(LEESVILLE, La.) — As part of the national campaign to change the names of U.S. Army installations to cut ties with Confederate figures in America, Louisiana’s Fort Polk was redesignated to Fort Johnson Tuesday morning.
The campaign includes renaming nine U.S. Army bases, including North Carolina’s Fort Bragg changed to Fort Liberty, Texas’ Fort Hood changed to Fort Cavazos and Georgia’s Fort Benning changed to Fort Moore, among other changes.
Fort Polk was originally named after Lt. Gen. Leonidas Polk, a Confederate commander.
Now, the Fort Johnson base is honored for Sgt. William Henry Johnson, an African American World War I Medal of Honor recipient who served in the all-Black 369th U.S Infantry Regiment.
“Sgt. William Henry Johnson embodied the warrior spirit, and we are deeply honored to bear his name at the Home of Heroes,” said Brig. Gen. David W. Gardner, commanding general of the Joint Readiness Training Center and Fort Polk, in the press release.
The North Carolina native served one tour of duty on the western edge of the Argonne Forest in France’s Champagne region from 1918-1919, and became one of the first Americans to be awarded France’s highest award for valor, the French Croix de Guerre avec Palme.
According to the U.S. Department of Defense, former President Theodore Roosevelt called Johnson one of the five bravest Americans to serve in World War I.
After his death in July 1929, Johnson was awarded the Purple Heart in 1996, the Distinguished Service Cross in 2003, and most recently, the Medal of Honor in 2015.
More names are expected to be changed through the renaming campaign, including Georgia’s Fort Gordon changed to Fort Eisenhower to commemorate Army General Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Virginia’s Fort A.P. Hill will be changed to honor Dr. Mary Edwards Walker.
(WASHINGTON) — The Department of Homeland Security has issued an 18-month extension of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designations for El Salvador, Honduras, Nepal and Nicaragua, the department announced on Tuesday.
The extension allows approximately 337,000 immigrants from those countries, who are currently protected from deportation, to temporarily continue legally living and working in the country.
TPS is issued by the secretary of Homeland Security when countries are deemed too dangerous for their citizens for several reasons including national disasters, political unrest and war.
Although TPS may protect immigrants from deportation, it does not offer a pathway to citizenship for certain people residing in the U.S. before a certain date. For those from Nicaragua, for example, TPS protections were granted after Hurricane Mitch devastated Central America in 1998, and so only certain individuals that were in the U.S. on Jan. 5, 1999, are eligible to apply.
Applicants must also meet other criteria, like background checks.
The Trump administration had previously tried to end TPS for these and other countries, but a lawsuit filed by advocates on behalf of TPS holders stalled the termination. DHS claims Tuesday’s announcement officially rescinds those attempts. A hearing in that case is scheduled on June 22.
Ahilan Arulanantham, an attorney representing TPS holders in the ongoing lawsuit, said in a tweet that details about how the announcement affects their case still need to be worked out but celebrated the government’s actions.
“That’s why we are here now, watching the government finally inch toward doing the bare minimum version of the right thing,” he said.
Advocates say that Tuesday’s announcement serves as an acknowledgement from the Biden administration that immigrants from those countries must be shielded from deportation, but it falls short of protecting the thousands more that have come to the U.S. since TPS was designated.
TPS remains one of the only tools that the administration has to protect large groups of migrants without congressional approval.
“Through the extension of Temporary Protected Status, we are able to offer continued safety and protection to current beneficiaries who are nationals of El Salvador, Honduras, Nepal, and Nicaragua who are already present in the United States and cannot return because of the impacts of environmental disasters,” said DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in a statement. “We will continue to offer support to them through this temporary form of humanitarian relief.”
The DHS announcement coincided with TPS Children’s Day, a celebration observed by immigrant advocates. Gabriela Hernandez, a communications specialist for immigrant organization CASA, says around 10 children of current TPS holders met with and shared friendship bracelets with White House officials today ahead of the announcement and urged them to protect their families from deportation and to designate TPS for Guatemala.
The White House did not respond when asked to comment on the meeting.
Yubrank Suazo, a Nicaraguan opposition leader formerly imprisoned by Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, was freed and flown to the U.S. in February 2021.
“While I applaud the administration for doing this, it’s regrettable they did not redesignate TPS,” he told ABC News in Spanish. “Over 100,000 [Nicaraguan] immigrants who have fled oppression and the humanitarian crisis in our country are still vulnerable.”
Approximately 241,699 El Salvadorans and 76,737 Hondurans benefit from the program, according to a 2022 report by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Nepal and Nicaragua make up a smaller portion of the TPS-beneficiaries with approximately 14,556 and 4,250 immigrants enrolled, respectively.
Only those who are already benefitting from the protections are eligible to reregister. The announcement does not grant additional relief to any new group.
(DENVER) — Nine people were injured in a “chaotic” shooting in Denver near the arena where the Nuggets won their first NBA title on Monday night, police said.
A suspect in the incident was also shot and taken into custody and is currently hospitalized, police said.
The shooting, which occurred near the 2000 block of Market Street around 12:30 a.m. Tuesday, followed an altercation during a suspected drug deal, Denver Police Chief Ron Thomas said during a press briefing Tuesday. Multiple bags of fentanyl pills and cash were recovered from the scene, police said.
“Our strong believe is that this was completely unassociated to the celebration,” Thomas told reporters, noting that “tens of thousands” of people were in the downtown area peacefully celebrating the win.
“Unfortunately, there was a small group of individuals that chose to engage in some illegal behavior and that went awry and shots were exchanged,” Thomas said.
Thomas described the scene as “very chaotic.” At least 20 rounds were fired from multiple firearms, police said. Five to six of the shooting victims are believed to have been innocent bystanders, Thomas said.
There was a large police presence in the area and nearby officers ran toward the scene and rendered aid, the chief said. Eight men and a woman suffered non-life-threatening injuries, police said.
