Live updates: Trump faces 37 federal counts in the grand jury's indictment

This live blog has concluded for the day. Please follow NPR coverage next week when former President Donald Trump is scheduled to make his court appearance in Miami.

Leslie Caldwell, former assistant attorney general for the Department of Justice's criminal division, called many of the allegations laid out in the indictment against former President Donald Trump "quite stunning."

"The indictment is very clear, very concise, very specific, very easy to understand. And I think it lays out a very damning story if the allegations proved to be supported by sufficient evidence," Caldwell told NPR's Ailsa Chang.

Federal prosecutors unsealed their indictment against Trump earlier today, making him the first former president to ever face federal charges. Among the counts are the willful retention of national defense information, making false statements and conspiracy to obstruct justice.

"One of the most striking things about the indictment to me at least was the extent to which which it alleges President Trump's actual personal involvement in various things, including directing the movement of boxes, asking whether things really had to be returned or turned over, inducing lawyers to make essentially false statements to the government," Caldwell said.

"I was surprised, actually, to see the extent to which he was personally involved on an ongoing and pretty regular basis. And what was happening with these documents," Caldwell said.

The case was handled by a special counsel to avoid the appearance of any political interference from the Biden administration. Caldwell said it's "quite possible" to separate the actions of DOJ from the administration itself.

"That's really kind of the whole idea of a special counsel is to separate them from political influence and also from the Justice Department itself, so that they will be operating independently and will exercise their own judgment, obviously subject to the approval or veto by the Department of Justice by the attorney general," Caldwell added. "I think everyone involved is extremely careful to make sure that those lines don't get crossed."

In a short statement, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries responded to the federal indictment of former President Donald Trump.

“No one is above the law – including Donald Trump," the statement read. "This indictment must now play out through the legal process, without any outside political or ideological interference. We encourage Mr. Trump’s supporters and critics alike to let this case proceed peacefully in court.”

Former Justice Department prosecutor Jack Smith is running the investigation into Trump's handling of classified documents.

Paul Butler, Georgetown University law professor and former federal prosecutor, previously worked with Smith as prosecutors at the Justice Department in the unit that prosecutes public corruption.

"Today, [Smith] did kind of what the company man would do: he let the indictment speak for himself," Butler told NPR's Mary Louise Kelly."He's known as being an aggressive prosecutor, kind of a true believer in holding people accountable, and especially in bringing corrupt public officials to justice."

Smith is also supervising the criminal investigation into whether or not there was interference with the transfer of power after the 2020 presidential election.

Georgetown University law professor and former federal prosecutor Paul Butler says the indictment against former President Donald Trump "tells a story that anyone can understand," calling the charges "very serious."

"In the simplest version, the indictment accuses the president of taking sensitive documents pertaining to national security that he knew didn't belong to him, including documents related to the country's nuclear programs and documents about how the U.S. might respond if it were attacked," Butler told NPR's Mary Louise Kelly. "When he was asked to return these documents, not only did he refuse, according to the indictment, he conspired with his valet to keep them from the government and to cover up what he’d done."

Butler acknowledges there have been many different accusations against Trump over the years but that there has "never been anything this detailed and this consequential in terms of Trump's criminal exposure."

"Even if Trump was convicted in the Manhattan case, he is unlikely to go to prison on those counts," Butler said, referencing a separate case against the former president. "For the crimes listed in this federal indictment, even first-time offenders usually get jail time."

Butler added that there's nothing in the Constitution that would prohibit Trump from running for president even if he's convicted.

Former FBI Director James Comey, who was fired by then-President Trump in 2017 and has been a reliably vocal critic of him in the years since, had this to say on Friday afternoon:

If it sounds familiar, it's because it is.

On March 30, when Trump was indicted in the Manhattan case, Comey tweeted: "It's been a good day."

Later that week, when Trump was arrested and arraigned in court, Comey deemed it "another good day."

Comey weighed in on the Manhattan case in an interview with NPR's All Things Considered last month about his new crime novel. He said he didn't have a view on the merits because he didn't know the facts.

"But I think this is wonderful in the sense that the American people can see how the rule of law works, especially in the case of a person who's tried to take a flamethrower to the rule of law in America," he added.

Comey also clarified a comment he made in a 2021 NPR interview, about how the best thing for the country would be for Trump to be ignored, standing "in his bathrobe yelling at cars on the lawn at Mar-a-Lago with the camera lights off."

He doesn't stand by that anymore.

"At that point, I didn't know that if he was in his bathrobe, he may have top-secret, sensitive, compartmented information stuffed in the belt of his robe," Comey added. "And so his behavior has made it very difficult for that to be a reality. And I think it's important that the Justice Department and local prosecutors hold him accountable for what he's done. So I think Donald Trump has made it that we can't leave him on the front lawn in his bathrobe yelling at cars."

One might expect that a historic federal indictment of a former president also seeking the presidency in 2024 would lead to political rivals using that indictment to their advantage. But so far, most of former President Donald Trump's fellow Republicans running for the GOP presidential nomination have been fairly silent.

“It is odd, I mean, most people in most years who would want to defeat someone they’re running against would grab this like gold," says NPR's Domenico Montanaro on All Things Considered. "But it continues to be the case that these candidates are trying to walk a very fine line in not upsetting Trump's base."

So far, many of Trump's rivals have dismissed the indictment as the weaponization of the federal government.

He notes Republican pollsters say roughly 10% of Republican voters are "Never-Trumpers" with another third solidly in his camp, and the rest that have warm feelings for the former president but are open to supporting another candidate next year. That creates a bit of a tightrope walk for GOP candidates, who have to distinguish themselves in their own right and continue to appeal to a group of voters who are likely sympathetic with the former president's plight.

Trump's legal troubles have largely not affected his trajectory.

"It's been just the opposite," Montanaro says. "What Republican strategists tell me is that ... they actually, they expect for this in the short-term to actually help [Trump] — that he'll be the center of every conversation for the foreseeable future."

Read more here.

The indictment says Trump had personal involvement in packing boxes when he left the White House in January 2021. It also said at one point, he postponed his travel plans in order to be at Mar-a-Lago as his lawyer prepared for a meeting and met with representatives of the Justice Department last year.

The court papers also suggested Trump understood the rules about handling secret and classified information by citing his own remarks when he showed classified materials to people without security clearances in 2021.

Former President Donald Trump has responded to the unsealing of the indictment against him.

