Trump pleads not guilty in federal classified documents case

Former President Donald Trump made more history Tuesday, becoming the first chief executive to be arraigned on federal charges during a brief appearance in a Miami courtroom — as his rep blasted the prosecution as a moment that should “terrify” all Americans.

Trump, 76, pleaded not guilty to more than three dozen counts — most of which allege unlawful hoarding of national security information — before Magistrate Judge Jonathan Goodman.

“We most certainly enter a plea of not guilty,” Trump lawyer Todd Blanche told the court at the appointed moment. After the plea was entered, Trump sat at the defense table scowling with his arms crossed.

Clad in his trademark navy blue suit and red tie, the former president frequently engaged in animated conversation with Blanche, occasionally shaking his head slightly at answers that displeased him.

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Five days earlier, Trump had been indicted by special counsel Jack Smith on 37 counts alleging Trump improperly held onto classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate after leaving office in January 2021, and then lied to federal officials who sought their return.

Smith, who was tapped by Attorney General Merrick Garland in November to investigate the documents case as well as Trump’s role in the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot, watched the proceedings from the first row of spectators behind the prosecution table and gazed intently at Trump as he left the courtroom.

Outside, thousands of pro- and anti-Trump protesters mingled with hundreds of reporters from around the world. The public entrance to the courthouse was blocked by a yellow-tape police line and about half a dozen law enforcement vehicles. About two dozen Miami police officers circled the building’s perimeter on bicycles.

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Dominic Santana, 61, who showed up in black-and-white prison stripes and carrying a sign saying “LOCK HIM UP,” told the Associated Press he “wanted to join the circus.”

“A fellow New Yorker can spot a rat a mile away,” the retiree said of Trump. “Frankly, he should’ve been locked up ages ago.”

Santana was later detained by police after jumping in front of the former president’s motorcade as he left the courthouse. A Secret Service spokesperson, Special Agent Steve Kopek, told The Post that Santana “was removed swiftly from the roadway” and “had no impact on the security of the protective movement.”

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The father-son duo of Florencio and Kevin Rodriguez came out to support Trump, with Kevin wearing a shirt that read “Jesus is my savior, Trump is my president.”

“Even if he’s guilty, we will still support him,” said Rodriguez, who came to the US with his father as refugees from Cuba fifteen years ago.

The former president was fingerprinted digitally, but no mugshot was taken and he was not handcuffed. He can keep his passport and no restrictions were placed on his domestic or international travel.

Goodman ordered Trump’s release without having to pay a bond, though the former president was required to sign a personal surety and promise not to engage in criminal conduct. When asked by the judge if Trump objected to the no-crimes condition, Blanche answered: “I assure you he does not.”

The prosecution, led by David Harbach, made no objection to the release conditions, saying neither Trump nor his co-defendant Walt Nauta are seen as a flight risk.

The one point of contention during the hearing was a requirement imposed by Goodman that Trump not speak to people on a list of potential witnesses provided by the government.

Blanche argued that the scope of the restriction was too broad, since the list included people who “depend on President Trump for their livelihood.”

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“One of the key witnesses that we know of is still the president’s lawyer,” Blanche went on, apparently referencing Evan Corcoran, whose notes were cited throughout the 49-page indictment unsealed Friday.

Goodman was unmoved, ordering “no communications about the case with fact witnesses who are on a list provided by the government,” though he added that Trump’s legal team could object to individual witnesses. The judge also allowed Trump to continue to communicate with Nauta as long as they did not discuss the case.

Trump and Nauta had motorcaded to court from Trump National Doral Miami resort, arriving at 1:50 p.m. ahead of the 3 p.m. appearance.

Trump, who waved to supporters and chatted with staff members as he left Doral, rode to court in the company of his son Eric, who appeared to clap his father on the back just before he climbed in a vehicle.

After Trump disappeared inside the courthouse, his attorney and spokeswoman Alina Habba told reporters: “The decision to pursue charges against President Trump while turning a blind eye to others is emblematic of the corruption that we have here. We are at a turning point in our nation’s history. The targeting prosecution of a leading political opponent is the type of thing you see in dictatorships, like Cuba and Venezuela.”

