During an appearance on MSNBC this weekend, former White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham said she saw then-President Donald Trump show classified documents to his guests at Mar-a-Lago.
Grisham, who also was the chief of staff and press secretary to former First Lady Melania Trump, told network host Alex Witt that she wouldn’t be surprised if Trump was showing classified documents to people in private meetings.
“I watched him show documents to people at Mar-a-Lago on the dining room patio,” Grisham said. “So he has no respect for classified information. Never did.”
“He talks specifically that he should have declassified it, but he didn’t,” she said, referring to a clip where Trump refers to documents that he “could have declassified.”
“I believe also there’s a portion of that audio where he says, you know, this is off the record,” Grisham said. “And I know Donald Trump knows the rules of reporters, and he knows if it needs to be off the record that they can’t talk about it. So I think he was covering himself in that regard.”
“I just want to say to your viewers, I don’t think people understand how hard it is to get your classified permission. I remember when I was going through it to get all of mine. I got held up because of a $13 KinderCare bill that I did not know about, and so I couldn’t get it,” she continued. “They go through everything about it. It’s very difficult to get a security clearance, and I think people miss that in the weeds, obviously. But to be showing it to people who haven’t gone through the extreme vetting that you go through to get a clearance, it’s a disservice to the country, but it also puts people in danger potentially.”
Grisham went on to say that she found it “offensive” that Trump would share the documents.
“I can’t stress enough how by being so loose with this stuff, he’s potentially putting people in danger,” she continued. “And yeah, I had a top security clearance and it’s very, very hard to obtain. So it’s very important and it’s vital to our country and our national security. The only people with these clearances have access to any of these documents.”
Watch the video below:
Former Trump press secretary @OMGrisham on her former boss:
“I watched him show documents to people at Mar-a-Lago on the dining room patio. He has no respect for classified information…”
pic.twitter.com/SPJfwhinZz— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) July 2, 2023
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