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The administration tried to get former President Donald J. Trump to turn over classified documents before the case escalated into crime charges. On Monday, a ruling dismissed the case.
By Luke Broadwater, Katie Benner, Maggie Haberman and Michael Levenson
A little over a year ago, the Department of Justice filed a criminal complaint against former President Donald J. Trump, accusing him of embezzling classified documents he kept after abandoning his purposes and then obstructing the government’s efforts to achieve them.
For many legal experts, this is the most powerful case of the 4 opposed to the former president. But on Monday, a federal judge, after postponing the trial date, dismissed the case in its entirety and ruled that the appointment of special counsel Jack Smith violated the Constitution.
Here’s a timeline of nearly four years of fighting for classified documents.
End of 2020
The Trump White House is beginning talks about moving presidential records to the National Archives, as required by the Presidential Records Act.
Notes of conversations between White House staffers imply that there are discussions about the documents Trump had accumulated and about how to retrieve them and get the documents processed properly.
Mark Meadows, Trump’s chief of staff, has told others he will take matters into his own hands, according to other people familiar with the matter, but it’s unclear if he will ever communicate with Trump.
January 18, 2021
Two days before Trump’s departure, at least two moving trucks were seen at Mar-a-Lago, his club, and in Palm Beach, Florida.
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