‘Mind Boggling!’ Morning Joe Blown Away By New Trump Indictment: ‘Reads Like a Mafia Case’
Loyal Morning Joe viewers who tuned in to Friday’s show eager to see the gobsmacked reaction to new federal charges against former President Donald Trump were NOT disappointed.
Special Counsel Jack Smith filed a superseding indictment on Thursday, alleging the former president ordered the security footage at his Palm Beach residence Mar-a-Lago and directed boxes of papers — likely including classified documents — to be moved to his summer residence in Bedminster, New Jersey.
NBC News’s justice and intelligence correspondent Ken Dilanian started by exclaiming, “It’s just extraordinary! These allegations rival anything that Richard Nixon was accused of. These are two additional counts of obstruction of justice. And this indictment reads like a mafia case. ”
Willie Geist then called the revelations “astonishing,” adding, “Reading through this new indictment, it reads like something straight out of the Gambino crime family where they say the boss wants the tapes deleted.”
Jonathan Lemire made the mob-metaphor Trifecta, adding, “An extraordinary document with so many parallels to a mafia investigation from the sixties and seventies, with one perhaps exception: The fact the inclusion of an emoji apparently also in there as they’re trying to say, hey, we’re doing something secret, don’t tell anybody, and we use the shushing emoji. So that shows you the quality of henchmen that Donald Trump has in this particular matter.”
Dilanian: Well, let’s just take a pause on what you just said. It’s just extraordinary. These allegations rival anything that Richard Nixon was accused of. These are two additional counts of obstruction of justice. And these this indictment reads like a mafia case. Here you have and again, these are allegations and the burden of proof here is high. And they don’t have direct witnesses implicating Trump. But this is a scheme to destroy evidence. Three days after a grand jury subpoena lands on Mr. Trump, it’s it’s mind boggling. And as Chuck said, it involves very low level employees whose lives are about to be ruined unless they cut a deal with prosecutors. And as for Mr. Nada, there’s no sign that he’s going to do that. His lawyers are paid for by Mr. Trump. He’s he’s completely loyal. He’s following Mr. Trump around. So and the other thing I think about these obstruction elements is that, you know, a lot of regular Americans out out there who don’t follow this very closely when they hear about the classified documents case, they have a hard time distinguishing what Trump did from what Joe Biden and Mike Pence did, even though we all know that it’s vastly different. Right? All three men had classified documents in their possession. So but nobody has trouble, I think, differentiating these incredible obstruction of justice charges. Everybody understands what it means to destroy evidence, particularly surveillance video evidence. Now, I have to point out that there’s no allegation in this new superseding indictment that they actually attempted to destroy the tapes. Remember, we read in The New York Times about an episode where there was a flood and there was some concern that that was an attempt to destroy the footage. That’s not in here. There’s no allegation either. There’s nobody that can directly put Mr. Trump in a room and testify. I heard him say, destroy the tapes. That’s it’s all hearsay. It’s employee number four saying, I talked to Carlos D’oliveira and that’s what he said. So obviously, what they would really like, as Chuck said, is for Mr. de Oliveira to come and testify and tell the truth about his conversations with Mr. Trump. But if you read this indictment, the the obstruction is extraordinary. And then secondly, of course, this mysterious document, which we believe was a military plan, what we believe the indictment now says it was a military plan about options for attacking Iran. Donald Trump said it didn’t exist. Remember, after the original indictment. Now we know the government has it has had it since Trump turned over the first batch of documents to the National Archives in January 2022. And it’s the subject of the tape you just played. And it’s a devastating piece of evidence. So this superseding indictment, it seems to me, really strengthens this already very strong case. And, you know, we were all waiting around yesterday thinking that the January 6th indictment was coming. So we’re only at the beginning that really the third inning, I think, of the federal legal troubles for former President Donald Trump.
Geist: But it really is astonishing, Jonathan, the mayor, and it has to be said, reading through this new indictment, it reads like something straight out of the Gambino crime family where they say the boss wants the tapes deleted. Donald Trump calling his head of maintenance. Other people who work for him, who he knows are loyal to him and will do what he said, asking them to do things that are to get them to where we are now, which is brought up on federal charges. Guys meeting in the bushes at Mar a Lago, discussing what to do, and then after the feds come checking on Mr. De Oliveira, the head of maintenance, to say, we want to make sure Carlos is good. In other words, he’s not going to squeal to the feds, right? Is he loyal to us? It is an extraordinary document.
Lemire: An extraordinary document with so many parallels to a mafia investigation from the sixties and seventies, with one one perhaps exception. The fact the inclusion of an emoji apparently also in there as they’re trying to say, hey, we’re doing something secret, don’t tell anybody, and we use the shushing emoji. So that’s that’s shows you the quality of henchmen that Donald Trump has in this particular matter.
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