From its inception as a mission to retrieve documents endangering national security, the search of Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago compound has developed into the sharpest of the several daggers at the former president’s throat.
That’s not simply because the evidence linking Trump to the potential crimes specified in the warrant — removal of public documents, violations of the Espionage Act and obstruction of justice — grows ever stronger, but also because his handling of sensitive government property is a stunning example of the essential Trumpian sin: Equating his personal interest with the national interest.
It’s always been clear that the federal government can’t — won’t — bring just any charges against Donald Trump. The circumstances have to justify what will inevitably be a political and constitutional firestorm. The evidence must be ironclad and the wrongdoing has to represent grave offenses against the republic.