“What is being done to President Trump should terrify all citizens of this country,” Habba added. “These are not the ideals that our democracy is founded upon. This is not our America.”

Trump’s presidential campaign echoed the dramatic language in a series of fundraising appeals. In one, bearing the subject line, “My last email before my arraignment,” the former president implored his supporters to: “Please say a prayer for America today. Because our justice system is DEAD.”

Another message warned: “Friend, Reports state that I could receive a maximum sentence of 400 YEARS IN PRISON despite being a totally and completely innocent man” before asking: “Please make a contribution to peacefully stand with me and SAVE the greatest country in history – for 1,500% impact.”

The former president left the courthouse a little more than two hours after he arrived, heading to the airport and a flight back to his Bedminster resort in New Jersey.

On the way to the airport, Trump’s motorcade stopped at Versailles restaurant and bakery, a focal point of Miami’s Cuban exile community and a home base of South Florida’s most fervent Hispanic conservatives.

The indictment charges Trump with 31 counts of willful retention of the classified documents — which allegedly included sensitive defense information and an “attack plan” on a foreign nation — as well as charges of conspiracy to obstruct justice and making false statements. 

Nauta, a former White House military aide who was working for Trump as a body man at his Palm Beach resort, was also indicted as a co-conspirator on six charges including conspiracy, concealing and withholding documents, as well as making false statements. Nauta was released on the same bond as Trump, though his arraignment was rescheduled to June 27 due to a lack of local counsel.

Trump and Nauta conspired to move boxes of the documents out of the reach of federal authorities and even his own lawyers, storing the material at different points in a ballroom, bedroom, bathroom and storage room, according to the indictment.

Trump took to his Truth Social account before his court appearance to denounce Smith and the Biden administration.

“This [Smith] is the Thug, over turned [sic] consistently and unanimously in big cases, that Biden and his CORRUPT Injustice Department stuck on me,” he wrote. “He’s a Radical Right Lunatic and Trump Hater, as are all his friends and family, who probably ‘planted’ information in the ‘boxes’ given to them. They taint everything that they touch, including our Country, which is rapidly going to HELL!”

The former president also drew attention to another special counsel investigation involving President Biden’s alleged improper retention of classified documents from his days in the Senate and as Barack Obama’s vice president.

“Will Deranged Jack Smith be looking at the thousands of pages of documents that Biden had in Chinatown then, when caught, $5,000,000 bribe that was paid to Biden but that the Justice Department is trying to hide? Much more coming on that! We are living in a Third World Country. No Borders, Rigged Elections!”

Special counsel Robert Hur is leading the Biden classified documents probe after the president’s lawyers found some of the material stashed at his former office in Washington, DC, and his Delaware home.

FBI agents later seized other classified material after a search was conducted at Biden’s main residence in Wilmington, Del.

The FBI also combed through Biden’s Senate records now housed at the University of Delaware Library, but has not announced whether any of the 1,850 boxes of material had classified markings.

Trump and his Republican allies have pointed to the Biden case and another case of classified material being mishandled by Hillary Clinton as proof of politically motivated prosecution at the Justice Department.

The FBI did not charge the former secretary of state in 2016 for having stored tens of thousands of emails from her time at the State Department on a private server, despite having found 113 that contained classified information.

In a separate post on his social media network, Trump also said the grand jury that voted to indict him was not aware of the authority granted to him by the Presidential Records Act — and suggested that former President Bill Clinton had also improperly kept records after leaving office by storing in a sock drawer audio recordings of interviews he gave.

“THE GRAND JURY WAS NEVER TOLD ABOUT THE PRESIDENTIAL RECORDS ACT OR THE CLINTON SOCKS CASE, BOTH EXONERATING!” Trump said.

The former president is the front-runner for the GOP nomination with 52.7% support, followed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (22%), former Vice President Mike Pence (4.7%) and former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley (3.3%), according to the RealClearPolitics polling average.

With Post wires