Classified

Saturday January 14, 2023

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday January 14, 2023

How the Trump, Biden classified documents cases compare

The revelation that classified materials were discovered at think tank offices formerly used by President Joe Biden, as well as at the president’s Delaware home, has prompted questions on how the circumstances compare with the seizure last year of hundreds of documents marked as classified from Mar-a-Lago, the Florida residence of former President Donald Trump.

May 27, 2020

A side-by-side look at the similarities and differences between the two situations:

How many classified documents are we talking about?

BIDEN: It’s unclear precisely how many classified materials have been obtained from Biden’s office and home. Richard Sauber, special counsel to the president, said Monday that “a small number of documents with classified markings” were discovered on Nov. 2, 2022, in a locked closet at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement, a think tank in Washington, as Biden’s personal attorneys were clearing out the offices.

Biden kept an office at the Penn Center after he left the vice presidency in 2017 until shortly before he launched his 2020 presidential campaign. It was affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania and continued to operate independently of the Biden administration.

On Thursday, Sauber said a second batch of documents with classified markings — a “small number,” he said — had been found in a storage space in Biden’s garage in Wilmington, Delaware, with one document being located in Biden’s personal library in his home.

TRUMP: Roughly 300 documents with classification markings — including some at the top secret level — have been recovered from Trump since he left office in January 2021.

Wednesday August 10, 2022

In January 2022, the National Archives and Records Administration retrieved 15 boxes of documents, telling Justice Department officials they contained “a lot” of classified material. In August, FBI agents took about 33 boxes and containers of 11,000 documents from Mar-a-Lago, including roughly 100 with classification markings found in a storage room and an office.

How quickly were the classified documents turned over?

BIDEN: After the materials were discovered at the think tank, Biden’s personal attorneys immediately alerted the White House counsel’s office, which notified NARA, which took custody of the documents the next day, Sauber said.

“Since that discovery, the President’s personal attorneys have cooperated with the Archives and the Department of Justice in a process to ensure that any Obama-Biden Administration records are appropriately in the possession of the Archives,” Sauber said in a statement.

Part of that cooperation, Sauber said this week, included Biden’s personal lawyers examining other locations where records might have been shipped after Biden left the vice presidency in 2017. That search concluded Wednesday night, Biden told reporters at the White House on Thursday, though he did not say when the second batch of documents was found.

Sauber said the Justice Department was “immediately notified” after the documents were found at Biden’s home and that department lawyers took custody of the records.

February 11, 2021

The revelation that additional classified documents were uncovered by Biden’s attorneys came hours after White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre dodged questions about Biden’s handling of classified information and the West Wing’s management of the discovery. She said the White House was committed to handling the matter in the “right way,” pointing to Biden’s personal attorneys’ immediate notification of the National Archives.

TRUMP: A Trump representative told NARA in December 2021 that presidential records had been found at Mar-a-Lago, nearly a year after Trump left office. Fifteen boxes of records containing some classified material were transferred from Mar-Lago to NARA in January.

A few months later, investigators from the Justice Department and FBI visited Mar-a-Lago to get more information about classified materials taken to Florida. Federal officials also served a subpoena for some documents believed to be at the estate.

In August 2022, FBI agents conducting a search retrieved 33 boxes from Mar-a-Lago. The search came after lawyers for Trump provided a sworn certification that all government records had been returned. (Continued: PBS) 

 

Friday September 24, 2022

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday September 24, 2022

“It’s not magic. It’s delusion”

April 11, 2017

Perhaps the starkest example of how dramatically Donald Trump’s fortunes have changed in just a matter of days is contained in the opening paragraph of New York Attorney General Leticia James’ financial-fraud civil lawsuit against Trump and his family. Gone is any semblance of deference that Trump typically expects as a billionaire ex-president. There is no hint of acknowledgment of his claim to special privileges. Rather, Trump gets the same treatment that prosecutors afford common criminals, commanded by James to appear in court or face default judgment on more than 200 allegations of financial fraud and a $250 million fine.

Trump’s no-good, terrible, very bad day was a great day for Americans who want to put an end to his lawlessness and lies, once and for all. His bad day also included a federal appeals court ruling bluntly trashing Trump’s claim that the Justice Department should be denied criminal investigatory access to about 100 classified files that were among a trove of government documents Trump unlawfully possessed at his Florida estate. Trump has presented a convoluted argument that he somehow possessed special privileges as an ex-president to keep such files. The documents are the U.S. government’s sole property.

January 6, 2022

Trump also made the bizarre claim Wednesday on Fox News that he had authority to declassify those documents merely by pronouncing it verbally or “even by thinking about it.” Thus, he asserted, that no paper trail was needed to establish his legal authority to possess highly sensitive materials, unsecured, at his Mar-a-Lago estate.

By merely thinking they were declassified, Trump would have done his job. It would then be incumbent upon clairvoyant government officials to discern that he was abiding by the law instead of endangering national security by leaving the documents exposed to foreign espionage. Presumably, Trump would have used these magical thinking powers while he was still president, since ex-presidents have never had the power to declare verbally, in writing or using telepathy that highly classified materials are now declassified.

July 23, 2022

But this is the absurd degree to which Trump — who millions of Republicans still want back in the White House — deludes himself about his own powers. Add to that the hundreds of examples of Trumpian self-delusion contained within the New York attorney general’s lawsuit alleging financial fraud, and it should be clear to all Americans by now that Trump is a dangerous, unabashed con man whose only goal is his political or financial advancement.

Trump can try to deflect with accusations of a Democratic “witch hunt” and by labeling James as “racist” because she’s a Black woman pursuing justice against a white man. But the 222-page lawsuit speaks for itself. It is detailed, well-documented and damning.

Trump’s courtroom comeuppance ultimately would serve Americans of all political stripes because it would affirm a concept that badly needs affirmation: That no person is above the law. (St. Louis Post-Dispatch) 

From sketch to finish, see the current way Graeme completes an editorial cartoon using an iPencil, the Procreate app, and a couple of cheats on an iPad Pro …

 

Wednesday October 2, 2004

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday October 2, 2004

McGuinty’s Taxing First Year

A year ago Liberal Leader Dalton McGuinty solemnly pledged to Ontarians in prime-time TV election ads that he would make Ontario a better place without raising taxes.

A year later, Ontarians who voted for the “choose change” motto and believed the party would follow through on its election commitments face a harsh and opposite reality.

Instead, over the next four years Ontarians will be paying $9 billion more in taxes thanks to a hefty health premium that now-Premier McGuinty continues to insist he had to implement because a huge deficit left him with no choice.

“You bet that put a crimp in our plans,” McGuinty said, still blaming the derailing of the rookie government’s plans on the multibillion-dollar deficit left behind by the previous Conservative government.

“We made a very difficult decision, not a popular decision,” McGuinty acknowledged in an interview as the Liberal government arrives at the first anniversary of its election today.

“It wasn’t the kind of thing designed to boost our political popularity,” he said with a smile of resignation after facing months of relentless criticism for breaking his marquee election promise. “It was designed to get more money so we could invest and improve the quality of our health-care system for Ontarians,” he explained.

“I’m proud to report we’re making some real, measurable progress.” (CP)