Here's an interesting tidbit from the groaning buffet table that is the DOJ court filing

Remember when Trump complained about the FBI’s seizure of his passports? "Wow! In the raid by the FBI of Mar-a-Lago, they stole my three Passports (one expired), along with everything else," Trump whined on his Twitter-like social network, Truth Social. "This is an assault on a political opponent at a level never seen before in our Country. Third World!"

Since then, the FBI has returned his passports to the former president, and no one would have paid any attention if Trump had kept his mouth shut about them. Because he blabbed on Truth Social, however, the DOJ felt compelled in the filing it posted last night to make a point of how they came into possession of the passports: "The government seized the contents of a desk drawer that contained classified documents and governmental records commingled with other documents," the DOJ explained . "The other documents included two official passports, one of which was expired, and one personal passport, which was expired. The location of the passports is relevant evidence in an investigation of unauthorized retention and mishandling of national defense information."

How is it relevant, you might ask? Well, if classified documents which do not belong to you are found in the drawer where you keep things, like passports, that do belong to you, then you can be assumed to be treating the documents as if they are your own, and not the government’s.

The other reason the DOJ’s explanation is interesting is its use of the term “national defense information” to describe the governmental records that were “comingled” with the passports. Those words are taken directly from 18 U.S. Code 793, the section of the Espionage Act pertaining to the taking or possession of documents or other forms of information essential to the “national defense.” Here is paragraph (d) of that section of the Espionage Act:

“Whoever, lawfully having possession of, access to, control over, or being entrusted with any document, writing, code book, signal book, sketch, photograph, photographic negative, blueprint, plan, map, model, instrument, appliance, or note relating to the national defense, or information relating to the national defense which information the possessor has reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation, willfully communicates, delivers, transmits or causes to be communicated, delivered, or transmitted or attempts to communicate, deliver, transmit or cause to be communicated, delivered or transmitted the same to any person not entitled to receive it, or willfully retains the same and fails to deliver it on demand to the officer or employee of the United States entitled to receive it;”

Which is followed in paragraph (f) with the consequences to whoever “having knowledge that the same has been illegally removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of its trust, or lost, or stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, and fails to make prompt report of such loss, theft, abstraction, or destruction to his superior officer—

Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.”

So that’s why the DOJ seized the passports. Even though they have been returned to the former president, photographs that were taken at the time of the search on August 8 showing the location of the “national defense information” found in Trump’s desk drawer alongside the passports would be evidence that the documents Trump was “entrusted with” (again, language from 18 U.S. Code 793) were relevant to the investigation of crimes that violated the Espionage Act.

Yet another instance when Trump’s obsession with telling his MAGA base how wronged he was by the FBI has ended up implicating him further in the investigation that gave rise to the search of the office in which the “national defense” documents were found.

There will no doubt be further developments because Trump will not be able to resist the urge to dig the hole he is in even deeper.

Watch this space.