No. of Recommendations: 12
Except that the kerfluffle here is over superdupersecret classified info. I agree with you that a baseball bat and a cocktail napkin aren't that. I would disagree with you in characterizing *either* as government property.
Classified info is government property. A cocktail napkin almost certainly isn't. The baseball bat might be - some gifts to the President as President aren't his to keep, personally. Some belong to the U.S.
As I said upthread, I find this whole thing really amusing. As you guys build your case against Trump and prepare his jail cell, you're also building one for Hillary! and one for Biden.
I think the only reason you find it amusing is because you're not paying attention to specifics of the criminal statutes.
It's not a crime to retain classified documents you're allowed to have. It's (generally) not a crime to keep classified documents you acquired when you were legally allowed to obtain them, even after your authority to have classified information has ended. Trump frequently used Mar-a-Lago for business when he was President, and it was perfectly fine for him to have classified documents there - and merely having them stay there after his term ended would not have constituted a crime.
The criminal violations all would have occurred after the government asked for that material back. Once they've notified you that you have national defense documents, if you willfully refuse to give them back then you are committing a federal crime. If you take steps to conceal the fact that you are failing to give them back, you are committing another federal crime. If you lie about the steps you took to conceal your failure to give them back, it's yet another crime. The crime isn't "mishandling" classified material that you're legally entitled to possess - it's when you willfully refuse to return the material that you start facing criminal jeopardy.
None of that is present with Clinton or Biden.
