Summary
Donald Trump search warrant is released. The FBI executed a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago after finding probable cause of a crime. Interview with Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT).
Transcript
ALICIA MENENDEZ, MSNBC HOST: MSNBC PRIME starts right now with Ali Velshi.
Hi, Ali.
ALI VELSHI, MSNBC HOST: Saturday and Sunday after working this whole week?
MENENDEZ: It`s the weekend. I`m about to work some more.
VELSHI: We shall see you on TV tomorrow then, Alicia.
MENENDEZ: Bye.
VELSHI: Thank you for a great week. Nice to see you.
And thanks to you for joining us this hour. Happy Friday. Let`s start right in.
Here it is, the title, quote, search and seizure warrant. It was filed in the United States district court for the southern district of Florida and it reads, quote, in the matter of the search of the premises located that 1100 South Ocean Boulevard Palm Beach, Florida, as further described in attachment A.
Okay, so here is attachment A. Quote: Property to be searched. The promises to be searched his further described as a resort club and the residents. It is described as a mansion with approximately 58 bedrooms, 38 bathrooms, on the 17-acre estate.
The locations to be searched include the 45 office all storage rooms and all other rooms or areas within the premises used or available to be used by the former president of the United States and his staff and in which boxes or documents could be stored, end quote.
It just kind of seems like anywhere. That is, of course, the federal authorities describing former President Donald Trump`s Mar-a-Lago estate in the search warrant of the property that they executed on Monday. Today, a federal judge in Florida unsealed the document after the former president and the DOJ decided against disputing its publication. I want to pause for a second here.
You have heard this many times over the past few years. We are truly living in historic and unprecedented time here in U.S. history, but think about where we are right now just for a moment.
The Justice Department of the United States had probable cause to believe that evidence of a crime or crimes could be found at Donald Trump`s Palm Beach home. And not only that, they convinced the federal judge to agree with them and to allow them to execute a search warrant on the property.
So, on Monday, August 8th, 2022, with sign up from the attorney general himself. The FBI searched the home of the 45th president of the United States looking for potentially classified materials and evidence of crimes.
Today, we learned exactly which laws the Justice Department had reason to believe may have been violated. What specific items they were searching for and what they took from the immediate past president`s home.
Here`s a second attachment to the warrant. It is titled, quote, attachment B. Property to be ceased. Quote: all physical documents and records constituting evidence, contraband, fruits of crime or other items illegally possessed in violation of 18 U.S. Code section 793, 2071 or 1519.
Now, that string of numbers I just read is actually a set of federal statutes -- 793 for instance is part of what is known as the Espionage Act. It deals with the, quote, gathering, transmitting or losing defense information. This specific session of the Espionage Act that federal authorities cited the search warrant concerns collecting, transferring or losing information relating to national defense. Quote: with intent or reason to believe that the information is to be used to the injury of the United States, end quote.
The second federal statute that prosecutor site in the search warrant is Section 2071, which prohibits the willful, unlawful removal of records belong to the government.
And finally, in the unsealed warrant today, we learned that federal prosecutors showed probable cause that Section 1519, which deals with, quote, the destruction, alteration or falsification of records and federal investigations was violated.
What violation of that law means, the knowing destruction, concealment, cover-up or making of a false entry with respect to any record, with the intent to impede, obstruct or influence any federal investigation, which sure does make the reporting that Donald Trump routinely ripped up and flush documents down the toilet more interesting.
We also learned today what the FBI was looking for and had probable cause to believe resided at the president`s club. This is from the same attachment B, property to be seized. Here is why federal authorities searched Mar-a-Lago for.
Quote: Any physical documents with classification markings, along with any containers or boxes in which such documents are located. Information regarding the retrieval, storage, or transmission of national defense information or classified material.
[21:05:03]
Any government and/or presidential records created between January 20th, 2017, and January 20th, 2021. That`s the totality of the term of president.
And the evidence of the knowing alteration, destruction or concealment of any government and/or presidential records, or any documents with classification markings, end quote.
The FBI had probable cause to believe that there was information at Trump`s Palm Beach home that concerned the national defense of the United States or was itself classified material. And they searched the premises for evidence of any destruction or alteration or concealment of government documents, including classified documents, done intentionally to obstruct or impede an ongoing federal investigation. And one FBI agents uncovered at Trump`s home is astounding.
