Prosecutors examined whether Trump disclosed classified map on plane after leaving office
Source: The Guardian
Wed 25 Mar 2026 05.00 EDT
Last modified on Wed 25 Mar 2026 05.02 EDT
Federal prosecutors examined whether Donald Trump showed a classified map to people on his plane after his first term, including to his now White House chief of staff, Susie Wiles, according to justice department materials produced to the House judiciary committee. The incident was described in a 13 January 2023 briefing memo prepared for the then attorney general, Merrick Garland – roughly six months before special counsel Jack Smith charged Trump with retaining classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago club.
Trump’s alleged disclosure of the map, as described in the memo, would mark the second known time he waved around a classified map in front of Wiles. The indictment charging Trump also described an incident where he showed a classified map to people at his Bedminster club in New Jersey.
It was unclear whether the map Trump said to have brandished on his plane in 2022 and at Bedminster were one and the same. The map he had at Bedminster was a military map of Afghanistan, which Trump was showing associates as he criticized Joe Biden for the US withdrawal in 2021.
Trump’s disclosure of a classified map was not charged as a separate count in the indictment, likely because it happened after the withdrawal had been completed and so any information on the map could not be said to constitute national defense information. “One other thing on the use of classified documents that I want to bring to your attention. We have identified a classified map that we believe Trump may have shown to individuals on board an airplane after he left office,” said the 11-page memo reviewed by the Guardian.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/25/donald-trump-classified-classified-map-private-plane-susie-wiles
= new reply since forum marked as read
He already got away with that a few times, and he knows he can say it whenever he wants.
