What Was Trump’s Motive for Keeping Documents?
For all the detailed evidence laid out in the 38-count indictment accusing former President Donald J. Trump of holding onto hundreds of classified documents and then obstructing the government’s efforts to retrieve them, one mystery remains: Why did he take them and fight so hard to keep them?
Mr. Trump’s motive for having thousands of presidential records — including more than 300 classified documents — at Mar-a-Lago, his combination residence and members-only club in Palm Beach, Fla., was not addressed directly in the 49-page indictment filed on Thursday in Miami. The charging document did not establish that Mr. Trump had a broader goal beyond simply possessing the material.
While finding a motive could certainly be useful for prosecutors should Mr. Trump end up at trial, it may not be necessary in proving the legal elements of the case against him. Nonetheless, why Mr. Trump held onto an extensive collection of highly confidential documents and then, prosecutors say, schemed to avoid returning them remains an unanswered question — even after nearly 15 months of investigation by the Justice Department.
The indictment did offer some hints.
It described how Mr. Trump, who often focuses on payback against perceived enemies, brandished a classified “plan of attack” against Iran at a meeting in July 2021 at Bedminster, his golf club in New Jersey, as a way to rebut what he perceived to be criticism from Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In a recording of the meeting, Mr. Trump can be heard rustling paper and telling those around him that the document in question proved that he was right in his dispute with General Milley.
Source: The New York Times