Now as we knew last night, we were likely only going to get generalizations of what was seized, because obviously, if it`s top secret or classified information they are not going to tell us all about it. But the generalizations themselves are remarkable.
Also, unsealed today was this document. It`s called a, quote, receipt for property. After federal agents executed search warrant, they provide the property owner and the court with a copy of what exactly was removed from the home. It`s a handy list if you will.
Federal agents seized over 25 boxes of documents from Mar-a-Lago. And those boxes apparently include 11 sets of classified documents. This document contains a list of numbered boxes. Of course, we can`t tell what is inside those boxes.
But in addition to recovering more than 25 boxes, the agents also recovered several loose collections of documents, like this one, a copy of the executive grant of clemency that Donald Trump provided to Roger Stone with. He also uncovered an item that says, info regarding the president of France. And a, quote, leather bound box of documents.
This one is interesting -- it`s a scribe as, quote, various classified slash TS, slush SCI documents. Let`s break that down. TS stands for top secret. SCI stands for sensitive compartmented information. Both of those are classifications for some of the most highly classified documents.
They also found an item they described as a potential presidential record. Two binders of voters, a handwritten note, three sets of miscellaneous secret documents, four sets of miscellaneous top secret documents and three sets of papers classified as confidential.
So, the FBI found top secret, secret and confidential documents at Trump`s home, so much for a summer Friday. And it`s all the more stunning coming on the heels of a "Washington Post" blockbuster reporting last night that classified documents relating to nuclear weapons were among the items that FBI agents were looking for when they searched Trump`s home.
Our understanding of what took place during the search crew tenfold today. And yet there is still a lot that we don`t know. What more can we learn from the newly unsealed documents? What does this mean for the former president?
Joining us now is Sadie Gurman, reporter for "The Wall Street Journal" who covers the Justice Department. Her team is one of the first, or was the first, really, to report on the content of this today.
Sadie, thanks for your being here today, and thanks for your great reporting on this. You had a little bit more time than others in assessing what was in this warrant. So, maybe you`ve had a chance to think about, what stands out to you?
SADIE GURMAN, JUSTICE DEPARTMENT REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Well, what stands out to me is that while we got a very significant glimpse into the government`s investigation into what happened at Mar-a-Lago, there are a lot more questions -- it actually raises more answers questions than answers, which you mentioned.
But what was very significant to me was the fact that there were 11 sets of classified documents in this tranche, including some that were classified as top secret. That designation is so sensitive that those documents are only allowed to be open in a specific government facility. And it applies to things like military secrets, you know, defense information and other material person international security interests.
So, that was the most significant thing. But to me, it just a little bit of a glimpse into what is certain to be a much more sprawling investigation than what we even know at this point.
VELSHI: Let`s look at what we do know what you are able to find out today. There`s one box of documents that contains top secret and can sensitive compartmented formation. Then there are four sets of top secret documents.
Have you had a chance to make determinations of -- without knowing within them -- with a differences between these things are?
GURMAN: Well, they are all different layers of classification. And regardless of the nuances in that, the government says that these documents should not have been at Mar-a-Lago, that they should have been turned over to the National Archives when Trump left office.
[21:10:00]
So, there are some distinctions in the levels of classification of these documents. But to the government`s standpoint, they are all classified and they should not be a Mar-a-Lago.
This search, as you know, came after an extraordinary back and forth between the federal government and Trump team over this material, including serving of a subpoena back in June to get still more classified documents that the government believed at Mar-a-Lago, even after the National Archives seized 15 boxes of documents.
But even after that subpoena was issued, some information was turned over the government had somebody familiar with the documents telling them that there was still more classified information at Mar-a-Lago.
So, with the search represents to me is the culmination of a very long back and forth between the federal government and Trump and his attorneys over this information, and that doesn`t seem to be letting up anytime soon.
VELSHI: There are, in fact, some conservative lawmakers who are responding to the release of this warrant by calling for the further release of the affidavit in the case. Now, what we know about that? What would the affidavits show us that we don`t have in the warrant?