The suspect who had been shot — identified by police as 22-year-old Ricardo Vazquez — was taken into custody following a police foot chase and is hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries, according to Denver Police Major Crimes Division Commander Matt Clark. Officers recovered a firearm and fentanyl pills on him, Clark said.
A second suspect — identified by police as 33-year-old Raoul Jones — was located in a vehicle near the scene of the shooting and has also been taken into custody on a weapons charge, Clark said.
Police are still working to determine “what their involvement was and what, if any, injuries they caused by the rounds that were fired,” Clark said.
Police believe there are multiple suspects and urged anyone with information or footage from the scene to come forward.
The shooting was about a mile away from Ball Arena, where the Denver Nuggets defeated the Miami Heat on Monday to claim their first NBA title.
“All of us share the concern about this — the concern about gun violence in our community, you know, such a great event marred by some senseless acts of violence that we see far too common,” Denver Department of Safety Executive Director Armando Saldate said.
MORE: Graduate and his dad killed in mass shooting after high school graduation in Virginia
Police closed some downtown streets as large crowds exited the arena.
Many of those fans had dispersed before the shooting began but a smaller crowd lingered around the area, a police spokesperson said.
Thomas said will be a “significant” police presence at a parade planned for Thursday to celebrate the Nuggets’ win.
“We believe that we can keep them safe,” Thomas said.
ABC News’ Amanda Morris, Kevin Shalvey and Jeffrey Cook contributed to this story.
(NEW YORK) — A 51-year-old American living in Moscow was arrested on reported drug trafficking charges last week, according to Russian media. Michael Travis Leake, accused of selling narcotics, appeared on Russian TV in a courtroom cage.
“I am not admitting to any guilt,” Leake said in a video posted on social media by Russian media.
Leake was formally charged with narcotics dealing and placed in pretrial detention for three months, according to Russian news agencies. If convicted, he could face up to 12 years in prison.
Leake’s mother confirmed to ABC News that her son appears in a video that Russian media say shows his arrest. Leake briefly served in the Air Force as a teenager and has lived in Moscow for much of the past decade working as a musician with two Russian rock bands and teaching English, his mother said. She also said she hasn’t heard from her son since Mother’s Day and is concerned for his well-being.
Leake’s reported arrest comes amid a series of detentions of other Americans in Russia on what the U.S. calls “false charges,” including Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and former Marine Paul Whelan. The State Department said it’s aware of reports of an American detained in Moscow, but has declined comment otherwise.
Start Here podcast host Brad Mielke spoke to ABC News foreign correspondent Patrick Reevell about the detention and fears about other Americans living in Russia.
BRAD MIELKE: Just a few weeks ago, Brittney Griner played in her first WNBA game back on home soil. Remember, she had been imprisoned over marijuana possession charges in Russia. She pleaded not guilty, but was convicted and sent to a Russian penal colony. The only reason she didn’t serve her full nine-year sentence was because the U.S. made a deal. We got back Griner; they got back a notorious arms trafficker.
At the time, people said this feels like kind of a yucky trade. It was welcome news to Griner and her family, but will Russia try to ransom back more Americans to us?
Well guess what? As Griner is back home, another American has now been arrested on drug charges in Moscow.
ABC’s foreign correspondent Patrick Reevell spent years based there. Patrick, who is this American citizen?
PATRICK REEVELL: Yeah, Hi Brad. So over the weekend, we were monitoring the news and we suddenly saw that an American citizen had been arrested in Moscow. And his name is Michael Travis Leake, and he’s charged with selling drugs. And the first that we learned of it was that he was brought to court, and Russian media showed him in a cage in a court, with the allegations that he had been selling drugs.
And he was not someone who was known to us. He is not a well-known person. He’s not a famous person. He is ultimately an ordinary American, but who has spent a long time living in Russia. He’s been there now since 2010 and has spent most of the past decade, on and off, living in Moscow. And I think one of the main distinguishing features of Travis Leake is that he really loves Russian rock music. In 2014, he appeared in an episode with Anthony Bourdain on his CNN show “Parts Unknown.”
Travis Leake speaks pretty bluntly [in the episode] about his views of how Russia already was and how difficult it was for bands that might try and be critical of the government.
I spoke with the lead singer of a group called Tarakany!, which means “cockroaches” in Russian, and he had known Travis for about 10 years. This band is one that has actually recently been disbanded because they had spoken out publicly against [Russian President Vladimir] Putin and against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. And he actually now lives in exile, when I spoke to him.
MIELKE: And Patrick, is there kind of a sense that subversive music or a subversive scene is part of this that Russia’s factoring in? Or are the drug charges legit or is something else going on here?
REEVELL: So the first thing to say is that we really don’t know if the drug charges against him could be legitimate. Obviously though, the fear, the immediate fear that people have at the moment – because of what has happened to Brittney Griner and also recently to The Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, and before that to Paul Whalen, the former Marine, and before that to the former Marine Trevor Reid, who was freed in a prisoner exchange – because of all those cases, as soon as an American is arrested, there is suddenly this question of, is it going to be another hostage case? Has Russia taken someone yet again to try and pressure the U.S. and to have trades?
And obviously, each time we approach one of these cases, we have to be open-minded. Of course, there are Americans in Russia who do commit crimes, and we simply, for now, don’t know if it’s true that he could be guilty. But it has to be said, a lot of the signs around the case are already disquieting. They already are worrying and resemble some of the things we’ve seen in other cases. I mean, a pro-Kremlin TV channel put out what really can only be described as a hit piece on him after his arrest. The fact of this existence of this hit piece is worrying. I think it suggests that, yes, he could also be taken now as a possible hostage. We’ll have to wait and see. But certainly, there are a lot of signs around the case that are already quite worrying.
MIELKE: This feels like this continues to put the U.S. government in a tougher and tougher position, right? Because you’re making deals to get back a former Marine or then you’re making a deal to get back like a WNBA star, one of the most famous female basketball players who’s ever lived in this country, who’s a symbol unto herself – she’s Black, she’s gay.
