Former President Donald Trump allegedly discussed information with a foreign billionaire at Mar-a-Lago shortly after he left office in 2021 involving potentially sensitive material about the capabilities of the U.S.’ most advanced nuclear submarines.
ABC News reported that federal law enforcement officials with Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation have interviewed the Australian billionaire — 63-year-old Anthony Pratt, who runs a packaging company and who is a member at Mar-a-Lago — at least two times about what Trump allegedly told him.
Pratt told investigators that Trump made the disclosures during a conversation that the two were having at Mar-a-Lago in April 2021 when Pratt told Trump that he wanted Australia to purchase submarines for its Navy from the United States, the report said. Pratt said that it was at this moment when Trump allegedly told him in a discreet manner the exact number of nuclear warheads that U.S. submarines can carry and how closely they are able to get to Russian submarines without being detected. Pratt said that the former president did not show him any documents — something Trump has been accused of doing in a federal indictment with authors and one of his top campaign officials.
The New York Times reported that Pratt is one of at least 80 people that the special counsel’s office has identified as a potential witness who could testify against Trump at trial.
Information about how many Trident II D5 ballistic missiles that each U.S. submarine can carry is publicly known — what is not precisely known is how many nuclear warheads are on each missile. There also does not appear to be any precise publicly available information about just how close the submarines can get to hostile submarines without being detected.
After being told the information, Pratt then allegedly told at least 45 other people about what Trump had disclosed to him, including multiple journalists, nearly a dozen people at his company, ten Australian government officials, and three former Australian prime ministers, the report said.
Investigators asked Pratt to no longer tell other people the specific numbers that Trump told him. While there was no indication of whether the information that Trump told Pratt was accurate, the fact that investigators asked him to no longer share the information with others suggested that it could be potentially classified.
A spokesperson for the former president slammed ABC News’ report as an “illegal leak” coming from “sources which totally lack proper context and relevant information.”
“The Department of Justice should investigate the criminal leaking, instead of perpetrating their baseless witch-hunts while knowing that President Trump did nothing wrong, has always insisted on truth and transparency, and acted in a proper manner, according to the law,” the spokesperson said.
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