GURMAN: Well, the affidavit would certainly provide a lot more information that we currently know. It would be sort of a collection, an illustration of the evidence that the government has amassed in this case, including, potentially, witnesses and people who have talked to prosecutors about what is potentially stored at Mar-a-Lago. It is a representation of what the government sees as probable cause to be able to search the premises.
And so that is very significant document. I don`t think we are likely to see that any time soon, though I believe the organizations, including "The Wall Street Journal", have requested it. But its` so significant and it would really contribute to our understanding of what happened.
VELSHI: A few minutes ago you mention informant. You and your colleagues of reported that the Justice Department was made aware of this trench of documents by a person familiar with the matter. What, if anything, do we know about this?
GURMAN: We know very little about this person or who it is. But what we do know is that the information that this person provided prosecutors was in part what led to the search. It was in part what led to giving the government enough information it needed to form the basis for its search warrant which was approved on Friday as we learned today.
And so we think that this person played a significant role in the investigation. But we think that there are a number of different things that we still need to learn about how the government was able to put this together and what led them to believe that there was more classified information at Mar-a-Lago --
VELSHI: Sadie, thank you for your reporting and reporting for your team at the Wall Street Journal. We appreciate your time tonight.
GURMAN: Thank you.
VELSHI: Let`s go deeper into this with Mark Zaid. He`s an attorney specializes in cases involving national security and security clearances.
Mark, thanks for being here. I want to put a little meat on those ones that Sadie started to give us. Explain to me what`s the difference is between what we might see in that affidavit -- meaning the whole reasoning behind this search warrant and what they were looking for -- versus what some people accused the FBI of doing, and that was being on a fishing expedition.
MARK ZAID, ATTORNEY WITH EXPERIENCE IN NATIONAL SECURITY CASES: Well, the affidavit that provides the supporting information would give a template as to what they were basing it on. Did they have an informant? Wouldn`t necessarily indicate the identity of the informant, but it would give details to allow the magistrate judge to understand that there was probable cause that a crime war crimes were committed.
And it is not typical that an affidavit of this type would be released at this early stage. Later on, I have handled Freedom of Information Act involving Espionage Act prosecutions -- we have gotten copies of those supporting affidavits. But years after the prosecution ended.
VELSHI: Let`s talk about the level of classification. I was just talking to Sadie about that. There were different things in there. And the warrant specifically asked for different things in there.
What do they mean? For our purposes, whether something is top secret or classified or compartmented are these distinctions relevant to us? Or is it all bad?
ZAID: No, they are important distinctions. Now the first thing to understand is, under the Espionage Act, which is one of the statutes that could be at play, that act goes back over a century. It talks about national defense information because it was written before we have the courage classification status and framework.
Now that means, actually the information doesn`t even have to be classified, although I do not know of any recent prosecutions under the act where the information was not -- and I dare say, I can`t imagine the justice department would go after the president for unclassified information under the Espionage Act -- but the executive order that sets forth different levels of classification: confidential, secret, top secret, then SCI which you mentioned if you think of an offshoot of TS could also be under secret or a SAP, which is special access programs.
[21:15:16]
Those pertain to the levels of harm by definition that would because of the United States if that information were released, whether to a foreign power or to the media or never, just retained in a location where others who are unauthorized might have access to it.
VELSHI: You tweeted about ten minutes ago that Donald Trump via Breitbart, released unredacted copies of property receipts containing the names of FBI agents based on his history this could only be interpreted as an intentional -- intention to cause the special agents, one of whom I know and their families grief and subject them to possible threats. Now, obviously we are not putting that up.
Do you think that -- do you think that`s elaborate? Are they got a thing in they published it?
ZAID: He didn`t have a requirement to redact the information. But when I file papers that have email addresses and identifying information of agents in my court cases, I know it is best in today`s world unfortunately to redact that information out. There is no need for the public to know the identities of the FBI agents.
If the lawyers for Trump want to make an issue of these agents, hey, that`s fair game, go right ahead, knock yourself out. But by putting that out there, just like we saw in the attack on the FBI`s field office in Cincinnati, just like we saw with death threats against me, where individuals were prosecuted all because of Donald Trump and folks like Rush Limbaugh and other Fox News TV commentators who mentioned my name in conjunction with cases I have handled against the administration -- that brings about consequences. And those are not good consequences.
