Honig Dismantles Trump’s Laughable Claim About His Documents Case: ‘Virtually Every Word… Is Absolutely False’

CNN legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Elie Honig joined Jake Tapper on Thursday to discuss the Department of Justice’s decision not to pursue charges against President Joe Biden for retaining classified documents.

Trump responded to Special Counsel Robert Hur’s report detailing the end of the probe into Biden with a wild statement, claiming:

THIS HAS NOW PROVEN TO BE A TWO-TIERED SYSTEM OF JUSTICE AND UNCONSTITUTIONAL SELECTIVE PROSECUTION! The Biden Documents Case is 100 times different and more severe than mine. I did nothing wrong, and I cooperated far more. What Biden did is outrageously criminal – He had 50 years of documents, 50 times more than I had, and “WILLFULLY RETAINED” them. I was covered by the Presidential Records Act, Secret Service was always around, and GSA delivered the documents. Deranged Jack Smith should drop this Case immediately. ELECTION INTERFERENCE.

“Let’s just do a little fact-check here,” Tapper began. “Obviously, what President Biden is accused of is serious and Special Counsel Hur compares what Biden did to that of previous presidents, Reagan, etc., and says that those are similar. But he says when it comes to the allegations set forth in the indictment of Mr. Trump and President Biden – I just read this – that has more serious aggravating facts. So is President Trump correct when he says what Biden did as a legal matter is worse?”

“No. He’s coming from opposite world here. First of all, there is a lot of bad news in this report for Joe Biden that we’ll get to in a moment. But virtually every word of Donald Trump’s statement is absolutely false,” Honig replied, adding:

For example, Donald Trump says, quote, “I cooperated far more than Joe Biden.” To the contrary, Joe Biden, once these documents were discovered, cooperated essentially completely with the special counsel. Donald Trump obstructed justice. He tried to get rid of evidence. He tried to get witnesses to lie, complete opposite conduct.

Donald Trump says also that Joe Biden had 50 times more documents than I had. We don’t have a precise count in this report, but Donald Trump had hundreds of classified documents. This report really deals with two batches that Joe Biden had of classified documents. And then Donald Trump repeats the tired, false refrain that he is somehow protected by the Presidential Records Act that has no application to any of this.

Notably, Trump’s lawyers signed a certified letter in June 2022 saying that Trump had no more classified documents in his possession after returning some to the National Archives. The FBI later raided Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence to retrieve the additional material the Archives sought. Both President Biden and former President Mike Pence returned classified documents found in their possession voluntarily and now neither are facing prosecution.

Watch the clip above via CNN.