Booked
Trump says the law is not the law.
Hours after he was fingerprinted, booked and entered a “not guilty” plea in federal court in Miami, former President Donald Trump defied the very premise of the federal government’s case against him, claiming presidents have an “absolute right” to keep any and all documents they want.
Which is funny because that’s the opposite of the truth.
“Whatever documents a president decides to take with him, he has the right to do so. It’s an absolute right. This is the law,” Trump said.
The law is the opposite of that. The exact, clearly worded, explicit opposite. At noon on January 20 all presidential records become the property of the National Archive. That is the law.
If you tell a lie often enough, people will believe it is the truth. That defines the MAGAverse. And with a mainstream media that will never do much more than report what people say, as opposed to reporting whether what they say has any basis in reality, and a right-wing media universe that will only amplify the lies. Even when they do provide information, they do it in the least informative way possible. They start by presenting what Trump said, amplified in the headline, and then provide paragraphs of commentary as to why he’s wrong. The headline could say “Trump incorrectly claims “absolute right” to keep documents”. They assume people read all the way through an article, or even read past a headline.
I don’t even have the right to keep documents. I cannot take home papers with student names on them (other than to grade and bring back). Privacy laws mean these must be shredded if students don’t take them home.
Somehow I think weapons capabilities documents are a bit more serious than someone knowing what grade one of my students made on an assignment, but we treat that as utterly confidential (and we should; I’m not disputing that).
I also am very limited as to what documents (and other things) I can take from work. I’m also quite limited in what I can discuss about my work. Besides the usual business stuff (eg financial, HR, internal procedures) there’s the intellectual property stuff (eg product compositions, R&D projects). Even at work I sometimes have to be careful what I discuss or have out on my desk. For example, if we have visitors, or auditors.
We are allowed to take our computers home for work at home. And sales people and field appplication specialists have stuff with them as they travel for their jobs. All are expected to follow security protocols and take measures to keep work stuff confidential and out of the wrong hands.
There are a few exceptions, for certain types of situations. One would be to provide the HazMat team with relevant information if there is a chemical spill.