Trump indictment is 'very, very damning,' his former attorney general says

After a 37-count criminal indictment against Donald Trump was unsealed Friday, Trump's erstwhile Attorney General Bill Barr said determination is occupation up for the 2024 Republican statesmanlike hopeful.

"If adjacent fractional of it is true, past he's toast," Barr told "Fox News Sunday." "It's a precise elaborate indictment, and it's very, precise damning. And this thought of presenting Trump arsenic a unfortunate here, a unfortunate of a witch hunt, is ridiculous."

The indictment revealed allegations that the erstwhile president willfully retained hundreds of classified government records astatine his Florida location and conspired to forestall their instrumentality to U.S. officials.

The charging document, which was made nationalist a time aft a grand jury in U.S. District Court successful Miami voted to indict Trump, said that the records contained accusation astir defence and weapons capabilities of the U.S. and overseas countries, U.S. atomic programs, and "potential vulnerabilities of the United States and its allies to subject attack."

Trump stored these classified materials successful cardboard boxes successful a ballroom, a bathroom, a shower, and bureau space, on with his chamber and a retention country astatine his Mar-a-Lago Club successful Palm Beach, Florida., according to the indictment.

Barr said the mode Trump stored the documents astatine Mar-a-Lago would beryllium capable to marque anyone who cares astir nationalist information stomachs' churn.

"He is not a unfortunate here," Barr said. "He was wholly incorrect that helium had the close to person those documents. Those documents are among the astir delicate secrets the state has."

Many Republicans, including statesmanlike campaigner Vivek Ramaswamy, person rallied astir Trump successful the aftermath of the indictment.

Ramaswamy said helium would pardon Trump if elected, adjacent earlier the details of the indictment were released. He told CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday that aft speechmaking the indictment, helium is "even much convinced that a pardon is the close answer."

House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan said Sunday that the indictment is "as governmental arsenic it gets." The Ohio Republican claimed Trump had declassified the materials and could grip them arsenic helium pleased. CNN's Dana Bash repeatedly tried to property Jordan for grounds that Trump had declassified the documents.

"I spell connected the president's word, and helium said helium did," Jordan said.

But Democratic officials person been little forgiving, and Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware said Sunday that "no antheral is supra the law."

"Former President Trump has nary 1 to blasted but himself for being federally, criminally indicted," helium told ABC's "This Week."