Washington — Prosecutors with special counsel Jack Smith’s office have added new charges against former President Donald Trump in the case involving documents with classified markings discovered at this Florida resort of Mar-a-Lago, according to court papers filed in federal court Thursday evening.
A superseding indictment unsealed by the Justice Department lists multiple new counts against Trump, including: altering, destroying, mutilating, or concealing an object; and corruptly altering, destroying, mutilating or concealing a document, record or other object; and an additional charge of willful retention of national defense information.
Trump was previously charged with 37 felony counts, including 31 counts of willful retention of classified documents and one count of conspiracy to obstruct justice. He has pleaded not guilty and claimed the prosecution is a politically motivated “witch hunt” against him. Walt Nauta, the former president’s aide, was also charged in the case and pleaded not guilty.
Attorneys for Trump and Nauta did not immediately return requests for comment.
The new document also names a third defendant in the case: Carlos De Oliveira, a Mar-a-Lago property manager and former valet. He faces one count of altering, destroying, mutilating, or concealing an object; one count of corruptly altering, destroying, mutilating or concealing a document, record or other object; and one count of making false statements and representations during a voluntary interview with federal investigators.
He has been ordered to appear in federal court in Miami on Monday morning. An attorney for De Oliveira declined to comment, as did a lawyer for Nauta.
Steve Cheung, spokesman for the Trump campaign, claimed the new counts are part of an effort to damage Trump as he seeks the Republican presidential nomination and “nothing more than a continued desperate and flailing attempt by the Biden Crime Family and their Department of Justice to harass President Trump and those around him.”
The judge in the case, Judge Aileen Cannon, has set a trial date of May 2024.
The new charges come as the former president and his attorneys are waiting for the possibility of a separate indictment stemming from Smith’s investigation into attempts to alter the 2020 presidential election and interfere with the peaceful transfer of power. Trump’s attorneys met with federal prosecutors at the special counsel’s office Thursday in Washington, D.C. He has also denied wrongdoing in this case.