VELSHI: You wrote on Twitter as well, and this is interesting -- that anybody inside the Secret Service who knew the classified documents were being stored at Mar-a-Lago would have had a duty to report it up the chain. Their loyalty is to the government not to a president or former president. Do you -- you have any idea whether that`s where this information came from? We don`t know who the informant is at the moment or whether there are multiple informants or where the government got their information from?
ZAID: No, we have course do not know that just as Sadie, mentioned. And there`s a number of questions that need to be looked at for this investigation that go well beyond just Donald Trump. Who packed the materials at the White House to ship them down to Mar-a-Lago? Who knew about the documents being present at Mar-a-Lago? How many former White House officials or individuals who held or maybe still hold in some capacity of security clearance were aware that these documents were at Mar- a-Lago?
Once the documents will retreat a few months ago, by the National Archives and the FBI, who is aware that there still were documents that are classified, marked classified still at Mar-a-Lago?
The issue with the Secret Service is a complicated one. Because historically, and I have represented many Secret Service agents and officers. These are some of the most distinguished law enforcement personnel that worked for the federal government. The Secret Service primarily always in parts upon their membership, never, ever reveal anything about to protectee.
But we learned during the Clinton, Lewinsky, Judge Starr independent counsel investigation, that there is no privilege of protecting the protectee, that these agents, and officers in this case who are on the protective detail for the president, our law enforcement officers.
And if they were aware of classified information being held at Mar-a-Lago at anytime, they had a duty to report that -- and they knew, and that`s a very interesting question that the inspector generals at the Department of Homeland Security and Justice might want to look into to see.
VELSHI: You mentioned the Espionage Act and we have had people prosecuted under the Espionage Act in recent years. Chelsea Manning, Reality Winner. Is there some reason to believe that Donald Trump is insulated from the same kinds of charges that those individuals have faced?
ZAID: There are some defenses without a doubt that Trump and his lawyers will raise president because the statues in question were never intended or envisioned to be operable against the president of the United States. So sometimes there are references to executive branch employees or officers in the debate will be does that include the presidents of the United States?
Now, cases like Chelsea Manning whose book I actually helped go through pre publication review recently so that it was properly reviewed.
[21:20:04]
Or Reality Winner, cases where individuals obtained classified information illegally and released it illegally are different than what this case might be, and it`s important to understand their doesn`t have to be any intent or allegation that the president or those around him were going to sell the information or leak it to the right-wing media, left-wing media, who cares, or a foreign power. Possession of that information in a location where they are not authorized to have it is just as sufficient.
And just three years ago, a former NSA contractor was sentenced to nine years in prison for having a horde of classified documents in his home that, as far as I understand, was never intended to ever leave that residence.
VELSHI: Mark, I`ve been watching informed posts on social media over the last few days, I`m glad I got the opportunity to speak to this evening. We appreciate it. National security attorney Mark Zaid.
Believe it or not, this is not the first time Donald Trump was apparently negligent with classified information, or government materials, it`s not even the second or third time. Those details and the discussion with the House Intelligence Committee member on what this all means for America`s national security, is straight ahead. Stay with us.
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[21:25:56]
VELSHI: The FBI search of Mar-a-Lago to recover classified documents in just the latest data point in a long line of Trump`s security lapses. "The New York Times" today notes has led to a poison relationship between Trump and the keepers of U.S. secrets.
This piece reads like a low light rail of national security risks during the Trump years. Like the time when Trump hosted the then Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at Mar-a-Lago and North Korea launched a ballistic missile during their dinner. Trump turned the dining room into a makeshift situation room involve you have all the staff and guess. One diner seated nearby posted the whole thing on Facebook.
Or the time when Trump revealed classified intelligence to Russian officials in the Oval Office, that disclosure prompted concern that U.S. intelligence officials -- they tried to yank a highly placed source out of the Kremlin. And there was the time when Trump was so impressed on a classified photo of an explosion at a space launch facility in Iran that he wanted to post it to Twitter. He proceeded to do just that, against the advice of aides, he typed up a stocky caption to stick it to Iran and hit send, sharing it with his 33 million followers.
