florida resort, separate from a storage room where previous documents were found during a raid last year, the sources said. The classification level of the documents and the nature of the documents inside the folder were not clear.
The former president had ordered a deeper search of at least four properties in December, which resulted in the discovery of two more classified documents. But Trump’s team appears convinced that the investigation into the classified documents is a political “witch hunt.”
“[This] is nothing more than a targeted, politically motivated witch hunt against President Trump, concocted to try and prevent the American people from returning him to the White House,” a Trump spokesperson told ABC News. “Just like all the other fake hoaxes thrown at President Trump, this corrupt effort will also fail. The weaponized Department of Injustice has shown no regard for common decency and key rules that govern the legal system.”
The new folder comes as an array of classified documents emerges from the homes of important U.S. officials, including that of President Joe Biden from when he was the vice president. Classified documents have also been found at the house of former Vice President Mike Pence in Carmel, Indiana.
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The possession of classified documents violates the Presidential Records Act, which requires all presidents and vice presidents to turn over all classified documents to the National Archives when they leave office. However, Trump denies violating the act.