In a series of posts on Truth Social, Trump maintained he did nothing wrong, accused President Biden of holding onto classified documents and levied personal attacks against special counsel Jack Smith during his brief speech.

"Biden moved his Boxes all over the place, including to Chinatown and up to his lawyer’s office in Boston. Why isn’t deranged Jack Smith looking at that?" he wrote in one. "Also, I supplied them openly, and without question, security tape from Mar-a-Lago. I had nothing to hide, nor do I now. Nobody said I wasn’t allowed to look at the personal records that I brought with me from the White House. There’s nothing wrong with that…."

In another, he said "I'm allowed to do this" under the Presidential Records Act.

"There was no crime, except for what the DOJ and FBI have been doing against me for years," he said, in a now-familiar Republican rallying cry.

Trump also raised questions about Smith's professional record and personal biases, calling him — and his wife — a "Trump Hater" and a "deranged 'psycho' that shouldn't be involved in any case having to do with 'Justice' other than to look at Biden as a criminal, which he is!"

Smith is not registered with any political party, Reuters reports.

Some background on Smith: He spent a total of nine years in assorted positions at the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York, and served as the head of the Justice Department's public integrity unit from 2010 to 2015.

He most recently worked at the International Criminal Court at The Hague in the Netherlands, investigating and prosecuting war crimes.

Earlier today, Donald Trump announced via Truth Social that his lead lawyers who've been working on this indictment — Jim Trusty and John Rowley — would be stepping down, replaced by "Todd Blanche" and "a firm to be named later."

Trusty and Rowley confirmed the move to NPR in an emailed statement.

Trump thanked the pair for their work in his post.

Trusty and Rowley said it had been "an honor to have spent the last year defending him" and described it as a "logical" moment for them to "step aside and let others carry the cases through to completion."

The news came just hours after Trusty went on the major morning shows to defend Trump.

Here's more on what we know about the legal teams:

Jim Trusty and John Rowley

The pair have represented Trump for over a year as the DOJ special counsel investigated Trump's handling of classified documents. They scored a significant win earlier on by convincing a judge to appoint a special master to review the documents. The court's decision was ultimately overturned on appeal, but only after pausing the investigation for about two months.

Maybe as a sign of things to come, a member of their legal team, Timothy Parlatore, also exited last month due to infighting,according to a report from CNN.

Todd Blanche

Blanche is the New York lawyer who has taken the lead on representing Trump in his other indictment case: the Manhattan district attorney's probe into falsifying business records related to hush money payments.

It's still unclear who Trump may add to the legal team as part of the unnamed firm he referenced.

The indictment alleges that Trump and his lawyers made a false certification to the FBI and grand jury investigating his handling of classified documents.

Those probes began in March and April 2022, respectively. In May, the grand jury issued a subpoena requiring Trump's office to produce all classified documents in their possession.

Two of Trump's attorneys told him they would need to search for documents and provide a certification that there had been compliance with that subpoena. One planned to return to Mar-a-Lago on June 2 to do so.

Between May 23 and June 2, the indictment says, Trump directed his aide Nauta to move some 64 boxes from the storage room to his residence. The morning of June 2, Nauta moved some 30 boxes back into the storage room — without telling the attorney any of this.

The attorney found 38 classified documents during their search, and asked another attorney to return the next day to sign the certification — which she did, the indictment says, despite the fact that she did not search the boxes or review the subpoena itself.

The lawyer stated that based on the information provided to her:

• a. “A diligent search was conducted of the boxes that were moved from the
  White House to Florida”;
• b. “This search was conducted after receipt of the subpoena, in order to locate any and all documents that are responsive to the subpoena”; and
• c. “Any and all responsive documents accompany this certification.”

These statements were false, the indictment reads, because many boxes were not searched and many relevant documents were not found as a result of Trump directing Nauta to move the boxes prior to the June 2 review.
And yet, it notes that at a meeting with the FBI and Justice Department shortly after, Trump told authorities that he was "an open book."

The indictment includes several photos of boxes of documents stored in various locations at Mar-a-Lago. See for yourself:

Department of Justice

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"Today, an indictment was unsealed charging Donald J. Trump with felony violations of our national security laws, as well as participating in a conspiracy to obstruct justice.

This indictment was voted by a grand jury of citizens in the Southern District of Florida. And I invite everyone to read it in full to understand the scope and the gravity of the crimes charged.

The men and women of the United States intelligence community and our Armed Forces dedicate their lives to protecting our nation and its people.

Our laws that protect National Defense Information are critical. The safety and security of the United States and they must be enforced.

Violations of those laws put our country at risk.

Adherence to the rule of law is a bedrock principle of the Department of Justice and our nation's commitment to the rule of law sets an example for the world.

We have one set of laws in this country, and they apply to everyone. Applying those laws, collecting facts, that's what determines the outcome of an investigation. Nothing more, nothing less.

The prosecutors in my office are among the most talented and experienced in the Department of Justice. They have investigated this case, hewing to the highest ethical standards and they will continue to do so as this case proceeds.

It's very important for me to note that the defendants in this case must be presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.

To that end, my office will seek a speedy trial on this matter consistent with the public interest and the rights of the accused. We very much look forward to presenting our case to a jury of citizens in the Southern District of Florida.

In conclusion, I would like to thank the dedicated public servants of the Federal Bureau of Investigation with whom my office is conducting this investigation and who worked tirelessly every day upholding the rule of law in our country.

I'm deeply proud to stand shoulder to shoulder with them. Thank you very much."

DOJ special counsel Jack Smith just took the podium for a rare public statement after federal officials unsealed an indictment against former president Donald Trump.

In a statement that lasted just under two minutes, Smith framed the indictment as an important step for keeping the United States safe and protecting democracy.

"We have one set of laws in this country and they apply to everyone," Smith said. "Applying those laws, collecting facts, that's what determines the outcome of an investigation. Nothing more, nothing less."

Smith said his office would seek a speedy trial. He reminded everyone that the defendants must be presumed innocent until proven guilty.

Notably, Attorney General Merrick Garland was not present in the room, and Smith exited the stage without taking questions from reporters.

CORRECTION: A previous version of this post misquoted Smith as saying his office would avoid commenting publicly on the trial. In actuality, he said his office would seek a speedy trial.

In a meeting to discuss a May 2022 subpoena, Trump asked his lawyers what would happen if they didn't "play ball," the indictment says.

