The Espionage Act of 1917 has never been used against a former president, vice president, or even a cabinet secretary — until last week.
According to Mark Levin, the 106-year-old law was never intended to be used the way it suddenly has been: to criminalize document cases.
“Whether the documents are classified or not, it doesn’t matter who created them. They’re in the possession of the White House, the president, his staff,” Levin says.
“The Presidential Records Acts, which was passed in 1978 and instituted effectively in 1981,” Levin continues, “has no criminal penalty. So, you can’t start with a Presidential Records Act and all of a sudden say, ‘Okay, let’s move to the Espionage Act.’”
Levin notes that the Espionage Act wasn’t even used against Lyndon B. Johnson, who had directed his staff to remove top secret information involving the Vietnam War and illegally tapped Nixon’s phone.
“Nobody even thought about charging anybody with the Espionage Act,” he says.
Levin believes that Hillary Clinton would have been much worthier of charges based on the Espionage Act than former president Trump.
“They never investigated her for obstruction. Never investigated her for perjury even though there are existing subpoenas from the house oversight committee,” he adds.
Levin is sure that Trump is being treated unfairly in comparison, and it’s all political.
“They treat Trump one way and Biden another,” he says.
Bank records have shown that the Biden family and friends have received over $10 million from foreign nationals and their companies, and even more information has implicated the Biden family in a bribery scheme with Ukrainian company Burisma.
Levin has noticed that no one seems to care.
“And yet, Donald Trump is investigated criminally, and the attorney general, Merrick Garland, won’t even appoint a special counsel despite all those predicates that are pouring out of every orifice of the Department of Justice,” Levin says.
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Former Attorney General Bill Barr accused former President Trump of lying to the Department of Justice about the classified documents case in an interview on CBS's "Face the Nation" Sunday morning.
"Do I personally believe it? Yes, I do," Bill Barr responded, when host Robert Costa asked him if he believed Trump lied to the Justice Department about the classified documents case.
"Absolutely," Barr responded, when asked if Trump had mischaracterized the Presidential Records Act in defending his alleged actions.
"The legal theory by which he gets to take battle plans and sensitive national security information as his personal papers is absurd," Barr said, adding that it was "just as wacky as the legal doctrine they came up with for having the Vice President unilaterally determine who won the election."
Barr went on to explain that the purpose of the Presidential Records Act statute, passed after Watergate, was to stop presidents from taking official documents out of the White House.
The act restricts what a president can take to items that are "purely private" and have nothing to do with deliberations of government policy, in Barr's view.
"Obviously, these documents are not purely private ... they're not even arguing now that they're purely private ... it's an absurd argument."
"He had no right to those documents," Barr said, adding that Trump "jerked around" authorities trying for over a year to retrieve the documents in question.
"This is not a circumstance where he's the victim ... he provoked this whole problem himself," Barr said, also acknowledging that Trump had been the victim of "unfair witch hunts in the past."
"He engaged in a course of deceitful conduct," Barr said, commenting on his former boss's actions following a subpoena, according to the indictment.
"It was a clear crime if those allegations are true," he also said.
"[The obstruction case against Trump is] very strong, because a lot of the evidence comes from his own lawyers," Barr said, when Costa asked him how strong he believed the obstruction case against Trump to be.
Barr deflected when asked whether Trump should serve a prison sentence if convicted, but did say he "didn't like the idea of a former president serving time."
Barr described Trump as "fundamentally flawed," adding that he engages in "reckless conduct" that leads to "calamitous situations like this."
"Trump has many good qualities and accomplished some good things," Barr also said.
"He is a consummate narcissist, and he constantly engages in reckless conduct that puts his political followers at risk and the conservative and Republican agenda at risk."
"He's a very petty individual who will always put his interests ahead of the country's."
"Our country can't be a therapy session for a troubled man like this."
"I don't expect to be a witness, but I'll be glad to be one if I'm called," Barr said.
Former President Trump described Barr is a "disgruntled former employee" who "hates" him, in a post to his Truth Social platform last Sunday.
Trump added that he believes Barr "knows the indictment is bull..." and advised people to "turn off Fox News when that 'gutless pig' is on!"
Barr resigned from his position as Trump's Attorney General in December 2020, CNN reported. People familiar with the matter told the outlet Trump had been "seriously considering firing" him just prior to the resignation, but aides had discouraged him from doing so in the preceding months.
"Just had a very nice meeting with Attorney General Bill Barr at the White House. Our relationship has been a very good one, he has done an outstanding job! As per letter, Bill will be leaving just before Christmas to spend the holidays with his family," Trump tweeted at the time.
Watch host Robert Costa's interview with former Attorney General William Barr on CBS's "Face the Nation" below.
Former President Donald Trump is presently fighting legal battles on multiple fronts. While he prepares to mount defenses against what some have called a "patently political prosecution" in Manhattan and against accusations advanced by a Democrat prosecutor in Georgia, the legal team representing Trump in the classified documents saga is now going on offense.
Fox News Digital reported that the trio of attorneys representing Trump in the special counsel investigation into the presidential candidate's handling and retention of allegedly classified records are now forcing the National Archives and Records Administration to show its hand.
Attorneys James Trusty, Lindsey Halligan, and Evan Corcoran filed a Freedom of Information Act request Monday with the NARA.
They claim their FOIA suit will confirm their suspicions — and the suspicions of members of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability — that the National Archives is a "highly politicized" agency that criminalized a civil dispute over classified materials in an "unconstitutional and unprecedented weaponization of the Presidential Records Act."
Trusty told Fox News Digital that they have demanded "documents that will expose NARA's completely different treatment of President Trump from every other president."
