The first charges relate to misstatement of business expenses in corporate books concerning paying off hookers, with those expenses amounting to some hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The second set of charges relates to the misappropriation and illegal storage and sharing of government secret and top secret information, including charges related to intentionally thwarting attempts to retrieve that information on the part of the government.
The third set of charges are: i) conspiracy to violate civil rights; ii) conspiracy to defraud the government; iii) the corrupt obstruction of an official proceeding; and iv) conspiracy to carry out such obstruction.
Let me deal with each of these in turn.
Leveling charges against anyone related to the misstatement of a few hundred thousand dollars in the business records of a corporation that does millions of dollars worth of business each year is total bullshit. The normal course of action is to simply ask the company to properly record these expenses, and pay any associated taxes. This is an obvious witch hunt.
The second set of charges are more serious, but we know that Joe Biden and Mike Pence also illegally and intentionally retained and improperly stored at least tens of secret and top secret documents. While the aspect of intentionally interfering with attempts to retrieve this information makes what Trump did different from the other two, unless the Department of Justice was going to charge the other two gentlemen with having committed the same crimes as Trump, they should not have laid any of these charges.
This is because the aspect of intentionally thwarting attempts to retrieve the information probably only matters if the charges of illegally retaining the information go ahead first. They should not have gone ahead as Trump deserved the same treatment as the other two men. The fact that Biden and Pence cooperated in returning the documents means nothing, as cooperating with the cops after you have been nabbed goes to sentencing after you have been convicted, not to whether you will be charged in the first place. Trump deserved the same "light touch" treatment from the cops as Biden and Pence here, and he did not get it.
The third set of charges are shocking, not because of what they are, but because of what they are not. In short, Trump has not been charged with sedition or conspiracy to commit sedition.
If the Department of Justice does not have enough evidence to charge him with these crimes - "sedition" and related conspiracy to commit sedition are what claiming that January 6th was a "coup" are all about - then they should have pursued only Trump's allies here, and not charged him with anything. As it is, he has been charged with a "sub-plot" of charges that say just about nothing regarding what he actually did and planned on January 6, 2021.
Trump has much to answer for regarding his business dealings; the secret and top secret documents that he retained; and especially regarding what he was up to on January 6th. The charges that he faces regarding all three of these issues point at irrelevancies; they point to unequal treatment compared to similarly situated individuals like Biden and Pence; and they literally scream that he insulated himself from the plotters around January 6th so well that the Department of Justice does not have enough evidence to pursue the only charges that matters here, which are potential charges related to sedition.
In light of the above, Trump is poised to make the various Department of Justice and other officials who are pursuing him look foolish.
What happens in Georgia could be a different matter...
We shall see.