"Wouldn't it be better if we just told them we don't have anything here?" Trump said at one point, according to the memory of one of his attorneys.

He then referred to his 2016 presidential campaign rival, Hillary Clinton.Clinton had used a private email instead of a government one while she was Secretary of State. The FBI investigated her use and deletion of emails during the campaign. It concluded that she and her staff were "extremely careless" but did not recommend charges.

Trump had made the Clinton emails a major feature of his 2016 race. In the meeting with his lawyers, he raised the Clinton emails in an apparent suggestion of potential strategy for his own case.

"He was great, he did a great job," Trump said in apparent reference to Clinton's attorney. "That was the one who deleted all of her emails, the 30,000 emails, because they basically dealt with her scheduling and her going to the gym and her having beauty appointments. And he was great. And he, so she didn't get in any trouble because he said that he was the one who deleted them."

The indictment says Trump brought up the Clinton story more than once during the course of that meeting.

The FBI recovered 102 documents with classification markings during their search of Mar-a-Lago last August, according to the indictment.

The vast majority — 75 — were found in a storage room. Of those, authorities say six were labeled top secret, 18 were secret and three were confidential.

Of the 27 documents in Trump's office, 11 were top secret, 36 were secret and 28 were confidential.

Those are the only three classification categories for national security information, according to Cornell University. Here's what they mean:

• Top secret refers to material that requires the highest degree of protection, and is to be used with utmost restraint. "The test for assigning Top Secret classification is whether its unauthorized disclosure could reasonably be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security" — which includes things like armed hostilities against the U.S. or its allies.
• Secret describes material that requires a substantial degree of protection. "The test for assigning Secret classification shall be whether its unauthorized disclosure could reasonably be expected to cause serious damage to the national security" — such as certain disruptions of foreign relations or revelation of significant military plans or intelligence operations.
• Confidential means that the information requires protection, but to a lesser degree than the above examples. In other words: "The test for assigning Confidential classification shall be whether its unauthorized disclosure could reasonably be expected to cause damage to the national security."

Jack Smith, the special counsel who was looking into the case, is set to speak at 3 p.m. ET.

This will be the first time we 've heard from a DOJ official since the indictment was unsealed.

We'll be streaming his remarks at the top of the page, and you can listen to NPR's special coverage starting at 3 p.m.

The indictment points out that Trump — as a candidate and then as president — repeatedly and publicly spoke about the importance of protecting classified information.

It cites one July 2018 statement in particular, in which Trump acknowledged his "unique, Constitutional responsibility to protect the Nation's classified information."

He spoke critically about the broader practice of former officials maintaining access to that information even after their time in government.

"Such access is particularly inappropriate when former officials have transitioned into highly partisan positions and seek to use real or perceived access to sensitive information to validate their political attacks," Trump said. "Any access granted to our Nation's secrets should be in furtherance of national, not personal, interests."

The indictment also lists five public comments Trump made as a candidate, between August and November 2016, about the importance of preserving the nation's secrets.

"We can't have someone in the Oval Office who doesn't understand the meaning of the word confidential or classified," he said that September.

"In my administration I'm going to enforce all laws concerning the protection of classified information," Trump promised on an earlier occasion. "No one will be above the law."

That refrain has been echoed by many Democrats — and even Trump's former vice president-turned-presidential rival Mike Pence — since news of the indictment broke last night.

The indictment said after Trump's lawyer searched through boxes at Mar-a-Lago in early June 2022, Trump discussed with the lawyer whether the lawyer should bring them to his hotel room and put them in a safe there.

"During that conversation, Trump made a plucking motion, as memorialized" by the lawyer, the indictment said. Then the indictment quotes the lawyer: "He made a funny motion as though - well okay why don't you take them with you to your hotel room and if there's anything really bad in there, like, you know, pluck it out. And that was the motion he made. He didn't say that."

The indictment contains several photographs of where the boxes were kept and moved, alongside text message exchanges between Trump's employees.

In one exchange, Trump aide Walt Nauta noted that several of the boxes had fallen over, spilling top secret documents releasable only to the Five Eyes intelligence alliance (so leaders from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and United States).

The indictment says that even after a grand jury issued a subpeona asking Trump to return all his documents, the former president resisted by suggesting his attorney lie to the FBI, destroy all documents, or just show the FBI some of the documents and hide the rest (it's this strategy that he eventually went with, as consistent with previous information revealed by the court).

The prosecutors say Trump's personal aide, Walt Nauta, who is also facing an indictment, was his chief co-conspirator in hiding the documents.

The special counsel says Trump retained classified documents from his classified daily intelligence briefings, which included sensitive information provided to him by the following agencies:

• The Central Intelligence Agency
• The Department of Defense
• The National Security Agency
• The National Geospatial Intelligence Agency
• The National Reconnaissance Office
• The Department of Energy
• The Department of State

Justice Department

NPR's team is going through this document now. Here's a bit of what stands out:

The Department of Justice special counsel says that Trump risked the national security of the United States, its foreign relations and its military by storing sensitive material he was no longer authorized to have in his possession.

He stored boxes of those documents at Mar-a-Lago, in facilities not authorized to hold such documents, including "in a ballroom, a bathroom and shower, an office space, his bedroom, and a storage room," the investigators found.

The prosecutors say that Trump showed the documents to a writer, a publisher, and members of his staff who did not have security clearance.

He also "showed a representative of his political action committee who did not possess a security clearance a classified map related to a military operation and told the representative that he should not be showing it to the representative and that the representative should not get too close."

The indictment unsealed early Friday afternoon shows that a grand jury indicted Trump on 37 counts, including 31 counts of willful retention of national defense information and making false statements.

Trump's longtime aide Walt Nauta faces six charges, which are listed in the same document.