But now you’re talking about maybe ex-pats that live in Russia being taken, even if they’re being taken hostage, does the U.S. start making deals for them? At some point, I’m sure there’s a lot of Americans here being like, just don’t travel to Russia, like, not the time. Is it to the point where people just should not be there because they could be next?
REEVELL: So the U.S. State Department, when the war in Ukraine began, when Russia invaded, told Americans to get out of Russia, now. They said you must leave, you should leave, immediately. And, you know, many Americans, many foreigners and frankly, many Russians who oppose Vladimir Putin, who opposed the war, have left. You know, hundreds of thousands of Russians have fled. But equally, you know, and I know this from my friends, it’s a very difficult choice to have to make.
Ultimately, when you are someone like Travis Leake, who’s lived in Russia for ten years and clearly loved it very much, you’re being forced to say goodbye to your home and all the people you know and a place that you love, for something which, he clearly considered himself not to be a political person. You know, he didn’t have any control over Russia’s policy. He doesn’t have any control over America’s policy. And so, you know, it’s easy to say you should just get out now, and I think many people feel you should. But of course, it is always very difficult for every individual person.
MIELKE: Really a disturbing case at this point. But like you said, Patrick, still a lot more details still to come here. Patrick Reevell in London right now. Thank you so much.
(WASHINGTON) — Much as happened after his first indictment, former President Donald Trump and his Republican allies are minimizing and/or mischaracterizing the charges leveled against him over his alleged mishandling of classified documents.
The full-throated response from Trump and his staunchest supporters includes inaccurate claims about the Espionage Act and the Presidential Records Act, as well accusations of “weaponization” by the Justice Department, made without evidence.
Trump, who has been charged with 37 counts ranging from willful retention of national defense information and conspiracy to obstruct justice, has denied all wrongdoing.
The indictment unsealed last week by prosecutors alleged Trump knowingly kept classified secret documents and put national security “at risk.”
Here’s a fact-check of some of the claims being made by Trump and his Republican allies.
‘He is not a spy’
Trump inaccurately referred to the charges under the Espionage Act during a Saturday speech to a Republican audience in Georgia.
“Doesn’t that sound terrible?” Trump said in an apparently mocking tone. “Oh, espionage. We got a box. I got a box. The espionage.”
Trump is being charged with 31 counts under the Espionage Act, but he is not being accused by prosecutors of being a spy. The indictment did not provide evidence prosecutors believe Trump disseminated the information to a foreign government or other entity with the intent to harm the U.S.
The 31 counts under the Espionage Act are being brought under Section 793(e), with prosecutors alleging he had “unauthorized possession of, access to, and control over documents relating to the national defense” and “did willfully retain the documents and fail to deliver them to the officer and employee of the United States entitled to receive them.”
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., on ABC’s “This Week,” called the Espionage Act charges “absolutely ridiculous.”
“Whether you like Trump or not, he did not commit espionage,” Graham said. “He did not disseminate, leak or provide information to a foreign power or to a news organization to damage this country. He is not a spy. He’s overcharged.”
But Bill Barr, who served as attorney general under Trump, said the Espionage Act charges “are solid counts.”
“I do think we have to wait and see what the defense says and what proves to be true, but I do think that … if even half of it is true, then he’s toast,” Barr said during a Fox News interview.
He said efforts to paint Trump as a “victim” are “ridiculous.
‘He declassified all of this’
Rep. Jim Jordan, the Ohio Republican who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, claimed during a Sunday appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union” that Trump has “said time and time again he declassified all this” and “can put it wherever he wants and handle it however he wants.”
But according to prosecutors, Trump admitted on tape that he possessed classified documents he hadn’t declassified in a transcript of an audio recording of an interview he did at his New Jersey golf club in July 2021.
“See, as president I could have declassified it,” Trump allegedly said. “Now I can’t, you know, but this is still a secret.”
Trump and his legal team haven’t provided evidence that he declassified all the materials found at his Mar-a-Lago estate.
Pressed for proof Trump declassified the material, Jordan replied: “I go on the president’s word.”
Immunity under the Presidential Records Act
Trump, in Georgia this past weekend, continued to claim all the documents fell under the Presidential Records Act, which is not a criminal statute, and criticized prosecutors for not mentioning the law in the indictment.
The 1978 law requires that records created by presidents and vice presidents be turned over to the National Archives and Records Administration at the end of their administrations, but Trump and his team have argued in the past that the law allows him to negotiate with NARA over which documents are personal and what’s presidential.
NARA in a June 9 statement pushed back on misleading claims about the Presidential Records Act, stating it requires a president to separate personal and presidential documents “before leaving office.”
“There is no history, practice, or provision in law for presidents to take official records with them when they leave office to sort through, such as for a two-year period as described in some reports,” the administration said.
Comparison with Biden’s case
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy on Monday attempted to draw comparisons between Trump’s case and the classified documents found at President Joe Biden’s home and office, which is also under investigation by a special counsel.
“I think President Trump has not been treated equally like everybody else in this process,” McCarthy told reporters. “I think when you’re looking now currently at a current president that has documents sitting behind his automobile in a garage that date all the way back to a senator, that raises a lot if you’re charging one and not charging the other. You raid one house and you don’t raid the other — that’s a little different, and that’s not fair.”
Legal experts have noted the apparent differences in Trump and Biden cases, including how each responded to law enforcement. Unlike in Trump’s case, where authorities had to issue a subpoena and later conduct a search to get the documents, which Trump allegedly concealed, Biden attorneys said they immediately notified the National Archives when they found the first set of documents at his office in November 2022.
Reporters repeatedly pressed this point with McCarthy, noting that the indictment alleges that Trump deliberately misled investigators and conspired to obstruct justice, allegations that have not been levied against Biden and others. McCarthy did not address those discrepancies directly.