TheBlaze previously reported on accusations that the NARA provided deferential treatment to President Joe Biden, who was found to be in possession of several troves of classified documents, which he may have improperly handled and retained.
Committee Chair Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) wrote to acting Archivist Debra Steidel Wall on Jan. 10 concerning "a political bias" at the NARA. Wall was reportedly one of the leading figures who triggered the FBI raid on Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence over allegedly mishandled documents.
"For months, NARA failed to disclose to Committee Republicans or the American public that President Biden—after serving as Vice President—stored highly classified documents in a closet at his personal office," wrote Comer. "NARA learned about these documents days before the 2022 midterm elections and did not alert the public that President Biden was potentially violating the law."
"Meanwhile, NARA instigated a public and unprecedented FBI raid at Mar-a-Lago—former President Trump’s home—to retrieve presidential records. NARA’s inconsistent treatment of recovering classified records held by former President Trump and President Biden raises questions about political bias at the agency," Comer added.
Trusty said that he and the rest of Trump's legal team expect the FOIA suit to unearth evidence of "highly-politicized bureaucrats who worked in tandem with DOJ and politicians to criminalize a dispute that never has had criminal implications."
"We're confident that a substantive response to our demands from NARA will firmly establish a different and politicized treatment of President Trump," added Trusty.
In the event that the NARA complies with the FOIA suit, it will turn over records pertaining to its "dispute resolution process and communications about how the agency characterizes presidential records; its process for establishing secure locations for past presidents to maintain possession of those records; and other information."
The request, as written, "covers records located at any office within NARA, including its Office of General Counsel, each of its field and regional offices, the Clinton Presidential Library and Museum, the George W. Bush Presidential Center, and the Obama Presidential Library."
Insights into the Clinton, Bush, and Obama presidential libraries and into how other presidents were treated by the NARA (e.g., whether the NARA has made criminal referrals with Biden or past presidents) may provide contrast for how Trump was in turn treated.
Extra to demanding communications between the NARA and the Biden administration — both about his storage of classified records at various insecure locations and his possible circumnavigation of the National Archives in other instances — Trump's legal team is "very interested in the arrangement where Obama's Foundation acknowledged possessing classified documents for years."
The Federalist reported that prior to the end of former President Barack Obama's tenure in office, he "rented a private facility in Hoffman Estates to serve as a storage place for his presidential papers, and by October of 2016, while he was still in office, shipments of artifacts from his presidency began arriving at the suburban Chicago storage facility."
The NARA later worked with Obama to ship his classified and unclassified documents to the Chicago area, where many remained well into 2018.
Trusty noted that the Trump legal team would "love to see the paper trail" relating to the $3.3 million that Obama Foundation Executive Director Robbie Cohen mentioned paying to the NARA "in eventual moving costs" for the Obama documents in a Sept. 21, 2018, letter.
The lawsuit also covers "any and all documents" related to the "dispute-resolution process that NARA uses, or has used, to resolve disagreements with any of the Past Presidents and their Administrations, concerning the classification of records as Presidential records, personal records, agency records or otherwise."
In addition to providing a look behind the scenes at the NARA and at its approach to Trump, the former president's attorneys indicated they mean to expose that "the underpinnings" of the DOJ's investigation into Trump's handling of classified records are "rotten."
Trump's legal team gave the NARA 10 days to turn over the documents, noting, "Expedited treatment is justified because President Trump has a reasonable expectation of an imminent loss of a substantial due process right."
This lawsuit comes just days after a federal judge ordered Trump attorney Evan Corcoran to testify in the classified documents investigation, reported CNN.
A Trump spokesman said of the DOJ's targeting of Corcoran: "Whenever prosecutors target the attorneys, that’s usually a good indication their underlying case is very weak. If they had a real case, they wouldn’t need to play corrupt games with the Constitution. Every American has the right to consult with counsel and have candid discussions – this promotes adherence to the law."
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Proving a defendant’s intent and knowledge can often be tough. But it’s even tougher here because of the Presidential Records Act.
Former President Donald Trump was indicted for a second time Thursday over the same conduct Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton engaged in.
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The Democrat DOJ is attempting to DEPRIVE Trump of his due process
Alexei Navalny is President Vladimir Putin’s most prominent opponent, and Putin isn’t taking that lightly.
Navalny was sentenced to an additional 19 years behind bars on extremism charges — which stem from Navalny’s pro-democracy campaigns against the Putin regime.
Mark Levin believes Navalny’s treatment is eerily similar to the Biden crime syndicate's treatment of Donald Trump.
“Oh my God,” Levin says in shock, “in many ways they’re talking about what they’re doing to Trump.”
“Except what they’re doing to Trump is worse,” he continues. “Donald Trump faces, with the Manhattan district attorney, the Democrat left-wing Soros prosecutor, up to 136 years in prison.”
These charges, Levin says, are “completely bogus.”
“I want you to think about this. Putin puts this guy away for 30 years. 30 years and our State Department objects. What about due process?” Levin says.
Levin notes that in spite of all that, the chief judge for the district court in Washington, D.C., up until a few months ago is a lifelong Democrat who was appointed by Barack Obama. She also worked under a radical Democrat before that for 10 years in the U.S. Senate.
“She ruled in favor of the Biden administration and against Trump 100% of the time. She denied Trump attorney-client privilege in a secret proceeding, and her opinion has yet to be released,” Levin says. “You need attorney-client privilege if you’re going to have due process.”
Judge Beryl Howe also authorized the secret search of Trump’s Twitter account because she said she “believed he would flee if he knew about it.”
“This judge is no different than the Putin judge. No different. I don’t care how she got to the bench. No different,” Levin says.
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