You can read the full document here and read a summary of the counts below:

• Willful retention of national defense information applies to Trump only for allegedly storing 31 such documents at Mar-a-Lago
• Conspiracy to obstruct justice, alleging that Trump and Nauta, along with others, conspired to keep those documents from the grand jury
• Withholding a document or a record, accusing Trump and Nauta of misleading one of their attorneys by moving boxes of classified documents so the attorney could not find or introduce them to the grand jury
• Corruptly concealing a document or record pertains to the defendants' attempts to hide the boxes of classified documents from the attorney for that same purpose
• Concealing a document in a federal investigation, accusing the defendants of hiding from the FBI Trump's continued possession of those documents at Mar-a-Lago and causing a false certificate to be submitted to the FBI
• Scheme to conceal pertains to the defendants allegedly hiding Trump's continued possession of those materials from the FBI and the grand jury
• One count of false statements and representations concerns statements that Trump caused another one of his attorneys to make to the FBI and grand jury in early June regarding the results of the search at Mar-a-Lago
• Another count of false statements and representations accuses Nauta of giving false answers during a voluntary interview with the FBI in late May

According to the indictment, each one of those charges carries a maximum fine of $250,000, with maximum prison sentences between 5 and 20 years.

Federal authorities have unsealed a grand jury indictment that levies federal charges against Donald Trump for his role in keeping classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago home in Florida.

You can find the documents here.

Stay tuned for updates and analysis as NPR's reporting teams dig into it.

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Next week is shaping up to be a big one for Trump. He's expected to be arraigned in federal court in Miami on Tuesday — and he'll turn 77 the next day.

It's not clear how the former president (and now presidential candidate) had been planning to celebrate this year, though he's spent at least his last three birthdays at his golf club in Bedminster, N.J.

Trump's late ex-wife Ivana told People Magazine in 2021 that he "hates his birthdays."

But they haven't all been low-key affairs. In fact, quite the opposite. Trump, who was born in 1946 in Queens, N.Y., and spent decades as a real estate developer, has thrown his share of lavish birthday parties over the decades.

In 1988, Trump celebrated his 42nd birthday at one of his casinos, featuring a laser show complete with a 15-foot spaceship and a performance by magicians and dancers to a version of the Michael Jackson song "Bad" reworked in his honor.

"And of course, there was to be a telegram from President Reagan, and video birthday cards from Liza Minnelli, Billy Crystal, Dennis Miller and Joe Piscopo," the Washington Post reported at the time.

In 1990, Trump's casino party included televised birthday messages from Dolly Parton and Elton John and Robin Leach, the host of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, who Buzzfeedreports "stepped out of a giant replica of Trump's soon-to-be-bankrupted airline, Trump Shuttle." (This was observed by a reporter who snuck into the party and spent a night in Atlantic City jail for trespassing.)

In 1993, Trump's 47th birthday party theme was "Renaissance Man," the Independent reports. The invitations depicted him as a king brandishing a sword and promised both dancing and live jousting (it's not clear by whom).

"An event ghastlier invitation a year later indicates the party — held at the same venue — was Tarzan-themed and billed Trump as 'Lord of the Financial Jungle,' " it added.

In 1996, for his 50th, Trump's then-wife Marla threw what the New York Times described as a "no-holds-barred bash" with 400 of his closest friends, a mermaid ice sculpture (of herself), blown-up photographs of Trump from his childhood and a performance by Eartha Kitt, among other highlights.

"As the Superman movie theme began to play, the cake was wheeled onto the stage — with all of Mr. Trump's buildings on it, and a sugar figure of Mr. Trump, dressed like Superman with a money sign on his chest," per the Times. "Ms. Kitt sang 'Happy Birthday,' and 600 gold balloons cascaded from the ceiling."

In 2005 Trump celebrated his 59th at Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City, where Baywatch star Pamela Anderson was on the guest list and Trump blew out candles on a 15-foot cake, the Post reports. Anderson said in 2018 that she was paid $500 to attend.

If Trump — who leads the Republican primary field — wins reelection, he would start his second term at age 79. President Biden, who is four years older than Trump, was 78 when became the oldest living president the day he was sworn into office.

Federal authorities will also indict Walt Nauta, a personal aide to the former president, Trump said on his social media on Friday.

Nauta's lawyer declined to comment when NPR reached out for confirmation.

Nauta is a Navy veteran who served as a military valet during Trump's days in the White House, then retired to continue serving Trump as a personal aide, according to the former president.

"He has done a fantastic job!" Trump said in a Truth Social post. "They are trying to destroy his life, like the lives of so many others, hoping he will say bad things about 'Trump.' "

His responsibilities included moving cardboard boxes of the president's mementos and papers, according to aWashington Postreport.

White House deputy press secretary Olivia Dalton told reporters traveling with Biden on Air Force One that the president and his senior staff found out about Trump's indictment on the news.

“The president, senior staff found out just like everybody else last night," Dalton said, adding that they had no advance knowledge that the indictment was coming.

Dalton would not comment on the case specifically and referred reporters to the Department of Justice — and she pushed back on claims from Republican lawmakers who are defending Trump that the department is politicized.

“This is a president who respects the rule of law and has said that since Day 1. That’s precisely why we’re not commenting here. He believes in respecting the independence of the DOJ and protecting the integrity of their processes," she said.

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Sen. Mitt Romney, a Republican who has at times broken with his party when it comes to criticizing Trump, did so again when reacting to the indictment Friday morning.

He said in a statement that Trump is entitled to the presumption of innocence — but acknowledged that the accusations against him have merit.

"By all appearances, the Justice Department and special counsel have exercised due care, affording Mr. Trump the time and opportunity to avoid charges that would not generally have been afforded to others," Romney said.

That's a far cry from the response of many Republican lawmakers, who portrayed the indictment — and the Justice Department itself — as politically motivated in their defense of the former president.

Romney said Trump "brought these charges upon himself" by taking classified documents and refusing to return them despite numerous opportunities to do so.

"These allegations are serious and, if proven, would be consistent with his other actions offensive to the national interest, such as withholding defensive weapons from Ukraine for political reasons and failing to defend the Capitol from violent attack and insurrection," he added.

While Romney has been critical of Trump (including voting for his impeachment), he also seemed skeptical of the charges brought against him by the Manhattan district attorney in April. He said at the time that he believed the prosecutor had "stretched to reach felony criminal charges in order to fit a political agenda."

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NPR

NPR's Peter Haden is outside the Wilkie D. Ferguson Jr. U.S. Federal Courthouse in Miami, where Trump is expected to be arraigned next week.

Even with a press hungrily waiting for the court to unseal Trump's indictment, Haden says it's a pretty quiet and tame scene.

Camera operators are flipping out as lenses are perpetually fogged by the oppressive humidity. A few roosters are milling about.

"In the most Miami thing I’ve ever seen, the federal courthouse grounds are lorded over by combative feral roosters," Haden said. "The rooster is an unofficial mascot by the local Cuban community."