“Is it a good picture to have boxes in a garage that opens all the time?” McCarthy added, commenting on the documents found in Biden’s possession at his Delaware residence. “A bathroom door locks.”
It’s not clear whether the door at the Mar-a-Lago bathroom was locked or even had a lock.
ABC News’ Allison Pecorin and Gabe Ferris contributed to this report.
Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images
(MIAMI) — Former President Donald Trump is set to appear in federal court in Miami on Tuesday after he was indicted in an investigation into his handling of classified documents.
Trump has been charged with 37 counts: 31 counts of willful retention of national defense information; one count of conspiracy to obstruct justice; one count of withholding a document or record; one count of corruptly concealing a document or record; one count of concealing a document in a federal investigation; one count of scheme to conceal; and one count of false statements and representations.
Trump has repeatedly denied any allegations of impropriety.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Jun 13, 4:08 PM EDT
Trump makes stop at Cuban restaurant
Former President Donald Trump is making a stop at Versailles, a restaurant in Little Havana at the heart of Miami’s Cuban exile community.
He was greeted with cheers and shook hands with excited supporters.
Jun 13, 3:54 PM EDT
Trump leaves courthouse
Former President Donald Trump has left the Miami federal courthouse after pleading not guilty to charges including willful retention of national defense information and conspiracy to obstruct justice.
Trump will fly to his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, where he’ll address his supporters Tuesday night.
Jun 13, 3:47 PM EDT
Trump enters not guilty plea
Defense attorney Todd Blanche entered a not guilty plea on behalf of former President Donald Trump.
Trump was frowning at some points and was looking down toward the floor for most of the hearing.
Trump was already in the courtroom by about 2:45 p.m., ahead of the scheduled 3 p.m. start time. Seated at the same table as Trump was his aide and co-defendant, Walt Nauta.
Trump waited in the courtroom for about 10 minutes before the judge arrived.
At first Trump appeared slumped in his chair, but when the judge asked for him to be officially arraigned, the former president sat up a bit and crossed his arms.
At one point during the arraignment, the magistrate judge asked Trump’s lawyers Todd Blanche and Chris Kise if they were permanent attorneys, and they indicated they were.
Trump was barred from speaking to any witnesses about the case, except through counsel.
Nauta did not enter a plea because he does not have local representation. He’s set to return to court on June 27.
Jun 13, 3:03 PM EDT
Special counsel Jack Smith in courtroom with Trump
Special counsel Jack Smith is currently in the courtroom for former President Donald Trump’s arraignment. It’s very unusual for a top prosecutor to attend such an early court appearance in a case.
This marks the first time Trump and Smith are in the same room.
Other prosecutors and Trump’s lawyers are also present.
Jun 13, 2:12 PM EDT
Trump completes booking process at courthouse, will head to courtroom
Former President Donald Trump is inside the Miami federal courthouse ahead of his 3 p.m. appearance.
Former President Donald Trump leaves his Trump National Doral resort, June 13, 2023 in Doral, Fla.
While the former president is inside the courthouse, many members of Trump’s team are staying in the motorcade, sources told ABC News.
Trump spokesperson Alina Habba spoke to reporters outside the courthouse while the former president was inside the building.
Trump’s booking process has been completed, sources told ABC News. He was not expected to be handcuffed or have his mugshot taken, sources told ABC News.
Supporters and opponents of former President Donald Trump have congregated outside the courthouse with signs and costumes to make their voices heard.
Jun 13, 1:55 PM EDT
Trump arrives at federal courthouse
Former President Donald Trump has arrived at the Miami federal courthouse ahead of his 3 p.m. appearance.
Trump is not expected to be handcuffed or have his mugshot taken, sources told ABC News.
The booking process is not expected to take long, a law enforcement official told reporters, adding that it’s “the same process that everyone goes through.”
Jun 13, 1:48 PM EDT
Trump riding in car alone
As former President Donald Trump motorcades to the courthouse, he is riding in his car alone, sources told ABC News.
Trump’s lawyers, Todd Blanche and Chris Kise, are in the car behind him. Trump aide Walt Nauta, who is also charged in the federal indictment, is also riding in that car with his attorney, Stanley Woodward.
-ABC News’ Katherine Faulders and John Santucci
Jun 13, 1:32 PM EDT
Trump leaves Doral club to head to court
Former President Donald Trump has left his Doral, Florida, golf club to motorcade to the Miami federal courthouse for his 3 p.m. appearance.
Some supporters with Trump flags lined the street outside Doral.
Jun 13, 1:03 PM EDT
Crowds calm outside courthouse, Miami mayor says
Miami Mayor Francis Suarez told ABC News that the crowd outside the courthouse “seems manageable” ahead of former President Donald Trump’s arrival.
“Everything seems, right now, very calm. We are hopeful that it remains that way,” he said.
Jun 13, 11:28 AM EDT
Trump not expected to be handcuffed
As negotiations reach final stages, ABC News has learned from sources that former President Donald Trump is not expected to be handcuffed or be required to empty his pockets when he’s processed at the courthouse on Tuesday.
Trump is also not expected to have a mugshot taken, according to sources.
His hands are expected to be scanned electronically, sources added.
Trump will be asked for his name and social security number when he’s processed, a law enforcement official told reporters.
The booking process is not expected to take long, a law enforcement official said, adding that it’s “the same process that everyone goes through.”
-ABC News’ Katherine Faulders, Aaron Katersky and John Santucci
Jun 13, 11:20 AM EDT
How serious are obstruction charges?
Of all the federal charges that former President Donald Trump and his aide Walt Nauta face in the investigation into the alleged mishandling of top secret government documents, obstruction is one of the most serious, according to legal experts.
Claire Finkelstein, the founder and faculty director of the Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law at the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg Public Policy Center, noted that the obstruction charges in the indictment against Trump and his aide carry as much serious weight as the charges related to keeping the top secret documents, with a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.
