George Conway Says Donald Trump Will Go To Jail For Obstruction

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Donald Trump is facing jail time for obstruction in connection with an investigation into classified documents against him, according to attorney George Conway.

Conway is a frequent critic of Trump who split with former White House adviser Kellyanne Conway. He said the former president, who has denied all wrongdoing, faces a “strong” case of withholding top secret documents obtained by the FBI at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. Conway discusses an update on Special Counsel Jack Smith’s inquiry.

On Monday, The New York Times wrote that prosecutors have subpoenaed The Trump Organization for information about the former president’s businesses since he entered the White House in January 2017. It is unclear why the subpoenas were issued, but another sign that Smith is expanding his federal probe into Trump.

Former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally on April 27, 2023 in Manchester, New Hampshire. Attorney George Conway said the former president faces jail time for obstruction in connection with an investigation into classified documents. Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Conway told MSNBC’s All in With Chris Hayes that Trump doesn’t need a “financial incentive” to keep classified materials at his Florida home. His “insane narcissism and his belief that he controls everything” means he believes he is allowed to do this.

“The only thing that would really make it worse is if [Trump] there’s a FedEx slip showing that he sent them to the Saudis or the Kremlin or something,” Conway said. “And he probably almost did. Everything is possible with this man.

“But the interesting thing about this is that it’s not necessary to put this person in prison. It doesn’t matter if he gave these documents to a foreign power—it’s much, much worse because it would be an independent violation of Espionage Act—[but] it hardly mattered if he showed up [North Korea leader] Kim Jong Un’s letter to the guests, because the obstruction charges are so strong,” Conway added.

“I mean, Ty Cobb, the White House counsel who handled the Trump administration, took charge of the Mueller investigation on national television the other day and said, ‘Trump is going to jail for this.’ And he should and will, because the obstruction case is very strong.”

Trump has been accused of deliberately obstructing federal attempts to obtain the classified documents, which were removed from the White House in January 2021.

Trump received a government subpoena to turn over all materials to the National Archives and Records Administration in May 2022. Trump allegedly ignored the requests. The Washington Post reported in April 2023 that the former president looked through some of the boxes of government documents out of an apparent desire to preserve some of the materials.

In June 2022, the FBI visited Mar-a-Lago to recover classified materials. During the visit, Trump’s legal team allegedly “expressly prohibited” federal agents from looking inside a storage room at the resort.

Trump’s lawyer Evan Corcoran drafted a statement, which was signed by fellow Trump lawyer Christina Bobb. He told federal investigators that all classified materials kept at Mar-a-Lago were returned in June.

The FBI then raided Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home in August 2022 and seized more than 100 classified and top-secret documents, including some found in a storage room.

Last March, Corcoran testified before a grand jury for the second time as part of a classified materials investigation to answer questions under oath without citing the attorney-client privilege.

Washington DC District Court Judge Beryl Howell ruled that prosecutors could force Corcoran to waive the normally protected privilege under the so-called crime-fraud exception. This means that the protected attorney-client privilege cannot be invoked if an attorney and their client are allegedly attempting to cover up or commit a crime.

Elsewhere during her MSNBC appearance, Conway said that Trump’s accusation that his lawyers were implicated in his alleged wrongdoing would not be taken lightly by a judge.

“Judges are lawyers. They train lawyers, they respect the attorney-client privilege, and intruding on that privilege is something they don’t want to do,” Conway said. “And the fact that Judge Howell was willing to do this shows that the evidence is incredibly strong.”

Newsweek has reached out to Trump’s legal team for comment via email.

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