Osodecentx said:
whiterock said:
FLBear5630 said:
whiterock said:
FLBear5630 said:
Osodecentx said:
sombear said:
historian said:
Osodecentx said:
historian said:
As I understand the situation, as president Trump had the authority to declassify documents.
You misunderstand. I suggest more research. A president cannot declassify by merely thinking the act in retrospect.
I never said the president declassified a document by merely thinking it. That's stupid & ludicrous. I don't know what the actual procedure is but no doubt if he wanted those documents declassified he could have done that before leaving office. That's what he did.
His attorney have publicly stated that he is not even making that argument.
Wrong.
Trump: I could declassify documents by thinking about it
The former president insisted in an interview with Sean Hannity that the documents at issue in the Mar-a-Lago probe were all declassified. Evidence, he added, isn't really needed.
Donald Trump insisted he had declassified the documents in question when he left the White House, again without pointing to proof of such.
Former President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that he had declassified the documents he took with him to his Mar-a-Lago estate that have since become the subject of an extensive Justice Department investigation.
Speaking on Fox News' "Hannity," Trump declined to point to specific evidence of that declassification. But, in a pre-recorded interview, he told host Sean Hannity that evidence was not needed.
"There doesn't have to be a process, as I understand it," Trump said. "You're the president of the United States, you can declassify just by saying it's declassified, even by thinking about it."
Pressed further, Trump insisted he had declassified the documents in question when he left the White House, again without pointing to proof of such.
"In other words, when I left the White House, they were declassified," Trump said.
The comments came during a discussion of the ongoing criminal investigation of the highly sensitive documents seized by federal agents from Trump's home and resort in Florida. And they were offered as the ex-president's own legal team has resisted efforts to back up the assertion that the documents in question were declassified.
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/21/trump-i-could-declassify-documents-by-thinking-about-it-00058212
Now it is "as I understand it..."
Concept: the originating authority cannot be encumbered. To do so subordinates that authority to another,
Yeah, it was I can do it. If I think about it on the way to the toilet it is declassified, to "as I understand it". You don't see a backing off the position in that????
Originating authority cannot be encumbered, but the originating authority has to identify what is being declassified before it is declassified.
he can do so by simply revealing it, verbally or manually, without any prior action required. All Presidents have done so, frequently.
It can't be after the fact and the subordinates have to know what is being declassified. Without ANY documentation there is no way to prove it. He is screwed. Unless, there is document control. With your extensive knowledge of how this works, you are aware of document control? Try this to refresh your memory.
I had to worry about document control.....the officers under my command had to worry about document control....the officers above me had to worry about document control......because all of us had derivative authority to originate, possess, and use classified information derivative of POTUS, who has no such encumberance. No one else has the power to look at POTUS and say "oh, sir, you cannot do that!" because to do so would subordinate originating authority.
DoDM 5200.01 Vol 1, "DoD Information Security Program: Overview, Classification, and Declassification," February 24, 2012, Incorporating Change 2 on July 28, 2020 (whs.mil)
There are set requirements for how this happens. Trump just deciding to go to the Residence and thinking this is declassified is not part of this process. As I said, if there is no paper trail, which I believe there is not due to where we are, he is going to be found guilty. What that entails, who knows. But, to say he can't be encumbered is an oversimplification. For example,
No. There is no requirement that POTUS must fill out any forms, for either prior approval or to subsequently perfect an act. he/she may dispose at discretion. ALL procedures for classification, use, declassification flow from POTUS originating authority. Any deviations from protocols are presumed to be changes in protocols. Has always been so.
- there are Presidential Memorandum dictating how this all occurs, did he rescind them before he determined what was declassified?
See above. Doesn't matter. Deviations from his instructed procedures are always presumed to be changes in procedure.
- The documents generated in his 4 years may be found to be that he has the right to just declass. But anything originating from other Presidents he did not.
Nope. He may declassify or classify anything, regardless of what a predecessor or successor chose to do. Obama classifying something does not limit Trump's declassification of it. Similarly, Biden's classification of something Trump declassified is also binding. (and in fact, that was done in this particular case.....)
- Was anything he declassified determined by NARA and the current administration to make the securing the US more difficult? That is not his call, but NARA and the current administration.
NARA cannot determine anything without superseding POTUS originating authority! They cannot say "you did not perfect your declassification" for reasons outlined above.
You worked in MI in the military. I worked 3 years in JAG, it is not as open shut as you would like to believe.
A President CANNOT commit a security violation.
The weakness in your analysis is, at every turn, an implicit assumption that a President has no more latitude than a Sergeant, Lieutenant, General, etc....that a POTUS must obey "the rules." Problem is, POTUS.....IS the rules. His/her actions require no prior approvals or process. They may act on discretion, and those actions are both dispositive and indicative.
Then the files in Biden's garage (from Obama era) were ex post facto declassified when Joe "thought" about it after Jan 20, 2021?
Ridiculous
Are Trump's lawyers even asserting the "mere thinking = declassification" defense?
No. Biden was not POTUS when he took those files to his garage, so he did not have original authority at that time. Now, he could have, solely upon his own determination, declassified them after his inauguration. Whether he would have had to execute a document to do so, or simply tell an investigator "those are now declassified" when asked, is within the realm of the argument Trump is making. But that would not have had the ex post facto effect you allege. The relocation of those documents to his garage most definitely did break law the moment the move occurred. Biden's only defense is for Obama to chime in and say "I told him he could take them." BIden could only have cover for what he did with them (or others) after his own inauguration.
There is no legal requirement that a POTUS do anything, file any memo, etc.... to declassify a document. Show me where He/She is so encumbered. They are not. Because THEY ARE THE ULTIMATE AUTHORITY on such questions. And Trump most certainly was POTUS when those boxes at MAL left the WH.
But that's all tempest in a teapot, minutia about procedure, compared to the idea that a POTUS could be charged with ESPIONAGE for having moved, while POTUS, a document to his residence and then dared to make legal arguments that such was within his power.
This SCOTUS is not likely to encumber the office of President with the kind of restrictions on original authority the Trump prosecution seeks. It is going to let the political process handle such things......let the voters decide.
