I am wondering. The FBI/DOJ is stating Trump had top secret documents. Now, I dont know how this works but. If he has clearance what is the issue? If he has the proper clearance and has already had the secure location verified, what exactly is the crime? I dont see one. All I see is the DOJ/FBI playing town crier "He has secret stuff!!" Ignoring the idea that he has clearance to have them.
I am also wondering, if these documents are soo sensitive. Why are run of the mill FBI agents now in posession of them when they dont have clearance for it?
Who is going to go break down the FBI's doors and get the top secret stuff out of their hands before an agent sells to the highest bidder?
Even if the FBI agents had TS clearances, they would have to have been read on the program to be able to view.
President has ultimate classiffication/declassification authority, regardless of the original classifying authority (OCA).
Nuclear secrets can be MIL or they can be Q-classified by the DOE depending on what the material is.
Nuclear secrets can be classified from CONFIDENTIAL up to TS/SCI Codeword. Rumor is the material was SCI (just heard on the radio from Jonathan Turley that it was TS/SCI). In which case the agents would have to be read on. That material needs to be in a SCIF rated to be store SCI-level material.
All that said, there may be special conditions which permit law enforcement to view. But I doubt at SCI level.
Ok, further down this rabbit hole. For them to be read in, they would have to have known in advance what was there. They also SHOULD HAVE needed that for the warrant. Which means they either knew what was there and were read in, within what 72 hours of someone telling them it was there.(probably not possible) Or, they didnt have a legitimate warrant in the first place. Making it illegal search and seizure of TOP SECRET DOCUMENT, from a former President.
Not sure why someone downvoted your comment....
Yep - they basically broke classified while trying to entrap class violations. If I ever heard of someone who did something remotely close to this, I'd have been hauled in the booth for a poly.
Those agents either a) were sent in not knowing what they were looking for and not read on to what they found or b) were read on and knew in advance.
In either case, it stinks. Hard to say if PDJT left an SCI IED (U1) behind OR the Fudgepacker Bumbling Idiots planted evidence and got caught on CCTV. Did the FBI really think they shut the cams off?
If they did it off-prem, then they broke chain of custody.
The judge has previous recusals in Trump cases. Why not this one?
Burn it all down.
There are a lot of moving parts to those things, depending on precisely what the material is and it's classification status. And even a POTUS has to have Need to Know in most cases, there is no reason for a POTUS to be briefed on every classified matter in government.
If the materials are heavily classified then no, your average agent or office may not have anyone properly cleared to view the materials. That was one of the problems with Weiner's laptop, the agents in NY realized they did NOT have the clearances to view it and so logged what they had discovered and stopped, they sent it up the line and the leadership then squashed it all.
POTUS has clearance to declassify most anything while he is POTUS, that matters too.
In short there is no general answer to your posed question- 'what is the issue?' The issues are bogus and are phishing expeditions, obfuscation, obstruction of Justice, treason.
https://files.catbox.moe/2q5m1k.jpg
POTUS should never have to have "Need to know" for access. That entire concept blows my mind.
Ponder it from other perspectives, think beyond 'your' one angle viewing the thing.
I'm not suggesting there should be secret data sets which POTUS is refused to be briefed on, I'm merely saying that as an exPOTUS, if he is an exPOTUS, he is not necessarily allowed to view any presently classified data. And even when sitting as POTUS there is no need for POTUS to be briefed on it all.
Let me try an example from my own decades' old Service. Worked on nukes, had Top Secret clearance with code word access beyond that. Every Officer in my Squadron and Wing had a Top Secret clearance too, but that did not authorize them to know things beyond their Need to Know. So a guy from RV - reentry vehicle, the warhead guys who maintained laBombas - was not ever going to be briefed on our guidance techniques or training or circuits. Just as we were not going to ever know his circuits or procedures beyond the minimum we needed to know.
If a sitting POTUS demands to be informed of something he usually is, but not all persons who have sat as POTUS have had the same briefs on matters have they.
You must remember that our form of government was expressly designed to work for a moral Society, it will not function with an immoral Society. Checks, balances and compartmentalizations are built in on purpose, separate Branches for instance, all throughout such matters. So that will breed opportunity for corruptions on top of the fact of obfuscatory confusions as everyone seeks to ascertain who has authority for what. Agendas clash with Honesty - POTUS has no way to know if he is being fed accurate data sometimes.
From a security standpoint POTUS is not briefed until he must be on some things so it reduces leak possibilities. Can you imagine what an idiot such as biden or obama or clinto might say if they were fully aware of 'everything'?
But if POTUS needs to know, he does... Need to Know.
https://files.catbox.moe/y11221.jpg
I understand what you're saying but part of the perniciousness of censorship of withholding information is one does not know what they do not know.
If people purposefully, knowingly withhold classified information from active POTUS, they should be held accountable. It should be so severe it shouldn't be a consideration.
See...you get it .
Lots of super classified stuff is supposed to be kept in safes or not leave a classified room. So bringing them home can get you in big trouble. I know people who ended up paying rediculus fines for bringing work notebooks home.
Any truly classified material would be stored in an approved safe (big filing cabinet with locks) or a SCIF (basically a walk-in vault the size of an office). Any unclassified material can be stored for secure control and convenience. Trump would have been aware of this. You don't get security briefings without this being hammered into your head. (CovfefeNegro, above, has good comments.)