This is quite a different feel than the scene outside a Manhattan courthouse, when Trump was indicted by a state grand jury in March. Streets were closed down throughout the city as extra law enforcement officers stood by, braced for possible protests.

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Former President Donald Trump confirmed on social media that he is retaining new representation, minutes after his lawyers Jim Trusty and John Rowley announced their resignation.

Trusty and Rowley said in an email to NPR that they will not be representing him in the Mar-a-Lago case nor the Jan. 6 investigation.

"Now that the case has been filed in Miami, this is a logical moment for us to step aside and let others carry the cases through to completion," they wrote.

Who will those others be? Trump named one in his Truth Social post late Friday morning.

"For purposes of fighting the Greatest Witch Hunt of all time, now moving to the Florida Courts, I will be represented by Todd Blanche, Esq., and a firm to be named later," he wrote.

Blanche is a top white-collar criminal defense lawyer who spent more than eight years as a federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York. He resigned from his law firm position in April to become Trump's lead counsel in the Manhattan hush-money case.

Most notably, as NPR has reported, Blanche previously represented former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort against state charges brought in 2019 related to mortgage fraud — which a judge ended up dismissing.

Trump said that other lawyers will be announced in the coming days.

"I want to thank Jim Trusty and John Rowley for their work, but they were up against a very dishonest, corrupt, evil, and “sick” group of people, the likes of which has not been seen before," he added.

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The U.S. is far from the only democracy to have prosecuted its current or former leader, as NPR reported when Trump was first indicted in the hush money case in April.

Among them:

Two former French presidents, Jacques Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy, were convicted of corruption after their time in office. Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was found guilty of tax fraud in 2012 (though, over a decade later, was acquitted of several charges stemming from a 2010 sex-for-hire case).

In South Korea, which has a long history of prosecuting its former leaders, former President Lee Myung-bak's 17-year jail sentence for corruption was cut short when he got a presidential pardon last year. The previous year, a court upheld a 20-year jail sentence for former President Park Geun-hye over the corruption scandal that led to her impeachment in 2017.

Argentina's current vice president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, was found guilty of corruption in December in a case dating back to her time as president. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, now in his sixth term, is facing three corruption cases. And Brazil's president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, was reelected three years after he was released from prison on corruption charges.

Closer to home, former President Richard Nixon resigned on the brink of impeachment in August 1974, only to receive a blanket pardon from his successor, Gerald Ford, a month later. Former President Bill Clinton was impeached in the fall of 1998 after he was accused of giving false testimony to a grand jury, but never faced prosecution.

"We've allowed a lot of bad behavior and looked the other way with presidents and previous administrations, and I think now this really is the first time that it appears a president or former president may be held to account for actions that they did before, during or after being in office," University of Washington political science professor James D. Long told Morning Edition at the time.

What took so long? Read the full story here.

Donald Trump's lawyers Jim Trusty and John Rowley have delivered their resignations to the former president, the pair confirmed to NPR in an emailed statement.

"We will no longer represent him on either the indicted case or the January 6 investigation," they wrote. "It has been an honor to have spent the last year defending him and we know he will be vindicated in his battle against the Biden Administration's partisan weaponization of the American justice system."

The two added that they had no plans to address the media concerning their withdrawals.

The news comes after Trusty made the rounds on cable television networks this morning, defending Trump on Fox News, NBC and CNN.

Legally speaking, there's nothing stopping Trump from continuing his 2024 bid for the White House amid two historic indictments (and at least two more criminal investigations).

And even if he gets convicted, there's nothing in the U.S. Constitution prohibiting him from holding office. In fact, an individual only has to be at least 35 years old and be a natural-born citizen who has lived in the country for at least 14 years to hold the presidency.

Section 3 of the 14th Amendment prevents a person from holding office — the presidency along with other government positions — if they've engaged in an insurrection or rebellion against the United States, but even that can be overcome with a two-thirds vote from Congress.

It's still unclear whether an elected-and-convicted Trump would run the country from behind bars or see his sentence put on hold until after his time in office. Legal scholars told Politico in April that a judge may say an elected president's official duties would override a criminal conviction.

Trump could also try to pardon himself immediately upon taking office, which would be an action consistent with the messaging he's evoked about his indictments so far. "I AM AN INNOCENT MAN," Trump wrote in sharing the news of his indictment on Thursday.

Republican lawmakers are weighing in on Trump's indictment, with many defending the president-turned-candidate and accusing the Justice Department of political persecution.

Here's what some of them are saying:

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said "it is unconscionable for a President to indict the leading candidate opposing him" (Biden has said he's never suggested what the Justice Department should do regarding charges.)

He also vowed that "House Republicans will hold this brazen weaponization of power accountable," prompting vocal pushback from Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin.

Rep. Jim Jordan, a Trump ally, lamented a "sad day for America."

Rep. Harriet Hageman, who defeated Trump criticLiz Cheney in Wyoming's Republican primary last year, accused the federal government of "an unprecedented abuse of prosecutorial power."

"Criminal prosecution of political adversaries is something that Third World countries do," she said in a statement.

Hageman called the case against Trump "ridiculously weak" and said it wouldn't be happening if he were not running for president again.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said in a series of tweets that Democrats "must awake in the night with panic at the thoughts of us winning in 2024."

And for that to happen, she said, Republicans need to stop fighting each other.

"Democrats are arresting their political enemies and they work together in their corrupt ways to get it done," she added. "It’s time for Republicans to unify."

Rep. Matt Gaetz slammed the indictment as unprecedented election interference by the federal government.

"You have the Department of Justice taking an indictment of a former president as a tool to resolving a dispute with the archivist," he said, before accusing Biden — and a slew of other former presidents, and former Vice President Mike Pence — of having classified documents in their possession too.

"Almost everywhere that we looked we saw that this was a broken system," Gaetz added. "And then to use the power of criminal process to plow our country into the depths of the perceived third world is deeply, deeply troubling."

Rep. Elise Stefanik, the fourth-ranking House Republican, released a statement slamming the "unprecedented and sham indictment."

"The radical Far Left will stop at nothing to interfere with the 2024 election in order to prop up the catastrophic presidency and desperate campaign of Joe Biden," she wrote, adding that "we will elect President Trump back to the White House to Save America."

U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon has been assigned, at least temporarily, to oversee the case stemming from Donald Trump's indictment, a source confirmed to NPR on Friday.

