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Justice Department will not seek charges in Mike Pence document case (washingtonpost.com)

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[–]GratefulPhish42024-7 38 points39 points  (5 children)

Makes sense since he fully cooperated, unlike a person he used to work with.

[–]Charming-Chard7558 12 points13 points  (4 children)

Cooperated*

[–]ParadeSitColorado 3 points4 points  (3 children)

*Constipated

[–]organasm 4 points5 points  (2 children)

Coagulated*

[–]pinkfartlek 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Commiserated*

[–]Boxed_pi 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Say it ain’t so

[–]washingtonpost✔ Washington Post[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

From reporters Perry Stein and Devlin Barrett:

The Justice Department has closed its investigation into former vice president Mike Pence’s possession of potentially sensitive government documents after leaving office and will not pursue charges, according to two people familiar with the matter.

A Justice Department official sent a one-page letter to Pence’s lawyer Thursday informing him of the decision, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a federal investigation.

The Justice Department declined to comment. A spokesman for Pence, who is expected to enter the race for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination next week, said the former vice president was “pleased but not surprised.”

The investigation into Pence’s potential mishandling of government materials launched earlier this year. A Pence attorney said in January that after news broke that both President Biden and former President Trump were under investigation for alleged mishandling of government materials, the former vice president brought in outside counsel with experience handling classified materials to search records stored in his Indiana home “out of an abundance of caution."

The lawyer, Greg Jacob, said in a Jan. 18 letter to the National Archives that the outside counsel “identified a small number of documents that could potentially contain sensitive or classified information interspersed throughout the records.” Jacob said that Pence was “ready and willing to cooperate fully.”

This is a developing story. It will be updated.

[–]Schiffy94New York 19 points20 points  (3 children)

Wasn't it found that a number of past presidents and VPs had the occasional document or two that they took home and forgot to bring back?

All except one of them went "whoops my bad here take it back".

[–]Charming-Chard7558 5 points6 points  (1 child)

Yes.

More to the point- atleast in terms of legal culpability-

This is the only time a former president (or anyone in government) has repeatedly refused to turn over documents, swore to the FBI and the presidential records department that he had turned over all of them, was found to still have them, was asked again, lied again, was raided and more were found, then swore before a judge (and had his lawyers corroborate his lie) that he had turned over all of them, and was still found to have even more of them….and then found yet again to have even more of them.

This isn’t a simple “oopsie, took my work stuff home”

This is a repeat, and repeat, and repeat criminally liable attempt(s) to lie and withhold said documents to multiple government agencies on multiple occasions, even lying in court, and still withholding them, all knowingly, the entire time, and trying to just crime-right-through by force.

Literally any of us- ANY OF US- would have been in jail A LONG TIME AGO during this ongoing saga. The fact that he has repeatedly, over and over again, been caught intentionally lying about this and continues to withhold stolen property (and it is* stolen, folks. That’s the law) and is still walking free is a TRAVESTY of Justice.

[–]TechyDad 4 points5 points  (0 children)

And there's proof that Trump held drills with staff members on how to move boxes in case the FBI came into Mar-A-Lago for the classified documents. To be clear, he was planning on how to hide classified documents so that the government couldn't get them back.

This is like a crime onion. Multiple layers and they all stink.

[–]macbalance 1 point2 points  (0 children)

To my understanding a concern is that Federal Government basically uses low-level classification as a “read this now” indicator.

At higher levels if it’s not classified your boss will probably assume its unimportant and ignore it or read it last.

POTUS level? Wouldn’t surprise me if menus for events are classified as part of the ‘security package’ to get the president to pick between the fish or the chicken.

I think most ex-presidents have admitted to some classified docs, but there’s a gap between highly secret or time sensitive stuff (nuclear secrets, intelligence asset dispositions) and things of minimal value like a 2014 memo that a foreign leader wants to talk about a topic with background data.

[–]DmetriKepi 3 points4 points  (0 children)

What about the time he didn't tell Congress Trump wanted to overthrow the government?

[–]Ketzeph I voted 5 points6 points  (0 children)

This makes sense - he cooperated and there's no indication he was aware of the error. DoJ hasn't gone after people if they've cooperated and were not actively using the material when they shouldn't have been

[–]DmetriKepi 2 points3 points  (1 child)

What about the time he didn't tell Congress Trump wanted to overthrow the government?

[–]evilgenius29 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Separate case... in which he may eventually be a cooperating witness!

[–]popsy13 1 point2 points  (2 children)

Right on cue:

“Just announced that they are not going to bring charges against Mike Pence on the document hoax. That’s great, but when am I going to be fully exonerated, I’m at least as innocent as he is. And what about Joe Biden, who is hiding at least 1850 boxes, and some located in Chinatown, DC? When will the witch hunt against “TRUMP” stop?”

[–]Hans_Delbruck 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Biden currently has thousands of secret documents at his current 'white house' right now! Why isn't he in jail right now!

[–]angrytwig 0 points1 point  (0 children)

He did what a person is supposed to do. A CERTAIN SOMEONE did not do this and I'm sure Trump will be crying all over Truth Social about it. I'm going to go home and drink his tears online