These high-risk blunders happened so frequently that U.S. intelligence officials have reportedly started withholding sensitive information from the president because they had so little confidence that it wouldn`t be lead to a compromise. And that`s when they could actually get Trump to focus at all during daily briefings.
We learned from "The Times" that Trump`s attention span was notoriously short. He rarely read intelligence reports but he really liked graphs charts and tables. That stopped altogether on January 6th. He didn`t show up for his briefing that day. Apparently too busy with his rally and his effort to overturn the 2020 election, he never received another presidential briefing in the final month of his presidency.
Of course, it goes without saying that none of this is how intelligence is supposed to be handled and how these briefings are supposed to go.
My next guest knows all about this process from his time at the CIA, where he worked as a daily intelligence briefing for both President Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. He is also tasked with briefing FBI Director Robert Mueller and Attorney General John Ashcroft on intelligence materials each morning.
So what does he make of the news that a search warrant unveiled today shows that FBI agents proved 11 sets of classified documents from the president`s Florida home on Monday.
Joining us now is David Priess, former CIA intelligence officer, , now publisher of Lawfare and author of "The President`s Book of Secrets", about the relationship between the presidents and top secret intelligence.
Mr. Priess, thank you for being with us.
DAVID PRIESS, FORMER CIA INTELLIGNECE OFFICER: Pleasure to be here. Thank you.
VELSHI: What`s your sense of it? I guess for those of us who don`t deal top secret or classified, or highly classified, or compartmented information, we are not quite sure vowed you would definitely call this classified, or this is not supposed to be shared with other people.
All experts I talked to like you it say this is not the gray area. People know when they are getting top, secret, classified or compartmented information.
PRIESS: That`s right. There can be some confusion about it in some cases in a briefing, when someone is having a conversation between an intelligence officer and a policy maker and not emphasizing but parts are classified and what parts aren`t. That is not what we are talking about here.
We are talking about material, presumably most of them documents. Documents that are classified, have classification markings, that`s the confidential secret or top secret depending on the level of damage to U.S. national security, if they were compromised and then often they also have controls or limits even within that classification range. That is something like the SCI that you`ve seen references to today, that talked about sensitive compartmented information. Not everybody who has a top secret clearance can see every bit of information that`s in the compartment.
Those markings are on the documents.
[21:30:02]
Even the president`s daily brief itself which is a stylist production he often in the fancy leather notebook still has top secret stamped on it just to make sure that you know it`s classified. There is no area for confusion here.
VELSHI: Who controls the controls on the limits on the various types of documents? I`m asking you this obviously in the context that there are some people arguing, who made the case, that the president declassified the information. He`s also made references to that. What is the process somewhat would`ve had to have happen? Is it just something the president could just say he did?
PRIESS: The president cannot retroactively declassify something from when he was president. So, let`s take that off the table. If the argument is, well, he declassified these while I was president and I don`t tell anyone, that does not hold up. Courts of actually shown, you cannot do that. There must be some kind of process or procedure to show that this is declassified.
Plus, when that happens, those documents no longer have these huge markings on them, and there`s a declassification stamp on the document so that there is no confusion about it whatsoever. It states when it was declassified, so that it can be seen publicly.
Presumably that`s not the case, here maybe that`s what this seizure and warrant is for, to determine if in fact all these documents, and there`s quite a few here, if all of these documents in fact we`re properly de- classified and have all of these declassification markings on them, maybe there is less of an issue here. I would say less of an issue because there is still an issue under the Presidential Records Act, because if these are presidential records, Trump should not have the metal. This is property of the U.S. government as soon as he is all out of office.
But I very much doubt that we are going to find that these presumably dozens or even hundreds of previously classified documents were probably declassified at the time.
VELSHI: But this is an entirely probable manner, right? That`s the kind of thing that if Donald Trump says he did, and there should be an evidence trail that he should produce that could answer the question that could satisfy the court of the Justice Department, one where another.
PRIESS: Absolutely. That is not something that should be a mystery. That is something that should be resolvable question of fact. Where they declassified while he was president, or where they not? If they were declassified while he was president, that should be visible on the documents, as I mentioned. But there should also be other government documents tracking this up to show the process of declassification. It`s not the president waving a magic wand when he feels like it, and secrets aren`t secrets anymore. It doesn`t work that way.
