Donald Trump’s Legal Problems Are Mounting…So Naturally He’s Blabbing to the Press

Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images

The former president is back in the news due to more legal troubles, including a motion for sanctions in New York, renewed investigations by the Manhattan DA, an FBI investigation into his mishandling of sensitive materials after leaving office, and cooperation by some of his family members with the January 6 Committee. All this means that we likely are about to see and hear a lot more about Donald Trump, particularly as public hearings around January 6 dominate news coverage later this spring and he gears up to respond. Here’s a quick rundown of Trump’s continuing legal perils and problems.

NY Attorney General Letitia James Has Moved for Sanctions

After Trump and his two eldest adult children were ordered to appear for testimony and to produce documents in the New York state investigation of possible financial fraud, Donald Trump responded by filing yet more objections. But James quickly struck back: Yesterday, she filed a motion asking a court in Manhattan to hold Donald Trump in contempt for failing to provide the requested records by March 31, as he had been ordered to do. She asked further for monetary sanctions of $10,000 a day for as long as Trump does not comply.

As reported by The Washington Post, instead of turning over the documents, Trump instead had responded by “raising objections to each of the eight document requests in the subpoena based on grounds such as overbreadth, burden, and lack of particularity” according to her court filing. The time to raise such objections has long since passed, of course, so it appears Trump is seeking only to delay the production, a common tactic he has deployed in all his litigation. “This Court’s order was not an opening bid for a negotiation or an invitation for a new round of challenges to the subpoena," James’s office argued.

The Manhattan DA’s Criminal Investigation Is Still Kicking Around

The Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin Bragg, broke his long silence over developments in the criminal case for possible financial and tax fraud by the Trump Organization currently being investigated by his office. Earlier this spring, two veteran lead prosecutors tendered their resignations from the case, claiming that Bragg had stopped their work and suspended the grand jury. Bragg apparently believed that without a cooperating witness or smoking-gun documentation, his team lacked sufficient evidence against the former president to tie him to false and inflated valuations on Trump Organization properties. Trump’s CFO Allen Weisselberg has refused to flip, and Trump is notorious for leaving little to no paper trail of his misdeeds. 

After the departures of the two lead prosecutors, most legal experts had opined that the case was all but dead in the water. Not so, said Bragg yesterday, insisting that the investigation was continuing despite the resignations of the lead prosecutors. He claimed his office had recently interviewed two new witnesses and reviewed new documents that had not been part of the investigation to date.

Whether there will be some kind of new, game-changing evidence that will move Bragg off his reticence to bring charges remains to be seen. There was admittedly significant public pressure upon him following the resignations to explain his thinking and keep the investigation going, but up until yesterday he had refused to comment or signal anything about what was going on.

The FBI Is Preparing to Investigate Trump’s Classified Material Handling

One of the startling discoveries arising from efforts by the January 6 Committee to obtain Trump’s presidential records from the National Archives was some 15 boxes containing sensitive national security information. The boxes had been removed from the White House and sent not to the archivist but to Trump’s home in Mar-a-Lago. A battle of sorts has ensued for more information about the boxes and the documents, especially now that, as The New York Times reported, the FBI is preparing to or perhaps has already launched an investigation into the matter. 

Importantly, the Justice Department recently specifically instructed the National Archives not to discuss the matter or share any details of the materials with the House Oversight Committee, which is currently also investigating the issue. Such a move tends to imply that there may be a criminal investigation already underway. (The Oversight Committee was displeased by this instruction, claiming the Justice Department was obstructing the Committee’s own investigation by muzzling the National Archives.)

The removal of the highly classified information by Trump when he departed the White House is ironic given that so much attention was paid to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s private email server, with national headlines breathlessly suggesting that some kind of criminality might attach. This led to the oft-used “Lock her up!” chant at Trump rallies—and to charges now of double standards for what appear to be far more serious breaches and mishandling of sensitive materials by Donald Trump.

The President’s Daughter Ivanka Talked to the January 6 Committee

As I wrote about earlier, the biggest recent development for the Trump family is that Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner have both given numerous hours of testimony before the January 6 Committee, apparently without invoking either the Fifth Amendment or executive privilege. Asked about the testimony during an interview with the Washington Post, Donald Trump claimed he did not know what she had said, but labeled the pursuit of her testimony a “shame and harassment.”  Trump even admitted that he had offered the couple “privilege” if they wanted it, but they declined. (Trump’s statement is curious and rather misguided because executive privilege is normally considered to be held by the office of the president and is thus exercisable or waivable only by the sitting president, not the former president.)

If Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner provided anything substantive in their testimony, it is likely in the form of confirmation of what the January 6 Committee already knows. But their cooperation also could prove important because of its inherent credibility. After all, it is one thing for third parties such as General Keith Kellogg or the staff of former Vice President Mike Pence to claim that the former president was attempting to coerce Pence to betray his constitutional oath, and another for the daughter of the former president or her husband to say so, too.

Trump Is Starting to Blab to the Press

The increasing legal pressure upon the former president and his family may explain why Donald Trump decided finally to speak with The Washington Post about January 6, despite the perils that might arise legally. Without going into detail on the rambling, largely incoherent interview, Trump spent much of the time blaming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for failing to put down the insurrection, voicing regret that he was prevented from marching down to the Capitol with the crowd, and claiming that he was very disturbed by the images he was seeing on television that day. All of this is very likely false; his account is contradicted by the facts around Capitol security, statements by the secret service who he claims prevented him from attending the march, and by witnesses who said Donald Trump was enthralled rather than appalled by what he was seeing that day on his television and took no action to stop it.

Now that Trump has opened the door to him talking freely about January 6, some wonder whether the Committee might consider interviewing him or even subpoenaing him as a witness. After all, this could be a lose-lose situation for Trump, as any reluctance to appear under oath would be viewed as highly suspect given his apparent willingness to speak to the press openly about it, and if he does appear but pleads the Fifth, that might be used aggressively against him in political ads should he run in 2024 as currently expected. 

But such a request from the Committee remains unlikely. In response, Trump probably would claim, as many of his aides have, that the Committee itself is improperly constituted and has no authority to call him, and that it is little more than a political witch-hunt that he rightfully should ignore. This would set up a legal showdown that couldn’t realistically be resolved in time before the midterm elections happen, after which the fate of the Committee would be in serious doubt. 

But while Trump can probably run out the clock on the January 6 Committee, he can’t outrun the Justice Department should it decide to pursue criminal charges. They still have just under three years under Attorney General Merrick Garland to prosecute him—and perhaps even longer should a special prosecutor be appointed. All eyes therefore will be upon the Department to see how far up its investigation truly will go.