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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsTelepathy? Trump Claims He Could Declassify Documents 'By Thinking About It'
Donald Trump just made one of the broadest claims of presidential power yet, telling Fox News host Sean Hannity he had the ability to declassify government documents with his mind.
Or, as one U.S. senator summed it up, Trump appears to think it can be done telepathically.
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All he needed was his mind.
There doesnt have to be a process, as I understand it, he told Hannity. Youre the president of the United States. You can declassify just by saying, Its declassified. Even by thinking about it.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-declassification-mind-power_n_632bc629e4b05db5206aad2c
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It really boggles the mind, doesn't it? I thought you had to click your heels together three times?
dutch777
(2,871 posts)officially....not just in the lame brain President's mind. Courts seems to be catching on to this fact too and fast. I wonder if poor Donnie has any idea how impotent he was and now increasingly is? I guess as long as he can rant about it and have rallies and stupid people continuing to send money to support his delusions and lies its all okay. King of the Grifters would be a fitting title.
Septua
(2,234 posts)..some classified documents would remain classified for years, depending on the information they contain. Barr commented that if Trump in fact, did declassify all the documents, it was a reckless act far worse than his taking the documents to Mar-a-Lago.
I would be highly surprised it Trump even knew what was in all the documents.
RockRaven
(14,782 posts)but ultimately isn't relevant even if it were true, which it isn't.
Even if mental declassification were real, he would still have to prove that he had done it. Proving brain states is not easy, or arguably even possible. We have cold hard proof that those docs were classified, they have physical markings on them. Between the time/date of the classification and the end of his term he did the telepathy thing? Prove it. PROVE. IT. Prove that during a specific time range he had this specific thought. Go ahead. Y'all are making the assertion, show us the proof. Or shut the fuck up.
It's a waste of time to argue about whether or not a POTUS can when there isn't a shred of evidence that he tried anyway.
Septua
(2,234 posts)..line of reasoning (if you can call it reasoning) is bogus. Hirschmann purportedly advised Trump removing the documents was illegal. The Courts are saying the status of classification is irrelevant...he had no authority or privilege to take possession of the documents.
Period.
I guess he's just trying to convince his base he did no wrong, as usual.
LetMyPeopleVote
(143,999 posts)chriscan64
(1,789 posts)It does not even occur to him that he can't do things he wants to do, "I'm the president so I can!" As usual, he does not even understand the nature of the trouble he is in. In his "mind" the problem is that there were classified documents, so therefore they were declassified, problem solved. Dude, not your documents, classified or not.
I wonder if his faithful are taking a page from his book and using his style of defense in traffic court. "Your honor, I declared that light green a full 5 seconds before I blew through the intersection!"