Cannon, whom Trump appointed to the bench in 2020, is the same judge who ruled in favor of Trump's request to appoint a special master to review the documents seized by the FBI from Mar-a-Lago last summer, a move that temporarily stopped federal prosecutors from continuing their investigation into the documents.

The ruling sparked pushback from the Justice Department, which argued that the appointment would "significantly harm important governmental interests, including national security interests."

Within months, a federal appeals court unanimously overturned the ruling, citing a concern for the precedent that might be set by allowing the subject of a search warrant to block government investigations after the warrant is issued.

Cannon also ruled to unseal a list of items the FBI seized from its search of Trump's home.

If Trump is convicted and Cannon remains on the case, she would be responsible for determining the sentence, including any prison time.

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Former Vice President Mike Pence, fresh off announcing his own 2024 bid, responded to news of Trump's indictment on a conservative radio program on Friday morning.

In a 25-minute interview with the Hugh Hewitt Show, Pence decried what he called the politicization of the Justice Department while acknowledging that "no one is above the law."

The full interview and transcript are available online.

Pence described handling classified materials as a "very serious matter" and drew from his personal experience: Exactly one week ago, the Justice Department closed its investigation into classified documents discovered at Pence's home, without finding evidence of any criminal wrongdoing.

"I'm pleased the Justice Department concluded that investigation last week found it was an innocent mistake, but it was a mistake," Pence said. "We have to protect our nation's secrets. And my only hope is, as we learn about the facts of this indictment next week, that the American people will see in this case that it would meet a high standard necessary to justify the unprecedented federal indictment of a former president of the United States by the current president of the United States' Justice Department, and by a potential rival."

Pence said he had hoped the Justice Department would resolve the situation without an indictment, which he fears will be divisive for the country and damaging to its reputation abroad.

That said, he's calling for it to be unsealed immediately, saying, "The sooner we bring the facts forward to the American people, the better." He's also urging Attorney General Merrick Garland to publicly address the facts of the case and answer questions about it.

"I think before the sun sets today, the attorney general of the United States should be standing in front of the American people, should unseal this indictment, should provide the American people with all the facts and information here and the American people be able to judge for themselves whether this is just the latest incident of weaponization and politicization at the Justice Department or if it's something different," Pence said.

He also pledged that as president, he would "clean house all across the top floors," from the Justice Department to the FBI, to restore public confidence in the rule of law.

"This is a good, decent, fair-minded nation, and the people that serve in law enforcement at every level are the best people in this country," Pence added. "We need new leadership that will move us past this era of politicization and weaponization at the Justice Department, and appoint the kind of people at the highest levels that will restore public confidence by virtue of their integrity and their commitment to the rule of law."

Pence says he has every confidence that Trump and his legal team will be able to make their defense, adding, "He knows how to make his case."

And when asked whether he thinks Trump will be able to engage in presidential debates without legal peril, Pence says he believes the Republican Party "will be able to accommodate and make sure that the former president, the former vice president, everybody else that qualifies will be able to be on that stage."

Here's what some of Trump's other GOP primary challengers are saying.

It's still pretty unclear.

The Department of Justice declined to comment on reports of the indictment on Thursday and hasn't given any other public indication that the charges will be unsealed soon.

NPR was among the news organizations that joined a legal motion to unseal documents after Donald Trump was indicted by a grand jury in Manhattan in late March. A judge denied that request.

It's still possible the public won't see the indictment until Trump appears in court for an arraignment, which he and his lawyers say will happen on Tuesday at 3 p.m. ET.

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There are three different sets of classified documents to discuss here:

1. In January 2022, the National Archives and Records Administration arranged for the transfer of 15 boxes of classified documents from Mar-a-Lago, a year after the initial deadline for turning over all classified documents as part of the Presidential Records Act.

As first reported by The Washington Post, the documents retrieved last month from the Florida property contained important records of communication along with Trump's self-described "love letters" with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, as well as a letter addressed to Trump from his predecessor, former President Barack Obama.

2. In June 2022, Trump's lawyers handed over 38 documents, which The Associated Press reports included five documents marked confidential, 16 marked secret and 17 marked top secret.

3. The third set, which the FBI seized in an August 2022 raid on Mar-a-Lago, included 33 boxes containing over 100 classified records, some of which were stored in office desks.

We still don't know too much about those documents, some of which were so highly classified that the FBI agents themselves couldn't review them. But court filings have clued us in to a taste of what was in the trove:

• An Executive Grant of Clemency re: Roger Jason Stone Jr.
• A document titled "Info re: President of France"
• Empty folders marked "return to staff secretary/military aide"
• A binder of photos
• One item labeled "potential presidential record"

As a reminder, Trump is facing seven counts in the indictment, including willful retention of information related to national defense, at least one charge of false statements and one charge related to obstruction of justice.

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Trump has been summoned to appear in the federal courthouse in Miami at 3 p.m. on Tuesday.

NPR's Carrie Johnson says the location is significant: The Justice Department decided to bring the case in Florida (rather than Washington, D.C.), where the jury pool could be a lot more favorable to the former president.

On Tuesday, he will be processed and make his first appearance before a judge.

"His lawyer Jim Trusty told CNN last night that Trump will not be arrested, but he may go through processing at the courthouse and deal with other red tape behind the scenes," she tellsMorning Edition.

U.S. Marshals and the Secret Service will be doing a lot of planning over the next few days to make sure that courthouse is secure, she adds.

Trump's first indictment — and appearance in federal court in Manhattan — in April could offer a blueprint of what might happen next week, as far as security measures and logistics go.

But there are some major differences this time around, Johnson notes.

"Those are charges that relate to falsifying business records for alleged hush money payments to Stormy Daniels shortly before the 2016 election," she explains. "This federal case from the Justice Department is more serious legally and would carry more significant penalties."

A handful of Democratic lawmakers have weighed in publicly on Trump's indictment so far. Here's what some of them are saying:

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries tweeted that the rule of law "must be applied without fear or favor. To everyone."

Rep. Jamie Raskin, who served on the Jan. 6 committee and as lead manager in Trump's second impeachment trial, released a lengthy statement saying the indictment shows Trump "put our national security in grave danger as he pursued yet another lawless personal agenda by pilfering and hoarding government documents."