Finkelstein said an obstruction charge can cover a broad range of alleged activities, from as simple as lying to investigators, to as major as destroying evidence. But she said it all comes down to one clear allegation: that the accused deliberately interfered with an ongoing criminal investigation.
The federal indictment against former President Donald Trump alleges that he willfully retained documents containing the nation’s most sensitive secrets, including nuclear programs, after he left office, showed some of them on at least two occasions and then tried to obstruct the investigation into their whereabouts.
Federal prosecutors allege that the classified documents included “defense and weapons capabilities of both the United States and foreign countries; United States nuclear programs; potential vulnerabilities of the United States and its allies to military attack; and plans for possible retaliation in response to a foreign attack.”
Boxes of the documents were allegedly stored in locations around Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, including a ballroom stage and a bathroom, according to prosecutors.
Jun 13, 9:28 AM EDT
Trump not expected to be handcuffed
As negotiations reach final stages, ABC News has learned from sources that former President Donald Trump is not expected to be handcuffed or be required to empty his pockets when he’s processed at the courthouse on Tuesday.
Trump is also not expected to have a mugshot taken, according to sources.
His hands are expected to be scanned electronically, sources added.
Jun 13, 8:25 AM EDT
Chris Christie calls Trump’s conduct ‘inexcusable,’ ‘self-centered’
Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie took aim at former President Donald Trump during a CNN Republican Presidential Town Hall Monday night, calling Trump’s conduct “inexcusable” for someone who wants to occupy the Oval Office.
“He has shown himself, and I think most particularly in his post-presidency, to be completely self-centered, completely self-consumed, and doesn’t give a damn about the American people, in my view, if what the American people want is in conflict with what Donald Trump thinks is best for him,” Christie said.
“I mean, put aside taking the documents in the first place,” Christie said. “But then when you start getting asked … nicely with a letter from the archivist saying, ‘Could you please give it back,’ and you ignore it, ignore it, ignore it. Then they come with a grand jury subpoena, and then, according to the indictment, you tell your lawyers to tell them we don’t have anything even though you have dozens and dozens of boxes of material. That’s obstruction of justice, if it’s true.”
Jun 13, 8:11 AM EDT
Lawyers Todd Blanche, Chris Kise expected to attend court appearance
Former President Donald Trump is expected to be joined by his lawyers Todd Blanche and Chris Kise at Tuesday’s court appearance in Miami, sources told ABC News. Meetings with additional local attorneys are ongoing.
Blanche is representing Trump in the Manhattan criminal case while Kise represents Trump and the Trump Organization in other matters.
Jun 13, 5:12 AM EDT
Trump to appear in court at 3 p.m.
Former President Donald Trump is set to appear in federal court at 3 p.m. Tuesday.
He’s accused of willfully retaining documents containing the nation’s most sensitive secrets, including nuclear programs, after he left office, prosecutors said. He allegedly showed some of the documents to people on at least two occasions and then tried to obstruct the investigation into their whereabouts, prosecutors claim.
Trump denied any wrongdoing over the weekend, saying: “We did absolutely nothing wrong. Take a look at the Presidential Records Act. We did it by the book. Perfect.”
Trump is expected to arrive at and depart from the Miami courthouse via secure private access points that would make it impossible for the public or journalists to see him.
Trump aide Walt Nauta, who was also charged in connection with his handling of government documents, is also due in court at 3 p.m.
(WASHINGTON) — Last week’s indictment of Donald Trump, marking the first time a former president has ever faced federal charges, also created new questions about how his political future could be affected by a historic prosecution.
The 37 counts against Trump over how he allegedly handled government secrets after leaving the White House are the latest and most serious of his legal issues.
But polling, reactions from Republicans — including some of Trump’s 2024 opponents — and the aftermath of Trump’s first indictment, in New York City, show that it’s so far unclear whether the case will have lasting impact on the public.
A near equal percentage of Americans believe both that Trump should have been charged and that the charges against him were politically motivated, an ABC News/Ipsos survey last week found.
What is clear, however, is that the indictment has changed the course of the Republican primary campaign.
Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, a 2024 candidate facing Trump, said on Fox News on Monday that she had concerns both about federal law enforcement and about Trump’s suspected behavior.
“Two things can be true at the same time. One, the DOJ and FBI have lost all credibility with the American people. … The second thing can also be true if this indictment is true, if what it says is actually the case, President Trump was incredibly reckless with our national security,” she said.
Trump is set to be arraigned on Tuesday afternoon in Florida. He has said he is innocent. He previously pleaded not guilty to the felony charges he faces in New York City related to hush money he paid to an adult film actress before the 2016 presidential election.
He has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and claims he is being politically persecuted. Prosecutors have pushed back.
“This indictment was voted by a grand jury of citizens in the Southern District of Florida, and I invite everyone to read it in full to understand the scope and the gravity of the crimes charged,” special counsel Jack Smith, who is overseeing the federal case against Trump, said on Friday.
Here are key political takeaways and questions after Trump’s second indictment.
Poll shows contradictory feelings among Americans
The ABC News/Ipsos poll, conducted on Friday and Saturday among a random national sample of 910 U.S. adults, found sharp divides on the appropriateness and seriousness of the charges as well as whether Trump should now leave the race.
Forty-eight percent of Americans said Trump should have been charged with crimes, while 35% said he should not have been and 17% said they didn’t know. And 46% said Trump should suspend his bid for the White House, while 38% said he should not and 16% didn’t know.
However, 47% of respondents also said they believed the charges were politically motivated, while 37% said they weren’t and 16% weren’t sure.
Generally speaking, non-whites and those with a college education were less favorable to Trump on these questions.
About six in 10 Americans (61%) said that the charges were very or somewhat serious, while only 28% said they were not too serious or not serious at all.
In a sign of possible political danger for Trump, about 63% of independents called the charges somewhat or very serious, and 38% of Republicans said the same. Democrats, unsurprisingly, overwhelmingly thought the charges were somewhat or very serious, with 91% saying so.
