It’s difficult to say which of Donald Trump’s many criminal investigations are of greatest concern to his defense attorneys, but it’s a safe bet the classified documents case is near the top of the list. By all accounts, the Justice Department’s scrutiny of the controversy is intensifying, and a federal indictment remains a distinct possibility.
It’s against this backdrop that one of the former president’s lawyers working on the case quit yesterday. NBC News reported:
Timothy Parlatore, a key lawyer representing Donald Trump in a special counsel investigation of his handling of classified documents, said Wednesday that he is leaving the former president’s legal team. Parlatore had been a staunch defender of Trump, calling special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the former president’s retention of classified documents “improper.”
There’s been some speculation about why, exactly, the defense attorney walked away, though Parlatore briefly spoke to The New York Times and said his departure was unrelated to the merits of the case. He also told Politico, “It’s personal and it’s got nothing to do with my belief in the strength of the case.”
It’s also worth noting for context that when it comes to the broader controversy, Parlatore hasn’t just served as legal counsel: As CNN, which first broke the story, noted in a report yesterday, the attorney also testified late last year before the grand jury hearing evidence in the case.
But perhaps the most notable thing about these developments is their inopportune timing.
It was just last week when Trump, facing the threat of a possible indictment, admitted during a town hall event that he improperly took sensitive materials from the White House, contradicted earlier defenses from his own legal team, and hedged when asked whether he’d showed classified documents to others.
John Fishwick, a former U.S. attorney, soon after told NBC News, “Trump’s comments hurt him, and what he said is…
Read the full article here