A former lawyer for former President Donald Trump says may not be charged in the ongoing classified documents investigation by special counsel Jack Smith.
Timothy Parlatore pointed to the lack of prosecution in the Hillary Clinton email case in 2016 when asked if he would be surprised if Trump is not charged, while on NBC News’s Meet the Press on Sunday.
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“Not at all. I think this is a case where, you know — you have to evaluate every case based on what are the facts and the law and is it something that’s provable, but there’s also the other atmospherics, is this something that from a discretion point of view, is this something where a prosecution makes sense? Is it something where it is a slam dunk case where some of these things could be interpreted a few different ways?” Parlatore said.
“And also when it comes to a specific issue like this, where we are talking about potentially national defense information. Is it the type of thing where they want to declassify these things if they haven’t already been declassified and put them out publicly?” he added.
Parlatore then discussed how prosecutors may not charge Trump using similar logic to why former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was not charged for the alleged mishandling of her emails in 2016.
“And I know not a lot of people are going to agree with this parallel, but to me, even if he did a lot of the things that they’re saying that he did, prosecuting him, there is the same reasons why you wouldn’t want to prosecute him as to why back in 2016, I was of the opinion that Hillary Clinton shouldn’t be prosecuted, because there are all of these other problems,” Parlatore said.
“Classification is not binding; you have to actually take these documents, show them to the jury, and then prove to them that it constitutes national defense information,” Parlatore added.
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Smith was appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland in November 2022 to investigate Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents, along with his alleged role in the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021.
A report last week suggested an audio recording of Trump exists from Summer 2021 where he discusses having a classified document in his possession regarding a potential attack from Iran.
