Donald Trump, William Barr trade potshots over classified documents case

Bill Barr, like Mr Trump, is a Republican. He was attorney-general under George H.W. Bush in the early 1990s, and again under Mr Trump from February of 2019 to December of 2020.

Like several of Mr Trump’s other cabinet secretaries, including Mr Barr’s predecessor as attorney-general, Jeff Sessions, he eventually left the administration in deeply acrimonious circumstances.

Mr Barr had drawn Mr Trump’s ire for refusing to go along with the then-president’s baseless claims that widespread voter fraud had caused his defeat to Joe Biden in the 2020 election. As tensions between the pair flared into public view, he decided to resign.

Mr Trump is now in serious legal jeopardy, having been indicted by a federal grand jury. He is the first US president to face federal criminal charges. And they come on top of a civil case in New York, concerning alleged hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels.

The government alleges that Mr Trump illegally retained sensitive national security documents when he left office and became a private citizen, storing them at his residences in Florida and New Jersey.

It further alleges that he failed to return the documents when repeatedly asked, defied a subpoena, lied about keeping some of them, and showed some to people who lacked the necessary security clearances.

The FBI raided his Florida residence, Mar-a-Lago, last August, where prosecutors allege boxes full of sensitive government documents were found, some with markings indicating they were highly classified.

Mr Trump has been charged with 31 counts of wilful retention of national defence information, and one count each of conspiracy to obstruct justice, withholding a document or record, corruptly concealing a document or record, concealing a document in a federal investigation, scheme to conceal, and false statements and representations.

If convicted, he could face a prison sentence.

The indictment was revealed in full on Friday. It alleges that Mr Trump stored documents “in a ballroom, a bathroom and shower, an office space, his bedroom, and a storage room”. There are photos of boxes being stored in these locations.

It says the documents in question included “information regarding defence and weapons capabilities of both the United States and foreign countries, United States nuclear programs, potential vulnerability of the United States and its allies to military attack, and plans for possible retaliation in response to a foreign attack”.

‘If even half of it is true, he’s toast’

Speaking to Fox News on Sunday, Mr Barr stressed that the documents allegedly in Mr Trump’s possession belonged to the government, not him, and should have been stored in secure facilities.

“Now, I do think we have to wait and see what the defence says, and what proves to be true, but I do think that if even half of it is true, then he’s toast,” Mr Barr said.

“I mean, it’s a very detailed indictment. And it’s very, very damning. And the idea of presenting Trump as a victim here, a victim of a witch hunt, is ridiculous.

“Yes, he’s been a victim in the past. Yes, his adversaries have obsessively pursued him with phony claims. And I’ve been at his side defending against them when he is a victim. But this is much different. He’s not a victim here. He was totally wrong.

“Those documents are among the most sensitive secrets that the country has. They have to be in the custody of the archivist. He had no right to retain them. And he kept them in a way that anyone who really cares about national security – their stomach would churn at it.”

Mr Trump’s supporters have alleged there is bias and hypocrisy in the decision to prosecute him, pointing to former secretary of state Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server for government business, for which she was investigated but never charged.

They have also pointed to the fact the Mr Biden and Mr Trump’s vice president, Mike Pence, were both recently found to wrongly be in possession of sensitive government documents.

Mr Biden and Mr Pence returned the documents in question when they were discovered. Prosecutors allege Mr Trump refused to do so, and in addition, covered up the fact that he’d retained them.

Mr Trump himself has alleged that his predecessors also took documents with them after leaving office (for eventual use in their presidential libraries).

“There are two big lies that are out there right now,” Mr Barr argued.

“One is that, ‘Oh, these other presidents took all these documents.’ Those were situations where they arranged with the archives to set up special space, under the management, control and security provided by the archivist, to temporarily put documents until the libraries were ready. These were not people just putting them in their basement.

“And the second thing, this idea that the president has complete authority to declare any document personal, is obviously, facially ridiculous.”

He said “personal” documents were those “prepared by the president”, such as notes or diaries, as opposed to those prepared by the government for his use in office.

“Stuff the president himself generates, he has some discretion. But these are official documents. It’s inarguable. The president’s daily brief, provided by the intelligence community, is not Donald Trump’s personal document.”

Mr Barr said he was “shocked by the degree of sensitivity” of the documents allegedly in Mr Trump’s possession “and how many there were”.

“The government’s agenda was to get those, protect those documents, and get them out, and I think it was perfectly appropriate to do that, it was the right thing to do,” he said.

“We can’t forget here that this entire thing came about because of reckless conduct of the president. If he had just turned over the documents, which I think every other person in the country would have done – they’re the government’s documents, they’re official records, they’re not his personal records – battle plans for an attack on another country, or defence department documents about our capabilities, are in no universe Donald Trump’s personal documents. They are the government’s documents.

“They gave him every opportunity to return those documents. They acted with restraint. They were very deferential with him and they were very patient. They talked to him for almost a year to get those documents and he jerked them around.

“They finally went to a subpoena, and what did he do? According to the government, he lied and obstructed that subpoena. And then they did a search and they found more documents. I don’t think they’re even sure now if they have everything.

“So, they acted in a very patient way and what they were met with was, according to the government and the indictment, very egregious obstruction.”

‘Gutless pig’: Trump fires back

Mr Trump initially responded to Mr Barr’s analysis on his social media platform, Truth Social, calling him a “disgruntled former employee” who was “lazy”, “weak” and “totally ineffective” as attorney-general.

“He doesn’t mean what he’s saying, it is just MISINFORMATION. Barr’s doing it because he hates ‘TRUMP’ for firing him. He was deathly afraid of the Radical Left when they said they would impeach him,” said the former president.

“He knows the indictment is bulls***. Turn off Fox News when that ‘Gutless Pig’ is on!”

Mr Trump subsequently continued the spray on New York radio while speaking to his former political adviser Roger Stone, whom he pardoned using his presidential powers in 2020. Mr Stone had been convicted of lying to Congress, witness tampering and obstruction.

“This thing is a disgrace,” Mr Trump said of the indictment, before alluding to Mr Barr’s refusal to play along with his false voter fraud claims as attorney-general.

“Virtually everybody other than a lowlife like Bill Barr, who, as you know, I terminated because he was gutless. He wouldn’t do what you’re supposed to do. But everybody says this is a disgraceful indictment.

“I think he’s a coward who didn’t do his job. We had unbelievable people, as you know, in the administration. But we also had some that we got wrong. And Bill Barr was a mistake.

“And now he goes and he sits down – if they can find a chair for him, because it’s not that easy – and he sits down and he just bloviates and it’s disgraceful. It is actually unpatriotic. It is so bad for our country, just so bad. But, you know, he’s got a lot of hatred.

“When I talk about a slob like Bill Barr, just a stupid person in a lot of ways, this is really not the standard.”

Mr Trump is scheduled to be arraigned in a Florida court on Tuesday, US time.