Share this page!

Enter URL or ID to Unroll

You can paste full URL like: https://x.com/threadreaderapp/status/1644127596119195649
or just the ID like: 1644127596119195649

How to get URL link on X (Twitter) App

  1. On the Twitter thread, click on or icon on the bottom
  2. Click again on or Share Via icon
  3. Click on Copy Link to Tweet
  4. Paste it above and click "Unroll Thread"!
  5. More info at Twitter Help
Jason Leopold Profile picture
@JasonLeopold
Jul 17 • 9 tweets • 3 min read • Read on X
NEW FOIA Files SPECIAL EDITION: 2 yrs ago, I filed a #FOIA request w/Secret Service for records of threats to Trump & security breaches at MAL between 2017& 2024. Last Wed, Secret Service finally turned over the documents. They're wild.

🧵

bloomberg.com/news/newslette…



Image
Image
Image
Image
Long before the assassination attempt on Trump on Saturday, I spent years using the #FOIA to look into the way the Secret Service responded to threats against all of its protectees & political violence in general.
The 159 pages of records I received from Secret Service last Wednesday provide a behind the scenes look at how the agency responds to potential threats against presidential protectees.
In late 2018, an 18-year-old college student arrived at MAL while Trump was visiting. After walking through a tunnel near the pool area, he was screened at a checkpoint by Secret Service and allowed through. During his brief visit, he entered a secure area and uploaded videos of his escapades to Snapchat. One was titled, "Sneaking into Trump club is like taking candy from a baby."
On another occasion on Dec. 30, 2018, a man showed up at MAL & “physically approached security.”

He said he wanted Trump to sign an executive order to “release six trillion dollars he believed he was owed for his marketing strategy associated with the production of a video game rental idea.” He believed Trump was “holding his money hostage” and said he should be executed “for his actions.”
In another case, two men were seen by Palm Beach police taking photographs near Mar-a-Lago on March 10, 2020. They were asked to leave. A few hours later, they returned, but this time they refused to leave. Palm Beach police then “shattered the windows” of their car “in order to extract” them from the vehicle.
Another incident took place in February 2021. A woman who claimed to be part of the Space Force said she rode her bike hundreds of miles to meet with Trump. Palm Beach police gave her a written trespass warning, told her not to return and sent her on her way.

Some hours later, she returned and said she needed to share classified information with Trump.
Long before the assassination attempt against Trump, dating to his first day in office, Trump has been uniquely vulnerable, partly because he spends a lot of time at Mar-a-Lago. The Secret Service doesn’t have any say in who gets welcomed to the so-called Winter White House. Although there are additional screening protocols for guests afforded close access to him, Trump is known to frequently socialize with guests who pay for an annual membership, sometimes making surprise appearances at weddings or parties.
Please check out today's special edition of FOIA Files and please subscribe if you haven't already! It's free!

I'll have additional installments of the newsletter covering political violence more broadly using documents I have obtained through the FOIA

bloomberg.com/account/newsle…

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
　

Keep Current with Jason Leopold

Jason Leopold Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @JasonLeopold

Jason Leopold Profile picture
Jun 13
BIG SCOOP: I obtained the 266-page transcript of the intv Special Counsel Robert Hur's team conducted with Biden's ghostwriter, Mark Zwonitzer, during their probe into Biden's handling of classified records

A FOIA Files special edition (please subscribe)
bloomberg.com/news/newslette…
Image
Portions of Zwonitzer’s testimony were briefly mentioned in Hur’s final report, but the transcript fleshes out the narrative of how he ended up entangled in the high-profile investigation and reveals what he told Hur's team Image
Zwonitzer was fiercely protective of Biden. He noted more than once that Biden’s memory was sound – in stark contrast to Hur’s own conclusions –and that much of what ended up in his book came from the president’s diaries and recollections.
Read 12 tweets
Jason Leopold Profile picture
May 31
NEW in this week's FOIA Files newsletter: I just obtained docs from NARA and it doesn’t disappoint. It’s about the discovery of ... wait for it... a stolen document that’s been missing for two decades! Plus, another internal report I obtained shows how NARA’s internal watchdog investigated a series of disturbing threats sent to former President Barack Obama at his presidential library
bloomberg.com/news/newslette…
I’ve never made it a habit of requesting documents that pertain to the inner workings of NARA itself, which is how I wield the FOIA when I’m looking to open up a government agency. But my approach changed after news broke about the agency’s yearlong effort to recover boxes of presidential records that Trump took to Mar-a-Lago. Since then, I’ve filed dozens of requests and have liberated some really interesting records about what took place behind the scenes.
A few weeks ago, the agency’s inspector general sent me another batch of documents: reports of various internal investigations that haven’t been previously disclosed.

