15 boxes
Turns out Trump stole a bunch of federal property when he skulked back to Mar a Lago.
The National Archives and Records Administration last month retrieved 15 boxes of documents and other items from former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence because the material should have been turned over to the agency when he left the White House, Archives officials said Monday.
That is, because the material wasn’t his to take, that is, he stole it.
Trump advisers deny any nefarious intent and said the boxes contained mementos, gifts, letters from world leaders and other correspondence. The items included correspondence with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, which Trump once described as “love letters,” as well as a letter left for Trump by President Barack Obama, according to two people familiar with the contents.
Interesting but does not touch the point that it was all government property. Those people weren’t writing to him because they like him, they were writing to the office.
Two former advisers described a frenzied packing process in the final days of the administration because Trump did not want to pack or accept defeat for much of the transition.
Which being translated means Trump is so stupid he thought he could just yell “I don’t want to!” and stay there indefinitely.
The National Archives and Records Administration said in a statement that “these records should have been transferred to NARA from the White House at the end of the Trump Administration in January 2021,” and that Trump representatives are “continuing to search” for additional records.
“The Presidential Records Act is critical to our democracy, in which the government is held accountable by the people,” Archivist of the United States David S. Ferriero said in the statement. “Whether through the creation of adequate and proper documentation, sound records management practices, the preservation of records, or the timely transfer of them to the National Archives at the end of an Administration, there should be no question as to need for both diligence and vigilance. Records matter.”
Especially records of a criminal pretending to be president.
“I don’t think he did this out of malicious intent to avoid complying with the Presidential Records Act,” one former Trump White House official said. “As long as he’s been in business, he’s been very transactional and it was probably his longtime practice and I don’t think his habits changed when he got to the White House.”
See that’s a pretty pathetic defense. It’s not that he meant to steal them, it’s just that he’s so stupid he can’t grasp that being president is not the same as being a real estate tycoon.
A lot of people can’t grasp that. A lot of people want the government run like a business. If people truly understood how businesses ran, and the proper functions of government, they would probably change their minds.
People think “running the government like a business” means that you can’t accumulate debt. Don’t people understand that most businesses run on debt? Also, the “household budget” analogy. Households also run on debt for a large part – house payment, car payment, credit cards – they don’t understand that they themselves are in debt. They say they have to keep to a budget. Yes, perhaps, but that budget includes paying off debt.
What iknklast said.
Not to mention that running a business means turning a profit*, if possible. The people who call for government to be run like a business expect governments to cut their income through reducing taxes. No business tries to restrict income, they look for ways to increase it.
*unless, of course, it’s a non-profit. But even then, they need to increase income through grants, fees, and donations.
By “transactional” the former White House official means “takes like a greedy pig and gives you cents on the dollar in return — if you’re lucky.”
YES. That’s yet another pretty it up word. It’s been a day for them.
And in addition to everything that’s already been said, businesses inevitably fail and disappear. Many, probably most, do so within a year of creation; some manage to stay around for decades, and a few for centuries, but eventually they disappear, or mutate into something completely unlike their original form. Government can’t do that; government is more or less permanent.
How on earth is this a defence of the man?? “Your honour, He didn’t withhold government property out of a desire to hide information, he did it out of greed.”
I wonder if this one was torn up and taped back together.