Forty-five percent of independents said that Trump should have been charged versus 33% percent who said he should not have been. A large majority (86%) of Democrats said Trump should have been charged compared to only 16% of Republicans.
What’s more, 44% of independents said Trump should end his 2024 campaign, while 37% said he should not. About three-quarters (76%) of Democrats also thought Trump should suspend his campaign. However, just over two-thirds (68%) of Republicans disagreed, saying Trump should not suspend his campaign.
On the other hand, 45% of independents also said they felt the case was politically motivated, while 37% said it wasn’t. Sixteen percent of Democrats and 80% of Republicans said it was politically motivated, too.
Trump could see primary boost as other candidates split
Given what happened after his previous criminal charges, Trump could see another increase in his fundraising and in support from Republican voters after his second indictment — at least in the primary.
An ABC News poll conducted after Trump’s first indictment in New York showed that he gained some ground in the primary over Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, his nearest competitor, compared to DeSantis’ previous polling average as compiled by FiveThirtyEight.
“There’s nothing in polling right now that suggests that Donald Trump is being hurt by federal indictments, by any indictments. The case of New York from a couple of months ago, it may have actually helped his standing,” ABC News Political Director Rick Klein said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.”
“It may be that this case is more serious, it may be that his rivals are making the case and they can sort of get in there a little bit and change these dynamics,” Klein said, “but for those who are saying that Donald Trump is done politically as a result of facing criminal charges, there’s just no evidence of that yet.”
Some of Trump’s challengers have rallied to his defense, like Vivek Ramaswamy. Others, like DeSantis, have criticized federal authorities for, in their words, unfairly targeting Trump.
But some Republican candidates have tried to prosecute the case that he is unfit, based on his alleged conduct.
“My point is that this is bad for our country, bad for the presidency, and it is a legitimate campaign issue. We do not need to have our commander in chief of this country not protecting our nation’s secrets,” former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson said on CNN. “If these allegations and probable cause have been found against any military person, any public servant that wasn’t named Donald Trump, they would have been indicted a long time ago.”
Independents could offer Democrats an opening
Independents were a key voting bloc supporting Democrats in the 2020 election, according to exit polls. Self-identified independents voted Democrat by a 54-41 margin in 2020, according to the exit polling.
The latest ABC News/Ipsos survey on Trump’s indictment shows they aren’t embracing him, while Democratic and Republican voters have largely broken along partisan lines on the issue.
Among independents, 45% said Trump should have been charged, a third said he should not have been and 22% said they didn’t know. Overall, 57% of independents in this poll had an unfavorable view of Trump and, again, a majority of independents were also more likely to count the charges as serious.
The numbers seem to bode well for a Democratic Party that has been chosen by a majority of independents in past cycles.
Low favorability for both parties’ front-runners
Both Trump and Biden suffer from identically dismal favorability ratings in the new ABC News/Ipsos poll. Both stand at 31% although Trump’s is up from 25% in the days after his first indictment while Biden’s has remained about the same.
Those numbers are sparking both handwringing from some Democrats and barbs from Trump’s critics that he is blocking more electable Republicans from making gains in the primary.
“I don’t think Trump can win a general election, but that is a nice way for him to diss people like Tim Scott, who is a pretty formidable candidate,” Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., said on CNN last month, referencing South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, another GOP primary candidate.
Meanwhile, on Sunday on “This Week,” Delaware Democratic Sen. Chris Coons, a close ally of the White House, acknowledged polling showing Biden trailing or tied with Trump.
“I think we should be worried given [Trump’s] conduct and given his record,” he said.
Coons later told anchor George Stephanopoulos, “I think the best thing for Joe Biden to do in this campaign is to keep showing that he is an effective and capable president by continuing to solve big problems” — all “despite the distractions of former President Trump’s rising legal problems.”
Trump indictment forces his rivals to talk about him
News of the federal charges on Thursday night immediately shook the primary, taking candidates off their regularly scheduled programming and dividing the GOP field, with some of Trump’s critics in the race taking the chance to highlight his legal peril — despite Republican voters saying in polls that they reject the indictment.
“The fact is that these facts are devastating,” former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, another primary candidate, said on Sunday.
“The bigger issue for our country is, is this the type of conduct that we want from someone who wants to be president of the United States?” Christie said.
Others, however, sided with the former president, with entrepreneur Ramaswamy vowing to pardon Trump if he’s elected president — an offer that Hutchinson labeled “offensive” — and others emphasizing what they view as a politicized justice system.
“What we see today across this administration of President Joe Biden is a double standard,” Scott said Monday. “That double standard is both un-American and unacceptable. You can’t protect Democrats while targeting and hunting Republicans.”
“This case is a serious case …. But in America, you’re still innocent until proven guilty,” he said.
DeSantis, who has been slamming Trump more directly on the trail, made more indirect references to the former president’s case. He decried what he called government “weaponization” and pointed to Hillary Clinton, who was investigated but ultimately not charged after prosecutors found “a lack of intent,” authorities have said.
“I remember, you know, Hillary [Clinton] had emails with the classified, and my view was, gee, as a naval officer, if I would have taken classified from my department, I would have been court marshaled in a New York minute, and yet they seem to not care about that,” DeSantis said on Sunday.
Unlike Ramaswamy, DeSantis has not promised a pardon to Trump if elected. GOP candidate and former Vice President Mike Pence was asked about it but avoided weighing in last week, saying, “I’m not going to speak to hypotheticals.”
Indictment fuels divides over law enforcement
Beyond the campaign trail, the indictment appears to be exacerbating partisan divides over law enforcement.
Democrats for years have been mired in an intraparty debate over changes to policing, which Republicans have taken advantage of to hit the party as, they claim, soft on crime.
But now, conservatives are accusing federal law enforcement of bias and even mulling efforts to defund part or all of the FBI.
