When we first learned that Donald Trump had allegedly incriminated himself through remarks on an audio recording capturing his mishandling of classified documents, it looked really bad for the former president. When the federal indictment against him included that recording as a major piece of evidence, it looked worse. Now that we can hear the audio itself — audio the jury in his trial is expected to hear — it's looking really, really bad for him.
To be clear, Trump's peril here is legal, not political. As I've written before, even the most damning indictment is unlikely to derail Trump with his adoring base. But the two-minute recording, in which Trump can be clearly heard referring to a "secret" document with his aides and people working on a memoir for former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, clearly conveys his knowledge, intentions and mindset about the documents he held. This is a preview of Zeeshan Aleem's latest article. Read more here. |