One in particular is fascinating and it’s a twist on the suddenly relevant theme of missing documents. It’s related to the work of a special unit called the Archival Recovery Team that’s tasked with tracking down missing records and artifacts that were lost or stolen from NARA facilities.
Read 10 tweets
Jason Leopold Profile picture
May 26
From my #FOIA archives

A couple of years ago, I obtained a transcript of an off the record discussion Obama had with progressive journalists about Trump as he was leaving office.

This is what he told them. 21 page transcript linked in the story.

bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
“I think that four years is okay,” Obama said. “Take on some water, but we can kind of bail fast enough to be okay. Eight years would be a problem. I would be concerned about a sustained period in which some of these norms have broken down and started to corrode.”
“I think his basic view -- his formative view of foreign policy is shaped by his interactions with Malaysian developers and Saudi princes, and I think his view is, ‘I’m going to go around the world making deals and maybe suing people,’” Obama said. “But it’s not, ‘let me launch big wars that tie me up.’ And that’s not what his base is looking from him anyway.”
Read 7 tweets
Jason Leopold Profile picture
May 10
NEW FOIA Files🧵: The FBI just sent me a set of docs that’s directly related to Trump’s hush money trial. They're business records from First Republic Bank, where Trump’s former atty Michael Cohen opened an account to pay off adult film star Stormy Daniels.

1/
bloomberg.com/news/newslette…Image
Image
Image
Image
The details around the bank activity have been widely reported, but many of the underlying financial documents haven’t surfaced. And since cameras aren’t allowed in the courtroom, the public largely hasn’t seen the evidence at the center of the trial

2/
How I got these documents is kind of a long story. Five years ago, I filed a FOIA lawsuit against the FBI. It was for all the interview summaries – or ‘302s’ as they’re known – from key witnesses questioned during the Mueller probe

Since Cohen was a witness, I’m now in possession of 25-pages of his supplemental interview material

3/
Read 7 tweets
Jason Leopold Profile picture
Apr 7
A little backstory on this week's FOIA Files newsletter 🧵

Not long after Russia launched airstrikes in Ukraine in 2022, I started seeing tweets that said some of Russia’s targets were labs where Ukraine had secretly been developing bio weapons w/the help of the US govt
1/
The allegations seemed to be an obvious attempt to justify the invasion. They garnered thousands of retweets. Soon Fox News was amplifying the claims.

2/
The stories had a huge impact. One poll in late March of that year found that more than a quarter of Americans believed the US-Ukraine bioweapons theory.

3/
Read 9 tweets
Jason Leopold Profile picture
Apr 5
NEW FOIA Files newsletter is out with a SCOOP based on 2500 pages of docunents about how a Defense Dept office struggled to fend off a "Russian lie" related to biolabs in Ukraine after the February 2022 invasion

Read & subscribe!
🧵
bloomberg.com/news/newslette…
Image
The documents provide a rare behind-the-scenes look into an escalating disinformation war during a critical two-month period after the Ukraine invasion

It took me more than a year to liberate these records from the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, the division that was targeted by Russia's disinformation campaign

2/
One name that stands out prominently in the cache is Robert Pope, the director of DTRA’s Cooperative Threat Reduction program. Pope said he’d suspected that his agency would eventually wind up in Russia’s crosshairs.

3/ Image
Read 13 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!

This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

Send Email!

:(