VELSHI: I have so many more questions for you, David. We`re going to continue this over the next few days, I appreciate how much you know about this and how much detail there is and how much our viewers need to know about it. So we thank you for your time tonight.
David Priess is a former intelligence officer at the CIA. He`s a publisher now of Lawfare. We appreciate your time.
PRIESS: Thank you.
VELSHI: In terms of moving the goalposts regarding the severity of Trump`s mishandling of classified documents, Republicans have been doing a lot of heavy lifting this week. The latest shift, plus our conversation with Congressman Jim Himes of the House Intelligence Committee is next.
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[21:37:53]
VELSHI: Conservative have reportedly repeated this fake when trying to spin the search have Trump`s search of Mar-a-Lago home as an FBI scandal as opposed to a Trump scandal? The leader of the Republican leader, Kevin McCarthy, threatened to arrest Attorney General Merrick Garland himself.
The chairman of the Republican Party, Ronna McDaniel, put out an op-ed titled: Trump targeted by Biden administration, and they can do to you, too.
Former Republican speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich, compared the FBI to the east German secret police, calling them the American Stasi.
Fox host Laura Ingraham said it reminded her of her days living in the Soviet Union.
Fox host and former Trump White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, said it was a, quote, understatement, end quote, to compare the FBI search to the actions of a banana republic.
Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene started selling t-shirts and hats say defund the FBI.
As that demonization of law enforcement started picking, the conservative Freedom Caucus planned a big press conference for yesterday morning about the FBI. That, of course, got, quote/unquote, rescheduled at the last- minute after that news broke that a man in Ohio had attacked an FBI field office and sparked an hours-long standoff with law enforcement. The man had spent the past week using anti FBI rhetoric online, specifically following the search of Mar-a-Lago.
After that, Republicans tone down much of their if anti FBI rhetoric. But in its place, they doubled down on their other tactic this week, asserting Donald Trump`s innocence. Conservative politicians like Senator Ted Cruz pushes simple demand, release the warrant now. Essentially, they`re pushing the idea that releasing the warrant will prove Donald Trumps innocence. Then Attorney General Merrick Garland petition to release the word, he called their bluff.
The funniest part of this, is after Garland`s announcement, Trump demanded that the courts release the warrant while he, of course, had a copy and he could`ve just released it himself.
[21:40:01]
Before the warrant was released, some conservatives also drew a clear line in the sand saying, overtly, what their red line would be to justify this kind of FBI action. At the time, what they came up with sounded so out of left field, it couldn`t possibly be true.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALICE STEWART, GOP STRATEGIST: Anything short of finding the codes of Mar- a-Lago are under huge backfire of the Biden administration.
DANA PERINO, FOX NEWS HOST: Short of the nuclear codes being written on these documents and locked behind closed doors, I don`t know how document like this could warrant this kind of warrant.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: Of course, we learned last night through reporting of "The Washington Post" that part of the reason for the raid on Mar-a-Lago, was that FBI agents sought classified documents related to nuclear weapons.
And I know what you`re thinking, how conservatives possibly spin their way out of that one?
Well, here is Republican Congressman Mike Turner, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, just this morning.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MICHAEL TURNER (R-OH): It depends on what the nuclear information is. You can say nuclear weapons, but there are things that are highly, highly classified. There are things that are not extremely classified. But our, nonetheless, classified.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: Actually, you can`t say nuclear weapons, you have to say nuclear weapons. So it went. As long as it wasn`t nuclear secrets down Mar-a-Lago to, well it depends on what kind of nuclear secrets, but regardless of how conservatives are spinning, this I want to hear where all of this actually should matter from someone who`s in a position to know.
Congressman Jim Hines, the member of the house of the intelligence committee, he joins us live next. We`ve got a lot to talk to him about not just this topic, but also something else that`s big today, a major win for Democrats this evening and Congress. The party sending a sweeping health and climate bill to the presidents task after passing a landmark piece of the Biden agenda.
Stay with us.
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[21:46:31]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: As anybody among the committee Republicans have concerned with unsecure classified information potentially being and storage area in Florida? Anybody have a concern with that?
