Former President Donald Trump has pleaded not guilty to 37 felony counts relating to his handling of classified documents after leaving office in 2021. Now, he has finally offered a reason as to why he refused to return the boxes of documents to the federal government.
After his arraignment at a Miami courthouse on Tuesday, the former president took off for Bedminster, New Jersey, where he delivered a speech to supporters at one of his golf clubs.
During the speech, Trump said that he hadn’t returned the boxes of classified documents because he had his clothes inside some of them.
“Many people have asked me why I had these boxes. Why did you want them?” Trump said. “The answer, in addition to having every right under the Presidential Records Act, is that these boxes were containing all types of personal belongings — many, many things, shirts and shoes, everything.”
Trump has continued to dodge questions about why he didn’t return the documents the government claimed he took after losing the 2020 election.
During his speech at his golf club, things changed, as Trump pushed several accusations, including that the photo of boxes stacked in his bathroom at Mar-a-Lago was staged. He also claimed that “someone” dumped the contents of one of the boxes on the floor.
Trump then said he would have pulled classified material from the boxes, but he hadn’t had the time yet.
“I hadn’t had a chance to go through all the boxes,” Trump said. “It’s a long tedious job, it takes a long time — which I was prepared to do, but I have a very busy life. I’ve had a very busy life.”
Trump also maintained that the indictment is a politically motivated stunt designed to stop him from running in the 2024 election. He also went as far as to call President Joe Biden a “dictator.”
As for his case, Trump’s legal team is expected to argue that the former president was in his legal right to keep documents, thanks to the Presidential Records Act.
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