Former Solicitor General Torches Trump’s ‘Ludicrous’ Documents Claim: ‘It Has Nothing to Do With This Case’

Former Acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal flamed Donald Trump’s claim that he was allowed to deem government documents to be personal material that he was free to take with him upon departing the White House.

Trump was arraigned on Tuesday and faces 37 counts after he took official materials to his Mar-a-Lago estate when he left office. The Department of Justice says the former president repeatedly obstructed the government’s attempts to retrieve them. According to the DOJ, those materials “included information regarding defense and weapons capabilities of both the United States and foreign counties; United States nuclear programs; potential vulnerabilities of the United States and its allies to military attack; and plans for possible retaliation in response to foreign attack.”

Trump pleaded not guilty to all counts.

Hours later he slammed the charges in a speech to supporters at his Bedminster golf resort in New Jersey. In it, he claimed the Presidential Records Act gave him “every right” to the documents.

“Neal Katyal he was able to stay quiet in the courtroom, but there he is tonight,” Lawrence O’Donnell said on Tuesday’s edition of The Last Word on MSNBC.

“Watching those excerpts from Trump tonight at Bedminster, I feel like I have to scrub my eyeballs and cleanse them,” he replied. “I can’t unsee what I just saw, but it was ludicrous. I mean, the idea that he’s complaining about the Presidential Records Act – what language in the presidential records act is he citing?”

Katyal added that he’s something of an authority on the legislation.

“I wrote one of the authoritative memos on that act and it’s just not in there,” he said. “He’s complaining that the indictment doesn’t cite the Presidential Records Act? I mean, give me a break. The indictment doesn’t cite the Bankruptcy Code of 1978, either. That’s because it has nothing to do with this case. And bankruptcy may have a lot to do with Donald Trump, but not with respect to this particular indictment.”

He concluded, “These may work with Trump’s base but they won’t work in a court of law.”

Watch above via MSNBC.