- Trump continues to publicly attack the DOJ and FBI after last week’s Mar-a-Lago raid.
- But people close to his inner circle warn that he could soon face criminal charges anyway.
- “I think he’s everyone’s target and I think he’ll be charged,” said a lawyer familiar with Trumpworld.
As former President Donald Trump continues to publicly attack the Department of Justice and the FBI Following last week’s unprecedented raid on his Mar-a-Lago club, people close to his inner circle told Insider they believe he may be in serious legal trouble.
A lawyer familiar with the Trump team’s thought process said in an interview that the ex-president “likes to run the show” and is a “big fan of PR aggression,” but could soon to face criminal charges that he cannot speak his way from.
“He should be worried about all these investigations,” added the lawyer. “I think he is everyone’s target and I think he will be charged.”
Trump is currently at the center of a number of state and federal criminal investigations. Foremost is the Justice Department’s investigation into whether Trump broke up three federal lawsincluding the Espionage Act, when it moved White House government records to Mar-a-Lago after leaving office.
The department has also focused on the former president in its extensive criminal investigation into the events surrounding the capitol riot and assigned a number of former senior White House officials those last weeks. Prosecutors have also assigned the National Archives for all White House records, it was turned over to the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 attack.
In Georgia, the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office is investigate whether Trump and his allies broke Georgia laws in their quest to undo President Joe Biden’s 2020 victory in the state. And in New York, the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office recently got a plea deal with Trump’s chief accountant, Allen Weisselberg, who this week pleaded guilty to more than a dozen crimes and agreed to implicate the Trump organization.
But Alan Dershowitz, who represented Trump in his Senate impeachment trial, said Insider Friday that Trump should be most concerned about the New York Attorney General’s civil investigation into his business practices.
“At the moment it’s only civilian, but you never know,” he said. “The civilian can always turn into a criminal as he did with Weisselberg.”
He also said he believed that even if Trump was charged with a crime in one of the criminal investigations, he could still run for president in 2024. ‘prevent from showing up based on ongoing investigations,’ Dershowitz said.
Earlier this month, the FBI executed a search warrant on Trump’s club and permanent residence at Mar-a-Lago, shown here in March 2017.
Darren Samuelson
As an insider Previously reported, there is nothing in the Constitution that prevents someone from mounting a presidential race if they are in prison after being convicted of a crime. Socialist candidate Eugene Debs had been convicted of treason under the Espionage Act when he ran for president in 1920. And Lyndon LaRouche, who was convicted of mail fraud in 1988 and imprisoned, ran for president in 1992.
If found guilty of violating two of the three laws the DOJ admitted it was investigating him as part of its removal of classified documents, Trump could theoretically launch a 2024 presidential campaign, even if he is incarcerated.
But if he is found to have violated any of those laws — 18 USC Section 2071, which prohibits the concealment, deletion or mutilation of government records generally — he could again be disqualified from holding office.
That said, lawyers told the New York Times that Trump is unlikely to be barred from running again even if found guilty of a Section 2071 violation, citing Supreme Court rulings that say Congress cannot override the criteria eligibility of the Constitution for the presidency.
Trump’s spokespersons did not immediately respond to a request for comment on his current legal status. On Friday night, the former president was still criticizing the FBI search as an exercise in corrupt power, and he also said on Truth Social that his attorneys will soon file a “major Fourth Amendment motion” related to the raid.