TURNER: Certainly. The issue of the handling of classified information is an issue that of course our committee deals with and that were very concerned with. However, the issue of classified information, and the tactics that are used in this instance are the ones that were very concerned about.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: That was Republican Congressman Mike Turner, ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee today explaining that, even his GOP colleagues are concerned about highly classified top secret information hanging around in places that it shouldn`t, the tactics used to retrieve that information are really what`s concerning here. Just the tactics, don`t mind the sensitive nuclear information that might be sitting at the former presidents home.
That sort of reaction comes as we are learning more about the FBI search conducted at Mar-a-Lago earlier this week. Given the search warrants released this afternoon, we now know that at least some of the material that the FBI obtained from Trump`s property where marked as top secret and meant to be viewed exclusively in secured government facilities.
But what sort of intelligence threat does all of this post? Thankfully, I have just the person to ask.
Joining us now is the Congressman Jim Hines. He is the member of the Intel House Committee.
Congressman, good to see you. Thank you for being with us this evening.
I have, to say before too much of these obvious patients be get away from, as we have to address them. The tactics here where not -- will not go down in the top 100 list of things the FBI has done that they should`ve done differently, this was just the execution of a search warrant, no one got shot, no doors were broken down, nothing happened. They went and looking for stuff, they got stuff.
REP. JIM HIMES (D-CT): That`s exactly right, Ali. We should try to keep our eyes on the main thing which is we are in a world of tropical Trump defense, right? So, my friend and colleague, Mike Turner, was trying to find distinctions between the nature of classified information and stuff. Donald Trump is tweeting about how Barack Obama kept nuclear secrets to, which is, of course, a total lie, right? So, we were all running around chasing this stuff.
Let me tell this because I do it every day as member of the intelligence committee. Every, single day, I go to a secure compartmented information facility in the Capitol and I take all the electronic devices I have on my body, my watch, my iPhone, I put them in a locker. I go past an armed guard through an extraordinarily thick, door to sets of doors, actually, and if I`m going to look as a member of Congress that the most sensitive information that we have in this country, known TS/SCI, which we know that the FBI took out of Mar-a-Lago of all places. I have to go through a lot of stuff.
And by the way, you know, if I take documents out of that facility, I have committed a felony. And if a president takes them out of a facility, he too has broken the law.
So I promise you, amidst all of the obfuscation, I promise you that if you or I had boxes of TS/SCI information sitting in our basement, not only would the FBI would have shown, but weapons will be drawn, it would have been done in the dark of night and it would have been all done because those documents, if they become public, could actually lead to our officers, both intelligence and military, being killed, our enemies, understand how they might better attack us. So, this is about a serious as it gets, Ali.
[21:50:03]
VELSHI: And, of course, when you go into those compartmented areas, without your phone, you can`t convey anything from there, you can`t take a photograph of anything, there`s nothing you can do. You go in with yourself, you can look at things and look at them, but then you have to leave and you cannot convey any of that information to anybody.
I lost Congressman Himes --
HIMES: Sorry, I lost you --
VELSHI: Going into those compartmented places, you can`t do anything with that information. You cannot convey it. You cannot photograph it. You cannot text. You cannot do anything with it.
HIMES: That`s exactly right. And think back, Ali, to what happened to David Petraeus, an American patriot, a general director of the CIA, when it turned out he had shared classified information with a relationship of his, you know, he was guilty ultimately of a misdemeanor, he stepped down as director of the CIA.
There have been a number of cases a very senior officials, including former directors of the CIA, I`m thinking of Director Deutch, who got in a lot of trouble because, even though they have these positions, if you access documents outside of these facilities, you have committed a crime.
VELSHI: Trump`s statement was just read on air at Fox News saying that Trump has a, quote, standing order, end quote, the documents removed from the Oval Office and taken to the residents were deemed to be declassified.
Don`t have the details on that, I don`t know if that`s automatically or if they left the Oval Office and went to Mar-a-Lago and there were, poof, declassified. Everything I`ve heard, is that there`s a bit more of a process involved in that.
HIMES: Well, that`s exactly right. First of, all I don`t believe for a second that that`s true because it suggests a bit more intentionality than we saw in President Trump. By the way, if you thought that that was told by anyone that that would be the case, there would be about 50 people who would say, no, sir, that doesn`t work.
