An audio recording obtained by the media revealed how US President Donald Trump talks about secret documents about the plan to attack Iran, during a conversation with the writer who interviewed him, after he left office in 2021, Voice of America reports.
This contradicts his later claims that he had no such documents, only newspaper clippings.
The recording was made in July 2021, in Bedminster, New Jersey, where Trump was interviewed by people who worked on the memoirs of his former chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and is one of the key pieces of evidence in the indictment against Trump.
Federal prosecutors cited portions of that conversation in an indictment accusing Trump of illegally withholding classified government documents and then conspiring to obstruct a federal investigation.
CNN, The Washington Post and The New York Times released audio in which Trump referred to reports that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, feared that Trump would create a conflict with Iran after losing the 2020 presidential election.
"With Mili, let me see that, I'll show you an example," Trump says in the video, which includes the sound of paper being shuffled. "He said I want to attack Iran. Isn't it amazing? I have a big pile of papers; this thing just came up. Look, this was him, this is what they presented to me. This is not official, but this is what they presented to me. This was him This was the Secretariat of Defense and him".
“Does this totally win my case?” Trump says. "Except it's, like, top secret, secret. This is classified information."
Trump later says, "See, as president I could declassify, now I can't."
The former president previously said he had a "standing order" to declassify all documents taken from the Oval Office to the White House residence. He pleaded not guilty in court in June.
On Monday night, he wrote on his social network that the released video was "actually extortion, more than what they would like you to believe," while his spokesman on CNN reiterated that Trump had done nothing wrong.
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