While the timeline for Trump’s federal case remains unclear — and with his trial in the New York case slated for March 2024 — it’s all but certain that the charges against him will shadow the Republican primary race for months to come.
METHODOLOGY – This ABC News/Ipsos poll was conducted using Ipsos Public Affairs‘ KnowledgePanel® June 9-10, 2023, in English and Spanish, among a random national sample of 910 U.S. adults with an oversample of Republican respondents weighted to their correct proportion in the general population. Results have a margin of sampling error of 3.7 points, including the design effect. Partisan divisions are 26-25-41 percent, Democrats-Republicans-independents. See the poll’s topline results and details on the methodology here. (NOTE: LINK the word “here” to the Topline document. )
ABC News’ Gabriella Abdul-Hakim, Libby Cathey, Abby Cruz and Dan Merkle contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — Almost immediately after the Justice Department on Friday unsealed its indictment against Donald Trump, the former president’s allies began crying foul, noting that — at least so far — no charges have been filed against President Joe Biden for retaining classified documents from his time as vice president or against Hillary Clinton for her use of a private email server as secretary of state.
Posting to Twitter on Friday, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., denounced the “double standard.” And appearing on ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Clinton “got away” with doing something “similar” to what Trump did.
Trump himself has made similar claims.
But a review of government documents and public statements tied to all three investigations suggests there are key differences between the evidence uncovered in Trump’s case and the others. It also helps to explain why the Justice Department recently declined to charge former Vice President Mike Pence for his handling of classified documents after leaving office.
What’s the intent?
The most glaring difference between Trump’s case and Clinton’s case is what prosecutors found about their intent: While the indictment against Trump alleges he violated the Espionage Act through “willful retention of national defense information,” prosecutors in Clinton’s case determined they couldn’t show she was “willful” in her intent.
In fact, as later recounted by the Justice Department’s inspector general, prosecutors in Clinton’s case concluded the evidence they gathered showed “a lack of intent to communicate classified information on unclassified systems.”
That’s largely because “[n]one of the emails Clinton received were properly marked to inform her of the classified status of the information,” and investigators found evidence that Clinton and her aides “worded emails carefully in an attempt to ‘talk around’ classified information,” according to the inspector general’s report on the matter.
“There was no evidence that the senders or former Secretary Clinton believed or were aware at the time that the emails contained classified information,” prosecutors concluded, according to the inspector general.
By contrast, the indictment against Trump not only says that nearly all of the 31 documents he’s charged with “willfully” retaining at his Mar-a-Lago estate were marked as classified, but it also details alleged conversations and actions showing that he allegedly knew he took and held onto classified documents from the White House.
In one recording obtained by investigators, Trump can be heard — six months after leaving office — showing a writer and three others what he calls a “secret” document, prosecutors allege. “As president I could have declassified it … [but] now I can’t,” he said on the recording, according to the indictment.
Media reports say authorities have been unable to find that document. And Trump is not charged with illegally retaining it or nearly 200 other documents that were returned to the U.S. government before the Justice Department issued its subpoena to Trump.
Trump has insisted he’s “an innocent man” who “did nothing wrong,” claiming on social media after the indictment was unsealed that “this case has nothing to do with the Espionage Act.”
In defending his actions detailed in the indictment, Trump has suggested he was operating in accordance with the Presidential Records Act — an assertion that the National Archives has disputed.
Nevertheless, he noted on social media that “Hillary and Biden were not indicted” for their handling of sensitive documents.
‘If Trump had done the same’
The indictment against Trump alleges that his “refusal to return” so many classified documents — despite “months of demands” by the National Archives and a federal grand jury subpoena — and the conspiracy he allegedly launched to “hide and conceal” his “continued possession of documents with classification markings” reflects his intent.
He participated in that conspiracy “knowingly and willfully,” including by allegedly pushing his own attorney to lie to federal authorities seeking all classified documents and by allegedly directing one of his aides to hide certain boxes of documents from that attorney, according to the indictment.
“The purpose of the conspiracy was for Trump to keep classified documents he had taken with him from the White House,” the indictment says.
By contrast, after Pence’s team conducted a review of his own records and found “some classified documents” at his home in Indiana, Pence “fully cooperated with the Justice Department,” according to Pence.
“I took full responsibility,” Pence told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt last week, just days after the Justice Department notified Pence that it would not be seeking charges in the matter. “[They] found that it was an innocent mistake.”
In Clinton’s case, she and her aides also largely cooperated in the FBI’s investigation, according to the Justice Department’s inspector general.
In his report, the inspector general said “the FBI obtained more than 30 devices” from Clinton and her aides, and “received consent to search Clinton-related communications on most of these devices.” Among those 30 devices were two of Clinton’s three private email servers, after the third server had been “discarded” years earlier “and, thus, the FBI was never able to access it for review,” the inspector general’s report said.
According to the indictment against Trump, the former president privately expressed admiration for how Clinton’s lawyer handled her case, saying “she didn’t get in any trouble because,” as Trump described it, her lawyer took responsibility for deleting 30,000 emails that Clinton’s legal team determined were personal in nature and not subject to government review.
But, according to the Justice Department’s inspector general, the FBI was actually able to retrieve a majority of those deleted emails through the many devices it obtained and through other means.
As for Biden, the special counsel appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland to investigate Biden’s retention of classified documents from his time as vice president in the Obama administration has yet to announce his findings. But Biden’s attorneys have insisted that from “the outset of this matter, the President directed his personal attorneys to fully cooperate with the Department of Justice.”
When Biden’s personal attorneys first found classified documents in private offices associated with Biden, they said they notified the National Archives and Records Administration, and they helped the government retrieve them, with one of Biden’s attorneys writing in an email at the time, “[W]e are prepared to facilitate whatever access you need to accomplish NARA taking custody of whatever materials it deems appropriate.”
And when the Justice Department then wanted to search Biden’s home in Delaware, Biden and his attorneys granted “full access” to the president’s residence, where investigators found additional documents marked classified, his lawyers said in a public statement at the time.
