Ever since Jack Smith was named special counsel for the investigations into Donald Trump’s attempts to steal another term and Trump's willful decision to haul classified documents to Mar-a-Lago, both investigations have ramped up considerably. Indeed, they’ve ramped up to the point that the chances of Trump getting indicted have zoomed exponentially.
The latest proof of how much trouble Trump is in came late Friday afternoon, when a federal judge ordered Evan Corcoran, the lawyer who initially certified that all classified documents had been cleared out of Mar-a-Lago, to give further testimony.
In a monumental ruling Friday, a federal judge ordered Donald Trump attorney Evan Corcoran to provide additional testimony as part of an investigation into the former president’s handling of classified documents, a source familiar with the matter told CNN.
Corcoran has the potential to become one of the most crucial witnesses in special counsel Jack Smith’s criminal investigation into possible mishandling of classified records after the Trump presidency and obstruction of justice.
District Judge Beryl Howell said in an order under seal that Justice Department prosecutors have met the threshold for the crime-fraud exception for Corcoran, the source said.
To my mind, the fact Smith sought Corcoran’s testimony at all is a strong indication that he’s at least thinking about indicting Trump himself.
You may recall that in June 2022, Corcoran drafted a sworn statement claiming that Trump’s legal team conducted a “diligent search” of Mar-a-Lago in May 2022, after classified documents were found in the raft of documents retrieved from Mar-a-Lago by the National Archives. That search, Corcoran said, did not reveal any more classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. However, after the FBI descended on Mar-a-Lago in August and found more classified documents, that statement has been called into question.
In a legal filing in February, the Justice Department made an extraordinary claim: it believed Trump used Corcoran to commit a crime. Since then, it has sought Corcoran to give further testimony beyond what he has already given to the grand jury. Corcoran has refused to answer several questions, citing attorney-client privilege. But Smith and the DOJ argued that if Corcoran committed crimes for Trump, that privilege doesn’t apply. Powell sided with the government.
The fact that Smith has even gone this far ought to have Trump quaking in his boots, and should make the Mar-a-Lago staff hide the ketchup. After all, practically the only way Corcoran can avoid jail time is to give up Trump. The only way I can see Smith taking the extraordinary step of taking a battering ram to attorney-client privilege is if he’s planning on using Corcoran’s testimony to build a case against Trump himself.
According to Rolling Stone, a number of Trump’s advisers know Corcoran is a huge liability, and have urged Trump to fire him. We may be about to learn just how valid those concerns are.