Ex-President Donald Trump faces more charges from a superseding indictment in the classified documents case (Picture: AP)
Former President Donald Trump attempted to delete Mar-a-Lago surveillance footage, according to an updated indictment in the classified documents case.
Justice Department prosecutors in an superseding indictment allege that Trump asked a staffer to delete security camera footage to obstruct a federal probe into classified documents he took from the White House to his Florida residence.
The indictment released on Thursday contains new counts of obstruction as well as willful retention of national defense records. It also names a third defendant – Mar-a-Lago property manager Carlos De Oliveira.
De Oliveira is accused of scheming with Trump and his valet Walt Nauta, who has already been charged, to hide video footage from investigators.
A copy of a superseding indictment, after US prosecutors broadened their criminal case against Donald Trump as they charged a second of his employees with helping the former president evade officials who were trying to recover sensitive national security documents he took from the White House (Picture: Reuters)
The Trump campaign called the new charges ‘nothing more than a continued desperate and flailing attempt by the Biden Crime Family and their Department of Justice to harass President Trump and those around him’.
‘Deranged Jack Smith knows that they have no case and is casting about for any way to salvage their illegal witch hunt and to get someone other than Donald Trump to run against Crooked Joe Biden’, stated the campaign.
The new indictment from special counsel Smith’s office claims that De Oliveira brought another Mar-a-Lago worker to an ‘audio closet’ in June 2022 and said the conversation could not be shared with anyone else.
De Oliveira allegedly asked the worker how many days of surveillance footage the server held, and said ‘the boss’ wanted it wiped, presumably referring to Trump.
Former President Donald Trump’s campaign called the updated indictment ”nothing more than a continued desperate and flailing attempt’ by the Biden administration to ‘harass’ him (Picture: Reuters)
The worker said he did not think he could complete the request, and De Oliveira allegedly said the ‘boss’ wanted it to be done and, ‘What are we going to do?’
Meanwhile, the new count of willfully retaining national defense information is linked to Trump allegedly showing a document on military activity in another country to a writer and publisher of a memoir for his ex-chief of staff Mark Meadows. The meeting happened at Trump’s golf resort in Bedminster, New Jersey, in July 2021.
Trump and Nauta have pleaded not guilty to criminal charges in the classified documents probe. A third defendant on the case could affect the trial date, which US District Judge Aileen Cannon has scheduled for May. Trump’s attorneys have argued he cannot receive a fair trial until after the 2024 presidential election.
The updated indictment came as much of the focus was on Trump’s lawyers meeting with prosecutors on Thursday. Trump shot down a report that his lawyers were told to expect an indictment in Smith’s investigation into efforts by him and his allies to overturn the 2020 election.
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at [email protected].
For more stories like this, check our news page.
An updated indictment brings new charges against ex-President Donald Trump and another one of his Mar-a-Lago staffers.
