37 charges against Donald Trump include retention of intel, obstruction of justice
Prosecutors unsealed a 38-count federal indictment against Donald Trump and an aide Friday, detailing the criminal case against the former president and his handling of classified documents.
Trump faces 31 counts of willful retention of national defense information, according to the indictment, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in the Southern District of Florida in Miami.
A Trump aide, Waltine Nauta, is also charged in the 49-page indictment, which details how secret U.S. government papers were stored at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Fla.
Counts 1-31 allege willful retention of national defense information. Prosecutors say Trump had unlawful possession and control of documents on national defense, willfully retained them and failed to deliver them to the U.S. government as required by law.
The indictment lists general descriptions of the documents pertaining to each count. They include intelligence briefings related to various foreign countries, documents related to military capabilities of a foreign country and the United States, documents concerning nuclear capabilities of a foreign country, communications with a leader of a foreign country and documents related to military attacks by a foreign country.
It does not name the country.
Other counts refer to documents concerning military contingency planning of the United States, projected regional military capabilities of a foreign country and the United States, and documents about military options of a foreign country and potential effects on U.S. interests.
Other documents that prosecutors allege were illegally in Trump’s possession after he left the White House include ones concerning foreign country support of terrorist acts against the United States and documents concerning U.S. nuclear weaponry.
Count 32 is a conspiracy to obstruct justice charge alleging that Trump and his “body man” Waltine Nauta conspired to “corruptly conceal a record, document and other object from an official proceeding.”
Prosecutors said in the indictment that the purpose of the conspiracy was “for Trump to keep classified documents he had taken with him from the White House and to hide and conceal them from a federal grand jury.”
Count 33 charges Trump and Nauta with withholding a document or record. Count 34 charges they corruptly concealed a document or record.
Count 35 charges the two with concealing a document in a federal investigation. Count 36 is for a scheme to conceal the documents.
Count 37 charges Trump only for false statements and representations about the documents. Count 38 charges Nauta for false statements and representations.
