An earlier version of this article incorrectly reported that former President Donald Trump’s legal team claimed that Trump issued a “standing order” while in office to declassify documents. This claim was made by Trump’s office. The article has been corrected. In his first televised appearance since a court-ordered search of his Florida home last month, Donald Trump reiterated Wednesday that all documents moved from the White House to Mar-a-Lago were declassified while he was in office, adding that a president can carry that out “even thinking about it.” “There doesn’t need to be a process, as I understand it,” Trump told Fox News host Sean Hannity. Prosecutors said about 100 of the documents obtained from Mar-a-Lago had been classified, including some marked top secret. “If you’re the president of the United States, you can declassify just by saying it’s declassified,” the former president added. “You’re the president — you make that decision.” Appeals Court: Justice Department Can Use Mar-a-Lago Documents in Criminal Investigations Trump’s comments came before an appeals court ruled Wednesday that the FBI can use the seized documents in its criminal investigation. His appearance also followed an announcement earlier in the day that New York Attorney General Letitia James filed a lawsuit charging him and his three children with manipulating property values to defraud lenders, insurance brokers and tax officials. On Hannity’s show, Trump called the lawsuit part of a politically motivated “witch hunt” that has been brewing since he first ran for office. He argued that if there were discrepancies about his property values, the banks should have done more due diligence, adding that his company provided a disclaimer in financial documents saying the same. Regarding the FBI’s investigation into possible mishandling of classified documents, Trump said he “declassified everything.” He also said he personally did not pack any boxes as he left the White House. The work was mostly carried out by General Services Administration employees, he said, referring to the office that plays a prominent role in presidential transitions. Trump’s legal team has so far presented no evidence that the documents at Mar-a-Lago were declassified, the appeals court’s three-judge panel noted in Wednesday’s ruling. His lawyers resisted doing so in front of special educator Raymond Dearie, the U.S. district judge who pressed the group this week to provide such evidence, the panel wrote. “For our part, we cannot discern why [Trump] would have a vested interest in or need any of the hundred classified documents,” the court wrote. Presidents have the authority to declassify information — although there is usually a process for doing so, which may include coordinating with the agencies or Cabinet members from whom the information originated to prevent potential risks to national security . The status of key investigations involving Donald Trump After the court-authorized search of Mar-a-Lago on Aug. 8, the former president’s office said in a statement that Trump had issued a “standing order” while in office that documents moved to his residence be immediately declassified. But Trump’s lawyers have avoided making such a claim in court or in legal filings, saying Tuesday that addressing the issue would mean revealing a potential defense that could be used if the criminal investigation leads to an indictment. In an interview with CNN in August, John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser, called the claim by the former president’s office about the standing order to declassify documents “complete fiction.” Devlin Barrett contributed to this report.
