SCOTUS Rejects Trump’s Bogus Assertion Of Executive Privilege Over National Archives Records (Updated)

Christmas came almost a month late, but it finally did come. I hate to say I told you so – oh hell, who am I kidding – I told you so! 

Reuters has a no pay wall report, U.S. Supreme Court spurns Trump bid to keep Capitol attack records secret:

The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected former President Donald Trump’s request to block the release of White House records sought by the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol investigating last year’s deadly attack on the Capitol by a violent mob of his supporters.

The decision means the documents, held by a federal agency that stores government and historical records, can be disclosed even as litigation over the matter continues in lower courts.

Only one of the court’s nine members, radical Republican Justice Clarence Thomas, publicly noted disagreement with the decision.

Trump’s request to the justices came after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Dec. 9 ruled that the businessman-turned-politician had no basis to challenge President Joe Biden’s decision to allow the records to be handed over to the House of Representatives select committee.

Trump and his allies have waged an ongoing legal battle with the committee seeking to block access to documents and witnesses. Trump has sought to invoke a legal principle known as executive privilege, which protects the confidentially of some internal White House communications, a stance rejected by lower courts.

The brief Supreme Court order noted that the weighty question of whether a former president can assert an executive privilege claim did not need to be answered to resolve the case.

“Because the court of appeals concluded that President Trump’s claims would have failed even if he were the incumbent, his status as a former president necessarily made no difference to the court’s decision,” the unsigned order said.

The House committee has said it needs the records to understand any role Trump may have played in fomenting the violence that unfolded on Jan. 6, 2021. His mob stormed the Capitol in a failed bid to prevent Congress from formally certifying Biden’s 2020 presidential election victory over Trump.

The committee has asked the National Archives, which holds Trump’s White House records, to produce visitor logs, phone records and written communications between his advisers. [It is also beleved to include draft executive orders and a draft presidential speech for the seizure of voting machines and ordering a re-do election in several states Trump lost based on his Bg Lie that the election was stolen. It may also include draft orders or memos to the Pentagon, involving using the military in his attempted self-coup. If these documents do exist, it would be the “smoking gun” for a seditious conspiracy charge.]

President Biden, who took office two weeks after the riot, has determined that the records, which belong to the executive branch, should not be subject to executive privilege and that turning them over to Congress was in the best interests of the nation. Trump has argued that he can invoke executive privilege based on the fact he was president at the time even though he is no longer in office.

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan on Nov. 9 rejected Trump’s arguments, saying he had not acknowledged the “deference owed” to Biden’s determination that the committee could access the records and adding: “Presidents are not kings, and Plaintiff is not President.”

The bipartisan select committee is comprised of seven Democrats and two Republicans.

[A]ny delay by the Supreme Court in allowing the disclosure of the records could have imperiled the panel’s chances of obtaining them. The committee aims to finish its work before the November congressional elections in which Trump’s fellow Republicans are seeking to regain House control. Republicans opposed the panel’s creation and could shut down the inquiry if they win a majority in the chamber.

The National Archives was already set to turn over a tranche of documents to the January 6 Committee today. Now it can load up the boxes on the truck and deliver it all to the committee. Small number of Trump-era White House documents set to be turned over to January 6 committee:

The National Archives plans to release four pages of Trump-era White House documents to the House on Wednesday, in what appears to be the first time the committee that’s investigating the January 6 riot would get records that former President Donald Trump wants to keep secret.

The documents are set to go to the House committee at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, according to a court filing from the Archives, which holds all of the Trump White House records. [SCOTUS ruled before 6:00 p.m. The boxes of records can now be delivered to the committee at any time.]

Trump’s legal team has ratcheted up its attacks of the Biden administration’s position on releasing the four pages. As the deadline neared on Wednesday, Trump’s team made public multiple letters to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals complaining of the plan.

One letter called the Archives’ decision “contemptuous behavior,” and the Archives’ choice to notify the court that four pages would be turned over an attempt to “prophylactically inoculate itself and its officers from contempt proceedings.”

In another court filing on Wednesday morning, the National Archives, represented by the Biden Justice Department, said it wasn’t intentionally misleading the court about its plan to turn over documents to the House, as Trump’s team had accused them of doing.

The Trump team, the Archives said, hadn’t done what’s needed in time to block the release of four pages being handed over.

Trump “hires only the best people.” Jesus Christ, the lawyers he has hird are some of the worst lawyers I have ever seen in my life, and shockingly so.

“The release of certain records from tranche four — that Appellant has known for over a month would occur today — will not violate any order of any court. Indeed, that is presumably why Appellant has asked the Supreme Court to enjoin release of documents from that tranche. The Supreme Court, however, has not acted on that request,” lawyers for the administration wrote. [SCOTUS acted only hours later.]

It’s not clear what those four pages include, and should they be turned over, it would be up to the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol to make them public.

[T]he select committee is seeking more than 700 pages of disputed documents as it explores Trump’s role in trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election. That includes his appearance at a January 6 rally in which he directed followers to go to the US Capitol where lawmakers were set to certify the election results and “fight” for their county.

The documents include activity logs, schedules, speech notes and three pages of handwritten notes from then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows — paperwork that could reveal goings-on inside the West Wing as Trump supporters gathered in Washington and then overran the Capitol, disrupting the certification of the 2020 vote.

Mark Meadows’ bogus assertion of executive privilege is now moot. The Department of Justice should now indict him on the committee’s referral for contempt of Congress. Merrick Garland needs to stop dragging his feet.

Trump is also seeking to keep secret a draft proclamation honoring two police officers who died in the siege and memos and other documents about supposed election fraud and efforts to overturn Trump’s loss of the presidency, the National Archives has said in court documents.

Broadly, the Trump White House records could answer some of the most closely guarded facts of what happened between Trump and other high-level officials, including those under siege on Capitol Hill on January 6.

It will take staff attorneys for the committee several days to sift through the documents once they have been received, but I anticipate some explosive revelations in the coming weeks.

UPDATE: After the SCOTUS ruling, the Committee tweeted:

The Supreme Court’s action tonight is a victory for the rule of law & American democracy.

The Select Committee has already begun to receive records that the former President had hoped to keep hidden & we look forward to additional productions regarding this important information

— January 6th Committee (@January6thCmte) January 20, 2022