Special counsel blasts judge's jury instruction request in Trump documents case - Boston News, Weather, Sports | WHDH 7News

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

47% : In their own proposed jury instructions filed Tuesday evening, Trump's defense attorneys suggested that, in the first hypothetical, Cannon tell trial jurors that Trump was "authorized" by the PRA to "possess a category of documents defined as 'personal records,' both during and after his term in office.
46% : ""Both scenarios rest on an unstated and fundamentally flawed legal premise -- namely, that the Presidential Records Act and in particular its distinction between 'personal' and 'Presidential' records, determines whether a former President is 'authorized,' under the Espionage Act, to possess highly classified documents and store them in an unsecure facility," the special counsel's team wrote.
43% : The second version Cannon asked for assumes that as president, Trump had complete authority to take records he wanted from the White House, which would make it nearly impossible for prosecutors to secure a conviction.
35% : According to the prosecutors' account, there is no evidence that Trump designated the relevant classified records as personal when he left the White House, and the prosecutors said he got the idea that he did have such power many months later, from the leader of a conservative legal organization.
31% : The first scenario would instruct a jury to assess whether each of the records that Trump is accused of retaining fell into the categories of "personal" or "presidential" as laid out by the Presidential Records Act, a post-Watergate law that governs how White House records belonging to the government are to be handled at the end of a presidency.
26% : In an unusual order last month, Cannon asked attorneys on the classified documents case to submit briefs on potential jury instructions defining terms of the Espionage Act, under which Trump is charged over mishandling 32 classified records.
18% : "In the second scenario, defense attorneys wrote that "there can be no appropriate jury instructions relating to factual issues ... because that scenario forecloses prosecution of President Trump.
17% : Prosecutors have repeatedly said that PRA is not relevant to the charges against Trump, as the conduct he is accused of happened after his term as president ended.

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