Why did Trump steal classified documents?

Toy Timothy L. O’Brien

We now know that the reason the FBI searched Donald Trump’s Palm Beach residence last week is because the 45th president is under investigation for possessing classified documents related to nuclear weapons and possibly violating the Espionage Act. He also may have lied to federal officials about the documents and obstructed justice.

Much of the debate that followed news of the FBI investigation focused on investigators’ motivations for executing a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago. That’s largely because Trump took advantage of the public relations gap in the wake of the investigation, filling a communication gap the Justice Department helped create by not providing more immediate clarity about its investigation.

Trump is not sophisticated or particularly intelligent, but messaging is one of his superpowers. Once he called the FBI investigation a politically motivated coup worthy of “broken, third-world countries,” his supporters at Fox News got to work repeating the same lies and talking points. Possible wrongdoing by the FBI became the focus of discussion about the investigation. Even well-intentioned analysts had their doubts.

But a few twists and turns in the census and a press briefing by Attorney General Merrick Garland have refocused attention on the suspected perpetrator, Trump. Continue to worry about the exaggeration of the FBI if you want, but more urgent answers are needed as to why Trump had the documents in the first place.

I think there are three possible reasons why Trump wanted to keep the classified documents to himself, even if we don’t yet know exactly what he had hidden in his Mar-a-Lago safe, closets and socks.

The first reason seems relatively harmless. Trump is a seven-year-old adult, and he liked some of the cool “toys” you get your hands on as president. He reportedly wanted to keep a model of Air Force One that showed a special paint job he had ordered for the presidential aircraft and resented the restrictions that prohibit him from keeping such things. Among the documents at issue at Mar-a-Lago was a weather map of Hurricane Dorian. Who knows why this map was so important to him? Who cares;

The second and third reasons are not at all harmless. They are deeply damaging and disturbing.

So, second reason: money. Unlimited greed has driven Trump throughout his life. He didn’t get into the casino business to beautify Atlantic City. He did not propose a mega-development on the west side of Manhattan because it would make New York more livable. He didn’t start Trump University to educate students and he didn’t join “The Apprentice” to teach entrepreneurs. He did not initially run for president to revive democracy. Money, money, money.

Other Trump administration alumni have made money in ways that should raise national security concerns. Former White House Counsel Jared Kushner (Trump’s son-in-law) and former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin have received billions of dollars from Saudi Arabia for various deals. These deals still look like influence peddling, but to Trump they no doubt looked like huge and enviable payouts. It must occur to him that if the Kushners and Mnuchins could collect billions because of their proximity to him, he could sell himself — or possibly government secrets — for even higher prices.

It is recalled that Trump’s businesses are in a difficult position. When Trump left the White House, his businesses were saddled with about $1 billion in debt, $900 million of which must be paid off relatively soon. He personally guaranteed the repayment of about $421 million of that debt. And its businesses – which focus on urban real estate and leisure – have been hit by the economic downturn in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. Trump and his company, the Trump Organization, also face civil and criminal fraud investigations in New York that could put him out of business.

This is a lot of financial pressure, especially for someone who is already prone to being stingy. It should also raise alarm bells for any reasonable analyst concerned that Trump may have been inspired to use the powers and access to records his presidency afforded him to hoard, sell classified information after leaving the White House. Maybe that won’t turn out to be the case – and I hope it won’t – but it would be wise to be extremely vigilant around this particular problem.

Third reason: Damage to reputation. Trump reportedly kept letters he exchanged with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. Perhaps vanity inspired the move because Trump has referred to such correspondence as “love letters.” But what other communications are contained in the documents kept by Trump? Something with Russian President Vladimir Putin or Chinese President Xi Jinping? How about documents relating to Trump’s phone conversations with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky from the time Trump was trying to pressure Zelensky to dig up dirt on his political rival, Joe Biden. Those communications led to the first of two impeachment proceedings against Trump.

Perhaps there is nothing of the kind in the documents kept by Trump. But it is not unreasonable to worry that his communications with foreign leaders – and anything shameful or possibly illegal that took place in connection with them – could be something he felt compelled to conceal.

The frenzied pace at which Trump has been spreading lies since the Mar-a-Lago investigation certainly suggests he has something to hide and is concerned about the investigation. After all, he has claimed, without even a shred of truth, that the FBI planted evidence at Mar-a-Lago. Trump also claimed he was not the first president to get classified information and said former President Barack Obama kept 33 million pages of documents, “many of which were classified.” The National Archives audits all Obama documents and immediately denied this claim.

Trump and his allies have also argued that Trump had the authority to declassify all documents in his possession as president and that he declassified the disputed documents kept at Mar-a-Lago. No damage, no error. But as Barbara McQuade, a professor at the University of Michigan Law School and a former federal prosecutor, has pointed out, that distinction doesn’t matter.

“Categorization is irrelevant,” McQuade noted on Twitter. “Government documents related to national defense cannot be withheld upon request for return. The obstruction charge in the warrant suggests that Trump tried to hide what he had.”

Trump has also used more direct actions. The New York Times reported that he had an intermediary warn Garland before his press conference last week that people were outraged by the FBI’s investigation into Mar-a-Lago. Armed Trump supporters have since demonstrated outside the FBI offices in Phoenix. A gunman who stormed an FBI office in Cincinnati last Thursday was shot and killed. The federal judge who approved the FBI’s search warrant at Mar-a-Lago has received anti-Semitic attacks and threats online.

Sorting out this investigation before the violence escalates further should be a priority for the police, but it needs to be sorted out. Watering down an investigation into whether a former president stole government secrets and what he wanted to do with them—especially if it involved espionage—because of violence or threats of violence simply favors Trump.