The 'My Boxes' Theory Is All You Need To Explain Trump's Behavior

US News & Politics
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The ‘My Boxes’ Theory Is All You Need To Explain Trump’s Behavior

There’s no deep mystery behind why Trump kept boxes of classified documents. He wanted them.

C.J. CIARAMELLA | 6.13.2023 12:42 PM

On Sunday, The New York Times floated a very important question on Twitter: Why was Donald Trump hoarding boxes of national security documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort? And what could possibly explain his intense resistance to giving them back?

Now, far be it for me to criticize the paper of record’s reporting, but last year I made a throwaway joke that solved the mystery. I would like to introduce you all to an advanced political theorem known as “my boxes.”

Former American Conservative columnist Rod Dreher had asked last year, around the time of the Mar-a-Lago raid, what reason Trump could possibly have for refusing to return the boxes. It was somewhat of a hobby among the professionally credulous to wonder what machinations could be behind Trump’s decision to hold on to these boxes, despite legal peril. Among some resistance liberals, there were unsupported accusations that Trump may have been selling classified documents or using them for nefarious purposes.

Then, in a joking back-and-forth with The Bulwark 's Sonny Bunch, I offered a fictional conversation between Trump and an aide that would tidily sum up the former president’s motivations and legal theories:

my boxes

For the past year since then, whenever a new bit of information dribbles out about the case, someone on Twitter alerts me that another point has been scored for “my boxes.”

All of the substantive reporting, as well as the recently filed indictment, has backed up the “my boxes” hypothesis. In August, The New York Times reported that Trump told several advisers, in response to the National Archives’ demands that he return the boxes: “It’s not theirs; it’s mine.” The Washington Post reported in November that “Trump repeatedly said the materials were his, not the government’s—often in profane terms.”

This April, Fox News’ Sean Hannity tried to tee up a softball for Trump, saying he couldn’t imagine the former president saying, “Bring me some of the boxes that we brought back from the White House, I’d like to look at them.” But Trump insisted that he would.

“I would have the right to do that,” Trump replied. “I would do that.”

According to the 37-count indictment filed in federal court against Trump this week, he told one of his long-suffering attorneys: “I don’t want anybody looking, I don’t want anybody looking through my boxes, I really don’t, I don’t want you looking through my boxes.”

“My boxes” has always been the simplest, most durable explanation for Trump’s behavior. He took the boxes because he likes boxes of stuff, and he refused to give them back for the same reason. He has a toddler’s conception of property and a similar developmental level of excitement for show-and-tell. (Kid Rock allegedly got a glimpse of national security documents when he met with Trump.) All of which is how you end up with descriptions of America’s nuclear capabilities sitting in a box in a South Florida bathroom.

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It’s his boxes… who else would they be?

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As always the intellect of the shallow end of the gene pool is astounding

I know you don’t get it as always

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Umm ok you can’t even answer the question, lol

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His boxes ASSumes he owned everything put into the boxes

Only dim witted morons would use such shallow thinking to make excuses for his Rump buddy

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He was going through them. That’s not a crime

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2 Years later and he’ll get around to it.

Donald Trump admits on tape he didn’t declassify ‘secret information’

Former President Donald Trump acknowledged on tape in a 2021 meeting that he had retained “secret” military information that he had not declassified, according to a transcript of the audio recording obtained by CNN.

“As president, I could have declassified, but now I can’t,” Trump says, according to the transcript.

CNN obtained the transcript of a portion of the meeting where Trump is discussing a classified Pentagon document about attacking Iran. In the audio recording, which CNN previously reported was obtained by prosecutors, Trump says that he did not declassify the document he’s referencing, according to the transcript.

And he needs documents about attacking Iran?

Rump could piss on your leg and you would make excuses for him.

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Presidents have taken “their” papers for as long as there have been Presidential Libraries, so that the ghost writers could get the story straight. What’s the big mystery? In every administration there are he said, she said moments and after retirement the Pres always wants to correct the record. That is only possible with the documents of the moment. Who wants to leave your own history to be written by your enemies?

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On Friday, special counsel Jack Smith’s team admitted to misleading U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon concerning the management of evidence in their criminal case involving former President Donald Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents.
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"Prosecutors in a court filing said that in some of the boxes FBI agents seized from President Trump’s Florida resort, the order of papers has been changed from shortly after the seizure,” reports The Epoch Times. “Prosecutors compared scans of the boxes done in 2022 under orders from Judge Cannon to the present state of the boxes and noticed that the order is not the same.”

“There are some boxes where the order of items within that box is not the same as in the associated scans,” Mr. Smith’s team admitted in the filing.

In a footnote, prosecutors acknowledged that the update contrasts with what they told the judge less than one month ago, during a hearing in the case.

When Judge Cannon during the hearing asked whether the boxes were “in their original, intact form as seized,” a prosecutor on the team said,

“they are, with one exception; and that is that the classified documents have been removed and placeholders have been put in the documents.”

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I am never going to understand how lawyers; people who are specificity trained in the law continue to bend, break, ignore, misuse and misunderstand the law. AND GET AWAY WITH IT??

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