“If Trump had done the same, there would have been no grand jury, there probably would have been no search warrant, and [he] probably would have avoided a potential criminal problem,” former Watergate prosecutor Nick Akerman previously told ABC News.
ABC News’ Alexander Mallin and Luke Barr contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — As former President Donald Trump makes his first court appearance in Florida to face federal charges related to his handling of classified documents, special counsel Jack Smith’s separate investigation into Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election appears to be quietly pressing on inside a grand jury room in Washington, D.C.
Nevada GOP Chairman Michael McDonald and Nevada GOP committee member Jim DeGraffenreid were spotted by a network pool reporter Tuesday afternoon inside the Prettyman Federal Courthouse, where the Jan. 6 grand jury meets.
Both men were part of the failed 2020 effort to put forward slates of fake electors who would attempt to cast electoral college votes for Trump on Jan. 6, despite Trump’s loss in the state to Joe Biden.
The House Jan. 6 committee said the “fake elector” plan, set up in multiple swing states, assembled “groups of individuals in key battleground states and got them to call themselves electors, created phony certificates associated with these fake electors, and then transmitted these certificates to Washington, and to the Congress, to be counted during the joint session of Congress on January 6th.”
McDonald appeared before the House Jan. 6 committee but invoked his Fifth Amendment right to refuse to answer questions.
Trump has dismissed the investigations into Jan. 6 and blasted the Jan. 6 panel as partisan.
The Nevada Independent reported in June of last year that the FBI seized McDonald’s phone as part of its investigation in the fake elector scheme, well before the appointment of Smith as special counsel last November.
In May, eight of the so-called “fake electors” in Georgia accepted immunity in the Fulton County district attorney’s separate probe into the matter, according to their lawyer.
Smith was appointed in November by Attorney General Merrick Garland to oversee the investigation into Trump’s handling of classified documents after leaving the presidency, as well as efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
(NEW YORK) — Popular Reddit pages, known as “subreddits,” with names like /r/funny, /r/sports, /r/todayilearned and /r/music are currently inaccessible for new posts in a protest over planned changes to the website.
The protest is over how the company plans to reshuffle pricing for its application programming interface, or API, which is the code that allows third parties to build apps. In recent years, the API also has been used to train artificial intelligence programs like ChatGPT.
Both OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, and Google, which makes a similar chatbot called Bard, use Reddit data to train their systems.
In April, as AI-powered chatbots soared in popularity, Reddit announced it was planning to change the pricing to access its API. Engadget Senior Editor Karissa Bell said the move was intended to crack down on companies that use Reddit’s API for AI programs.
“A lot of these companies had been training using Reddit’s data, because it was open and because their APIs were readily accessible,” said Bell. “So, at the time Reddit said, ‘hey, we are not going to be allowing these big companies, which are extremely profitable, to access all of our data for free.’”
But soon after, other companies that use Reddit’s API began raising concerns, saying the changes make the API too expensive and could take many popular Reddit-based apps out of commission.
“Third party developers, who make these Reddit clients, started sounding the alarm and saying, ‘hey, we’re probably not going to be allowed to continue operating our services at these prices,’” said Bell.
Christian Selig is the developer behind the app “Apollo,” which he said has about 1.5 million monthly active users. He told ABC Audio that Reddit’s move to charge for access to its API wasn’t completely unexpected.
“It is something in the back of my head that I thought they’d entertain at some point,” he said. But the actual cost ended up being much more expensive than he was anticipating.
Selig said his company would have to pay $20 million annually for API access. “I don’t see how this pricing is anything based in reality or remotely reasonable,” Selig wrote in a post on Reddit, adding, “I hope it goes without saying that I don’t have that kind of money or would even know how to charge it to a credit card.” Apollo said it would shut down its app on June 30, when the new API pricing goes into effect. Other apps, like ReddPlanet and Sync, have announced similar moves.
The prospect of losing apps like Apollo prompted some Reddit users to coordinate a protest of the pricing changes.
“Thousands and thousands of these subreddits have said that they’re going to ‘go dark,’ which means that they’ll be setting their communities to ‘private’ so people who aren’t subscribers can’t access them,” said Bell.
On Monday morning, visitors to Reddit were greeted with a variety of messages from some of the platform’s most popular communities. The subreddit /r/Music currently displays a message that says it is “Closed Indefinitely for Reddit API Policy Change Protest.” The /r/aww subreddit, which is dedicated to cute images, notes that it has gone private “due to Reddit’s decision to effectively kill 3rd party applications with their API costs. If or when /r/aww returns will depend on Reddit’s continued responses to the situation.”
“Reddit’s historically had a massive focus on being, like, a very community-driven website,” said Selig. “And now that, just, everybody feels very unheard and dismissed, I think that it’s not surprising that there’s some pushback there.”
Selig said he’s in favor of a pricing structure that differentiates between companies that use it for artificial intelligence programs, and those that use it for apps like Apollo.
“Of course, bills need to be paid and they need to have a sustainable platform going forward, and they need to charge bills to do so” said Selig. “But do so in a way that respects the community and makes them feel like they’re not being taken to lunch.”
Not all subreddits have joined the protest. Moderators of the popular /r/AskReddit continue to allow new posts, writing in part “as mods of a community dedicated to conversations, we think it’s more impactful to keep the subreddit open so people can discuss this controversial change and the surrounding impacts.”
In response to a request for comment, Reddit spokesperson Tim Rathschmidt drew attention to the “efficiency” of certain third-party Reddit apps – that is, how often they use the company’s API. “Some apps are more efficient (and require significantly less API calls),” said Rathschmidt, adding, “Apollo is notably less efficient than other third-party apps.”
Last week, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman took to Reddit to answer questions about the API changes. In his introductory post, Huffman told users “we respect when you and your communities take action to highlight the things you need, including, at times, going private.”
