Trump Associate Indicted in Classified Document Case
From Trump: “I have just learned that the ‘Thugs’ from the Department of Injustice will be Indicting a wonderful man, Walt Nauta, a member of the U.S. Navy, who served proudly with me in the White House, retired as Senior Chief, and then transitioned into private life as a personal aide.”
The DOJ also indicted Trump associate Walt Nauta, a Navy veteran:
An associate of Donald Trump was charged alongside the former president in the indictment returned Thursday in the investigation into the handling of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, according to people familiar with the matter.
A former military valet, Walt Nauta, who went to work at the Florida resort after working in the Trump White House, has been a key figure in the investigation into the former president’s handling of classified documents at the resort. A lawyer for Nauta on Friday declined to comment.
Trump was charged on Thursday with seven counts, including violations of the Espionage Act, which bars the misuse of classified information, as well as obstruction and false statements. It isn’t clear what charges the other person indicted would face.
Nauta came to the DOJ’s attention when a camera caught him moving boxes:
Nauta has long been a focus of that investigation, after he was seen on surveillance footage moving boxes from a storage room before and after investigators issued a May subpoena seeking the return of all government documents in Trump’s possession, The Wall Street Journal reported. Natua told investigators that he did so at Trump’s request.
Investigators spoke with Nauta at least twice and asked him to submit to further questioning, in part to clarify what prosecutors believed to be contradictory statements. He refused further questioning, the Journal reported, out of concerns about whether prosecutors are considering charges against him.
“I have just learned that the ‘Thugs’ from the Department of Injustice will be Indicting a wonderful man, Walt Nauta, a member of the U.S. Navy, who served proudly with me in the White House, retired as Senior Chief, and then transitioned into private life as a personal aide,” wrote Trump. “He has done a fantastic job! They are trying to destroy his life, like the lives of so many others, hoping that he will say bad things about “Trump.” He is strong, brave, and a Great Patriot. The FBI and DOJ are CORRUPT!”
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Regarding this, context would call for a mention that:
“The lawyer for Donald Trump’s valet, under scrutiny in the Mar-a-Lago documents investigation, has submitted court papers describing a meeting at which a top federal prosecutor brought up his application to be a judge when they tried to gain the valet’s cooperation last year, according to three people familiar with the matter.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/08/lawyer-trump-valet-nauta-mar-a-lago-classified-documents-misconduct-allegation
The article continues:
“Bratt then turned to Woodward and remarked that he did not think that Woodward was a “Trump guy” and that “he would do the right thing”, before noting that he knew Woodward had submitted an application to be a judge at the superior court in Washington DC that was currently pending, the letter said.”
America has not become a banana republic. It’s the Soviet model we are seeing.
He moved boxes as he was told. So the prosecution has to
1. Identify the boxes and their contents.
2. Prove the contents were covered by subpoena.
3. Prove the aide *knew* what was in the boxes.
4. Prove the aide *knew* the subpoena covered what was in the boxes.
5. Prove that the moved box location would somehow hinder the DOJ subpoena.
That is an extraordinarily tall hill of proof to climb without a biased judge and a DNC jury pool, particularly if the box o’ stuff was seized by the FBI during their raid anyway. I smell a prosecution pressure play to get the aide to plead to the above in exchange for a reduced sentence, or in other words, to get him to lie so they can convict Trump on obstruction.
I’d bet on a plea bargain strategy, then to be used against Trump.