Former President Donald Trump has defended keeping boxes of classified documents, claiming he needed time to sort through them because they contained personal items, including golf shirts.
“Like every other president, I take things out,” Trump told Fox News on Monday. “In my case, I took it out pretty much in a hurry, but people packed it up, and we left. And I had clothing in there. I had all sorts of personal items.”
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“I want to go through the boxes and get all my personal things out,” he added during the interview with host Bret Baier. “I don’t want to hand that over to NARA yet. And I was very busy. As you have sort of seen.”
“NARA” is the National Archives and Record Administration, and it was the federal agency’s requests for Trump to return the documents that resulted in the Justice Department‘s investigation into the former president.
Trump repeated that special counsel Jack Smith‘s documents case should not be a criminal matter and that he had the power to declassify the material under the Presidential Records Act. When asked about documents that allegedly related to his administration’s Iran attack plans and were discussed by the former president on tape with people without security clearances, he reiterated, “Not that I know of” and that “everything was declassified.” He was also adamant he no longer has any material and that he is not concerned about the case.
“Based on the law, zero. Zero,” he said.
Trump, too, targeted his former attorney general Bill Barr, who has increasingly criticized his onetime boss over the documents case, contending he fired him. Barr has insisted he resigned over Trump’s refusal to concede after the 2020 election and the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.
“Bill Barr was a coward,” Trump said. “Bill Barr didn’t do what he was supposed to do. I fired him, and he has great hatred, and that’s OK because some people do. And I loved him very much. He didn’t resign.”
Trump, who in the past has had problems articulating his priorities for a second term, listed addressing the economy and inflation, border security, energy independence, woke military policies, and the country’s standing abroad. He additionally declined to commit that the United States would militarily defend Taiwan.
“I’m not going to say that because that hurts me in negotiations with regard to President Xi [Jinping],” he said of the Chinese leader.
Trump, the front-runner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, promised to try to be “less combative” if he wins a second term but said he has trouble conveying his message because news outlets are “extremely dishonest.” When pressed on how he will court independent women before next year’s elections, he only stressed he did not lose the last contest, adding Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner would not come back to the White House.
“No, I said that’s enough for the family,” he said. “It’s too painful for the family. My family has been through hell.”
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Donald Trump was indicted this month on 37 federal felony counts after allegedly illegally retaining and concealing national defense information, in addition to obstructing the Justice Department’s investigation into the documents. He pleaded not guilty during his arraignment last week in Miami.
A federal judge approved a protective order sought by the special counsel Monday that prevents Donald Trump and co-defendant Walt Nauta from holding on to and sharing evidence the government discloses to them and their attorneys as part of the discovery process without court permission. The order similarly restricts the former president’s access to the material. The defense did not object.