So, first of all, I don`t believe it. I think it`s in the category of trying to convince people that Barack Obama also took classified information which the National Archives today pretty quickly said, no, that wasn`t true.
But look, we -- I think one of your earlier guests made this point, the president is a declassifying authority. The president can say that I am declassifying this. If the president does that, there is an elaborate set of procedures for that to happen. In other words, people like me need to know that information that we may have also seen was also declassified. Lots of documents need to have the classification headings removed.
There`s a really elaborate documented process for declassification. It takes months, by the way. So, of course, he`s going to say that because it creates a little bit of confusion and throws a little bit of mud into the water. But I can tell you, as somebody who also receives the most sensitive information this country has, it`s utter baloney.
VELSHI: Congressman, this afternoon on another topic, the House passed potentially the biggest Democratic win of the Biden presidency, the Inflation Reduction Act. It was passed by a party line vote, not a single Republican voted for it.
Now that it`s passed, can I ask you what it was like pushing for this thing for so long and now that it is done, it`s going to get signed in a few days by the president, one in it do you like the most?
HIMES: Well, everybody will have the things that they like the most. The thing, Ali, I like the most is that for the first time ever in this country, we will be able to reverse something that was established back when Medicare created a drug benefit for seniors, which was a prohibition on using the government`s purchasing power to negotiate prices.
Now, Ali, you and I both know that when General Motors by steering wheel, as they call the steering wheel company and, say hey we`re buying a lot of steering wheels, we want to get a good deal. We used to be prohibited, well, we still are, the president hasn`t signed a bill yet, we are prohibited explicit from doing that.
Now, Medicare will be able to do that and that will translate directly to savings on their prescription drugs. It`s going to take a little bit of time to phase in, but of 10, 15, and 20 of the most used prescription drugs, that will translate into lower cost for a senior citizens downward pressure on inflation and a really good achievement.
I should also mention that, as I think you know, this bill will also put a $2,000 annual cap on the out of pocket expenses of our Medicare recipients. That is going to make a dramatic difference in the lives of tens of millions of senior citizens in this country.
VELSHI: Congressman, good to see, you have a lot going through tonight. We appreciate your time, as always. Jim Himes is the member of the House Intelligence Committee.
We have more to get to on this Friday night, don`t go anywhere.
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: They started with a British publication, a public book burning in the city of Bradford. Then, a massive demonstration in London. Pakistan`s parliamentary leader called the U.S. and British governments to ban the book. One sign today red rescue is dead.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: That was February in 1989. Months after the writer Salman Rushdie published his novel, "The Satanic Verses". Just a couple of days after the protests in Pakistan, that then supreme leader of Iran, Ayatollah Khomeini, decided to go a step further issuing a fatwa and a bounty for two and a half million dollars to anyone who killed the author.
The threats against Rushdie were so pronounced, it forced the author into hiding for about nine years. He started making more regular public appearances after Iran`s government, distance himself from the death of the 1990s, but the fatwa was never really lifted. In the past few years, he has been living here in New York City, a champion of free speech.
But earlier today, the author was viciously attacked right before he was due to speak an art retreat in Upstate New York. A man rushed to the stage, stabbed Rushdie in the neck and the abdomen several times. He was taken into custody. New York state police have identified the suspects as 24- year-old Hadi Matar, but have yet to determine a motive for the attack.
ABC News is able to report that according to law enforcement, the suspect social medias accounts says he was sympathetic to Shia extremism and Iran`s Revolutionary Guard Corps. Rushdie was taken to a hospital nearby Pennsylvania for surgery. A few hours ago, his agent released a statement that he is currently on a ventilator, unable to speak and likely to lose an eye.
It`s terrible, terrible news today about one of the world`s finest living novelist, and he is in our thoughts.
That`s it for tonight. Rachel`s back on Monday, and "ALEX WAGNER TONIGHT" starts on Tuesday. I am always grateful for your time. And the time that I get to spend with one of the best teams of journalists in the business.
Time now for "THE LAST WORD WITH LAWRENCE O`DONNELL."
Lawrence, it has been one busy week.