{"id":92684,"date":"2023-06-20T11:48:44","date_gmt":"2023-06-20T15:48:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.citizen.org\/?post_type=news&#038;p=92684"},"modified":"2023-06-27T10:55:12","modified_gmt":"2023-06-27T14:55:12","slug":"no-both-sidesing-trump-indictment-says-public-citizens-vp","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.citizen.org\/news\/no-both-sidesing-trump-indictment-says-public-citizens-vp\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;No Both-Sidesing&#8217; Trump Indictment, Says Public Citizen\u2019s VP"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Washington, D.C. \u2013 Since news broke of former U.S. President Trump\u2019s indictment on federal charges, prominent Trump allies and conservative legal experts have weighed in on the truth about the documents and what they mean for Trump. In response, <strong>Lisa Gilbert, executive vice president of Public Citizen, released the following statement:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThere is no both-sidesing this indictment. Key Republicans and former Trump administration officials who have looked at the facts admit that these charges are credible, serious, and necessary.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWhile Trump and his allies continue their bluster, the media should focus on the facts of the indictment and the unprecedented obstruction it outlines: Trump repeatedly blocked federal law enforcement officials who were attempting to retrieve <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/charges-against-donald-trump-indictment-documents\/\">approximately 300 classified documents<\/a> that endanger our national security; and he directed his staff and lawyers to hide evidence, lie, and obstruct the FBI and grand jury in an attempt to keep them from recovering these documents\u2014which contained highly classified national security information.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cAs the overwhelmingly bipartisan response to the seriousness of this indictment shows, Americans are united in the belief that no one is above the law, not even a former president of the United States.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Background:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Here\u2019s what key Republicans\u2014including former Trump administration officials\u2014are saying about the bombshell indictment by the Department of Justice:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Former Trump Administration Attorney General Bill Barr: <\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;If even half of it is true, then he&#8217;s toast. I mean, it&#8217;s a very detailed indictment, and it&#8217;s very, very damning. This idea of presenting Trump as a victim here\u2014a victim of a witch hunt\u2014is ridiculous.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;The counts under the Espionage Act&#8230;are solid counts.&#8221; (<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/atrupar\/status\/1667896395804622848\">Source<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Former Trump Administration Homeland Security Secretary and White House Chief of Staff John Kelly:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cHe\u2019s scared s&#8212;less,\u201d said John Kelly, his former chief of staff. \u201cThis is the way he compensates for that. He gives people the appearance he doesn\u2019t care by doing this. For the first time in his life, it looks like he\u2019s being held accountable. Up until this point in his life, it\u2019s like, I\u2019m not going to pay you; take me to court. He\u2019s never been held accountable before.\u201d (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/politics\/2023\/06\/13\/donald-trump-arraignment-day-speech\/\">Source<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Former Trump Administration Secretary of State Mike Pompeo:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cIf the allegations are true, and there\u2019s lots of indications they are, President Trump had classified documents where he shouldn\u2019t have had them, and then when given the opportunity to return them he chose not to do that for whatever reason.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>\u201cI handled thousands and thousands of [classified documents] over my time in Congress and then as the CIA Director and Secretary of State. I suppose we can all make mistakes\u2026 but when somebody identifies that, you\u2019ve got to turn them in.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>\u201cThat\u2019s inconsistent with protecting America\u2019s soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines, and if the allegations are true, some of these were pretty serious, important documents. So that\u2019s wrong.\u201d (<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ronfilipkowski\/status\/1668657854557958152?s=46&amp;t=bPBHxxqGKEV5W9bvO9033Q\">Source<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Former Trump Administration Secretary of Defense Mike Esper:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cI think some of the investigations have been politically tinged against him. This one, I don\u2019t think so.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>\u201cIt was clear he had classified documents. I know what\u2019s important about handling classified documents. This is serious. If you were a young soldier, sailor, or airman and had classified documents at your home, you\u2019d be court-martialed. You could see jail time.\u201d (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sltrib.com\/news\/politics\/2023\/06\/09\/trump-indictment-not-politically\/\">Source<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>\u201cThere are two basic principles. Nobody is above the law, and everybody is innocent until proven guilty.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>\u201cPeople have described him as a hoarder when it comes to these type of documents. But clearly, it was unauthorized, illegal and dangerous.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>\u201cI mean, it\u2019s just irresponsible action that places our service members at risk, places our nation\u2019s security at risk. You cannot have these documents floating around.\u201d (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2023\/06\/18\/mark-esper-secrets-trump-classified-00102541\">Source<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Jay Town, former U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Alabama (Trump Administration, 2017-2020):<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cThe evidence in this indictment is very damning for the former President.&#8221; (<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/rgoodlaw\/status\/1667899281531977728\">Source<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Conservative legal commentator Andrew McCarthy:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cIt\u2019s a devastating document. If they can prove half of it, he\u2019s toast.\u2026 They can probably prove more than half of it, because a lot of it is recorded conversations, testimony from his lawyers, and that sort of thing.\u201d (<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/rgoodlaw\/status\/1667905359233667076\">Source<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Fox News legal commentator and GOP impeachment hearing witness Jonathan Turley: <\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cIt is an extremely damning indictment.\u201d (<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/rgoodlaw\/status\/1667908599031496706\">Source<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>CNN legal commentator and Republican campaign advisor Scott Jennings:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;I seriously doubt you&#8217;re going to hear a serious person say, oh, well, this is fine and &#8230; this is actually why this is okay. If you hear somebody doing that, that&#8217;s crazy talk.&#8221; (<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/rgoodlaw\/status\/1667910780258246659\">Source<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n ","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"class_list":["post-92684","news","type-news","status-publish","hentry","tax_topic-protecting-democracy","tax_supertag-taking-on-trump","tax_news-press"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>&#039;No Both-Sidesing&#039; Trump Indictment, Says Public Citizen\u2019s VP - Public Citizen<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Since news broke of former U.S. President Trump\u2019s indictment on federal charges, prominent Trump allies and conservative legal experts have weighed in on the truth about the documents and what they mean for Trump.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.citizen.org\/news\/no-both-sidesing-trump-indictment-says-public-citizens-vp\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"&#039;No Both-Sidesing&#039; 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