Video transcript
It doesn't get much more serious than that. The chairman of the House Intel Committee doesn't have declassification authority over these types of documents. They are made available to Congress under very tightly controlled rules. This has been a source of tension for years, and members of both parties have gone out of their way to assure that this material would be closely held and not weaponized. This was viewed as one of the most political chairs of that committee in its history. This is a truly chilling account, if true. When I first read it, frankly, I was taken aback because it's perfectly moronic to commit such a felony with a planning conference meeting with staff. That's not usually how things are leaked in Washington, D.C. What makes this different, Will, is that this was a statement made to FBI agents. The person who made this statement was no doubt aware that lying to FBI agents is not just a crime, but a crime that was repeatedly prosecuted during prior administrations, including the Obama and Biden administrations. Making this statement puts you at risk. That's why someone's lying here, and someone's a felon. Let's just for a moment hypothetically take this whistleblower at their word. Let's assume for a moment that it's true, professor. What kind of punishment follows for leaking classified information? This is a very significant punishment. You can have, in addition to having multiple counts, you can easily go 10 years in terms of a sentence, if not more, depending on the circumstances and the number of violations. Each of these leaks is an individual violation. Each of these documents would likely be charged as a violation. That type of count-stacking is precisely what Mueller and others did. Remember, these are very similar to the types of claims made against Donald Trump and Mar-a-Lago that he removed material and properly stored them. There were also allegations that he might have revealed them to third parties. This is much more serious in that, in one sense. Trump was accused of negligence in most of these counts. This would be a premeditated criminal act to release classified information to damage one's political opponents.
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