He called on Republicans to respect the outcome of the special counsel's investigation and the grand jury's eventual decision. And he added:

"Dangerous rhetoric about a ‘two-tiered system of justice’ —discriminating against the rich no less — in order to prop up the twice-impeached former President not only undermines the Department of Justice but betrays the essential principle of justice that no one is above the commands of law, not even a former President or a self-proclaimed billionaire."

Rep. Jerry Nadler referenced the slew of investigations Trump is facing, adding he is "grateful to live in a nation where no man is above the law."

Rep. Adam Schiff, a Jan. 6 panel member and lead impeachment manager during Trump's first Senate trial (who is now running for a California Senate seat himself), tweeted that Trump will try to use the indictment to his political advantage "because winning the presidency may be his only hope of avoiding jail."

He also took issue with what he described as House Speaker Kevin McCarthy "threatening to use Congress to interfere in the federal prosecution of Donald Trump."

"Donald Trump has got plenty of good criminal defense lawyers," Schiff told MSNBC. "That's not our job."

Rep. Greg Landsman, who represents a suburban district in the swing state of Ohio, said that what Trump is "doing to this country, the extremism and danger he and his allies present, has to end."

That's a different tone than he struck after Trump's first indictment in April, when he called for lawmakers from all parties to "keep our attention on the actual work of leading this country."

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"No, we haven't been provided with the indictment yet," Trump attorney Jim Trusty told CNN Thursday night. Trusty added that they've essentially been given a summary of the indictment, which includes a request for Trump and his team to be at the courthouse in Florida at 3 p.m. on Tuesday.

"It doesn't perfectly mirror an indictment but it does have some language in it that would suggest what the seven charges would be," Trusty said.

A source with knowledge of the charges confirmed to NPR on Thursday that the seven counts include willful retention of information related to national defense, at least one false statements charge and at least one charge related to obstruction.

In his account to CNN, Trusty said that the summary of charges also includes conspiracy and charges under the Espionage Act.

He added that it's not "100% clear" if the charges are all separate charges, but he did say the charge of espionage was "ludicrous."

Trusty also said they weren't advised if others have also been indicted in the case and hadn't been informed of when exactly they'd receive the indictment. He confirmed to CNN that Trump would appear in court at 3 p.m. ET on Tuesday.

This federal indictment of a former president is already historic — but it could just be the start of Donald Trump's legal journey.

Here's a look at three other investigations related to Trump:

The Stormy Daniels hush money investigation (Manhattan District Attorney's Office)

This investigation centers on a $130,000 hush money payment to Stormy Daniels, an adult film actor, made just before the 2016 election in order to quiet her allegations of an affair with Trump.

A grand jury in New York ultimately voted to indict Trump in late March on 34 felony counts of business record falsification. He was arraigned on April 4, where he pleaded not guilty.

The case is being brought by Alvin Bragg Jr., who was elected district attorney of New York County in 2021. He took over the case from his predecessor, Cyrus Vance Jr., who had opened a broad criminal inquiry into Trump's business activities while Trump was still president.

The Georgia 2020 election interference investigation (Fulton County District Attorney's Office)

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The Georgia case centers on the actions of Trump and his allies in the weeks following the 2020 presidential election, as they pressured state officials to undo his loss in the state.

The investigation is led by Fani Willis, the top prosecutor in Fulton County, Ga., where a special grand jury spent eight months hearing from more than 70 witnesses. Their work was finalized in early January. A portion of their report was released last month, but a judge ruled that most of it should remain confidential for now.

Willis has said decisions on indictments are "imminent." It's not clear if Trump would be among those charged. Possible crimes for him or others could include soliciting election fraud, giving false statements to government bodies and racketeering. Trump also denies any wrongdoing in Georgia.

An investigation into Trump's actions around Jan. 6 (U.S. Department of Justice)

This is the second ongoing probe led by the U.S. Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith.

Smith is looking at Trump's attempt to interfere with the 2020 election. As part of that probe, prosecutors have interviewed numerous Trump allies and aides. They've also subpoenaed former Vice President Mike Pence, whom Trump pressured intensely to overturn the election results during the certification process on Jan. 6. In April, Pence announced that he would comply with the subpoena.

Prosecutors are also reportedly investigating the finances of Save America, a Trump-affiliated political action committee.

The former president "of course" plans to plead not guilty to federal charges as he's arraigned in a Miami courthouse on Tuesday, according to a Fox News Digital article quoting Trump directly.

In line with his tone on Truth Social on Thursday, Trump directed his ire over the investigation squarely at the Biden administration.

"This is the most corrupt administration in history — there has never been an administration so corrupt, and they’re just starting to find it right now," Trump told Fox News. "They are trying to deflect all of their dishonesty by bringing this ridiculous boxes hoax case."

He added that he "did absolutely nothing wrong" and remains "totally innocent."

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President Biden has not yet commented publicly on Trump's second indictment, which the former president announced just before 8 p.m. ET.

But hours earlier, Biden took questions — including one about the Justice Department — from journalists at a joint press conference with visiting British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

At one point, he was asked how he would convince the American public to trust the independence and fairness of the DOJ, given Trump's repeated rhetorical attacks on it.

“You notice I have never once, not one single time, suggested to the Justice Department what they should do or not do relative to bringing any charge or not bringing any charge," Biden answered. "I'm honest."

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A number of prominent Republicans have responded to the news of Trump's indictment, with some — but not all — jumping to his defense.

How will the GOP deal with the fact that its 2024 frontrunner is facing federal charges?

Conservative columnist Jonah Goldberg of The Dispatch tellsMorning Edition that the news means "everything is going to be uglier and stupider for a little while," pointing to the reactions pouring in on Twitter last night.

"The only two Republican presidential candidates to actually take a different tact other than 'This is a political witch hunt' and all that nonsense were Chris Christie and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, which I think is at minimum a good sign," Goldberg says. "You need some oxygen out there to actually have an argument."

Christie tweeted that "no one is above the law, no matter how much they wish they were" and said he'd have more to add "when the facts are revealed." Hutchinson put out a brief statement saying Trump's actions "should not define our nation or the Republican Party," calling the criminal proceedings a "major distraction" and urging him to end his campaign.

As Goldberg puts it, there are three major candidates in the Republican primary who are critical of Trump, albeit for different reasons and with different rhetoric: Christie, former Vice President Mike Pence and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

"The different strategies have to do with the fact that they're going after different voters," Goldberg says. "DeSantis wants to get about half of the coalition that likes Trump; it's not the diehards — they rally to him when the press picks on him, they rally to him after the Mar-a-Lago, but they're not that hardcore 'shoot 'em on Fifth Avenue' base.

"And that's the question ... how many of those voters can these guys pick off during a rally-around-Trump moment?"

For his part, DeSantis tweeted that "the weaponization of federal law enforcement represents a mortal threat to free society" and pledged that his administration would end it "once and for all."

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Running the investigation into Trump's handling of classified documents is former Justice Department prosecutor Jack Smith Smith.

This investigation is one of two concerning the former president that Smith was tasked to oversee by Attorney General Merrick Garland.

Smith is also supervising the criminal investigation into whether or not an individual or entity interfered with the transfer of power after the 2020 presidential election.

In announcing Smith's appointment, Garland called Smith "the right choice to complete these matters in an even-handed and urgent manner."

Here are four key takeaways about Smith's career path:

1. He most recently investigated war crimes as part of the International Criminal Court at The Hague.
   
2. He previously served as the head of the DOJ's public integrity unit. In 2015, his team prosecuted former CIA officerJeffrey Sterling for leaking classified information and obstruction of justice.
   
3. He spent nearly a decade with the U.S. Attorney's office overseeing 100 criminal prosecutors in a range of cases, including plenty of white collar crime.
   
4. He has also worked in the private sector, serving as head of litigation for the Hospital Corporation of America.

That a former president is facing federal charges is a big deal unto itself — it's never happened in this country before.

But add to that the timing — the fact that the charges dropped while said former president is running, and leading, in the primary to get his old job back — and you have something truly unusual and extraordinary.

Only in Donald Trump's America.

How this ends is anyone's guess, but NPR's senior political editor Domenico Montanaro offers four key points to help you make sense of it from a political angle:

1. Not much has affected Trump's trajectory to this point. It's hard to see why this indictment would be any different from his previous indictment or a jury finding him liable in a defamation lawsuit.
   
2. Trump has already spent years perfecting his strategy of trying to undermine the Justice Department and FBI.
   
3. Most of Trump's challengers for the 2024 GOP nomination have declined to criticize Trump so far. They seem to be doing the same on this indictment.
   
4. This was already going to be a weird election for several reasons, but it may get weirder. If Trump is convicted and faces any jail time, he could still run for president.

➡️ Read more about the politics of Trump's federal indictment.

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The dispute over records at Mar-a-Lago in Florida exploded into public view in August 2022, when FBI agents executed a search warrant at the property while Trump was out of town. The former president tweeted about the search, which set off a weeks-long legal tug-of-war in Florida and D.C.

Attorney General Merrick Garland later told reporters he personally approved the search. And a federal magistrate judge signed off on the search warrant after reading a sworn statement from the FBI.

Authorities recovered highly classified materials — some so sensitive that the government officials involved in the search lacked the security clearance to review them.

Here's a timeline of key events:

January 2021 — Trump and his team were required to turn all government documents back to the National Archives as part of the Presidential Records Act.

January 2022 — The National Archives and Records Administration arranged for the transfer of 15 boxes of classified documents from Mar-a-Lago following discussions with Trump's lawyers. Trump's advisers denied any nefarious intent behind keeping the 15 boxes past the legal deadline.

May 2022 — The FBI learned there were more documents at Mar-a-Lago and secured a subpoena to search. In response, Trump's attorneys said they did a thorough search of Mar-a-Lago, including a storage room where boxes were kept, and that they gathered together all of the remaining classified documents.

June 2022 — A senior Justice Department official visited Mar-a-Lago with FBI agents. Trump's lawyers handed over one red envelope, double-wrapped in tape. That envelope contained 38 classified documents, including some that were marked top secret. Trump's lawyers said that was everything.

August 2022 — The FBI obtained evidence that some of the government documents had been removed from the Mar-a-Lago storage room they mentioned in May (this movement is a key detail as the indictment includes an obstruction of justice charge, a source confirmed to NPR). When they conducted a search themselves,the FBI found dozens more documents — some classified so highly that not even the FBI agents could review them.

November 2022 — The DOJ names Jack Smith as special counsel to oversee the investigations into Trump's handling of classified documents, as well as key aspects of the investigation into Trump's role in pushing to overturn the 2020 election results.

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We're going to learn a lot about this case as news leaks in the coming days, but when it comes to the legal process, the next big step is Trump's arraignment.

In breaking the news of his own indictment, Donald Trump said on Truth Social that he's due in a Miami Federal Courthouse on Tuesday at 3 p.m. ET, a claim that his lawyer repeated on CNN.

Once in court, he'll be processed and will make his first appearance, probably before a magistrate judge. You can expect security at that courthouse to be very tight.

The location clues us into the DOJ's strategy for prosecuting Trump.

Prosecutors had the option to pursue charges in either location, Washington, D.C., or Florida. Former Trump aide Taylor Budowich testified before a grand jury in Miami on Wednesday.

"They have to bring the case in the district where the alleged criminal conduct occurred," said Ryan Goodman, a law professor at New York University and former special counsel to the Department of Defense.

In March, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in case that could determine what happens when the government prosecutes criminal charges in the wrong venue.

"There is a significant legal risk if they got the choice wrong," said Goodman. "If prosecutors get the venue wrong, it could be thrown out, so South Florida is less risky." Goodman said he is watching to see if the Justice Department believes there are still outstanding documents that have not been returned and what hard evidence prosecutors have.

The location is significant, too — there's been a lot of grand jury action in Washington, D.C., but the special counsel decided to bring this case in Florida instead. That jury pool there could be a lot more favorable to Trump.

Former President Donald Trump has been indicted on federal charges for storing dozens of classified documents at his Florida resort and refusing to return them to the FBI and the National Archives.

He faces seven counts, including willful retention of information related to national defense, at least one false statements charge and at least one charge related to obstruction, according to a source with knowledge of the charges. Charging documents from a federal grand jury in Miami have not been made public.

"I never thought it possible that such a thing could happen to a former President of the United States, who received far more votes than any sitting President in the History of our Country, and is currently leading, by far, all Candidates, both Democrat and Republican, in Polls of the 2024 Presidential Election. I AM AN INNOCENT MAN!" Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform on Thursday.

Trump said in a statement that he has been summoned to appear in federal court in Miami on Tuesday.

A spokesman for DOJ special counsel Jack Smith said they had no comment at this time.