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Trump aide Walt Nauta also indicted in classified documents case

Trump announced a new legal team, and Aileen Cannon was assigned to oversee the case initially.
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WASHINGTON — Walt Nauta, an aide to Donald Trump, has been indicted on federal criminal charges connected to the former president's alleged mishandling of classified documents.

Nauta was hit with six charges including conspiracy to obstruct, withholding a document or record and scheme to conceal, according to the federal indictment that was unsealed Friday afternoon.

Nauta, Trump's butler and body man — whose legal bills are being paid by a Trump political organization — had come under scrutiny by investigators over his shifting accounts of whether he moved boxes of documents at the former president’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida at his urging.

An attorney for Nauta declined to comment to NBC News about Trump's post.

The charges against Nauta, a Naval veteran, were the latest in a flurry of developments cascading from the history-making news Thursday night that a federal grand jury had indicted the former president on seven criminal charges connected to his handling of classified documents discovered last year at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.

The grand jury’s charging decision is the culmination of a months-long Justice Department investigation led by special counsel Jack Smith, who was appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland. Smith is scheduled to speak at 3 p.m. ET in Washington.

The charges make the twice-impeached former commander-in-chief the first former president to ever face federal criminal charges.

Who is Walt Nauta?

This historic federal indictment links Trump, one of the world's most famous and at times, powerful, men, and Nauta, his 40-year-old aide who served his country and a president without much public attention until the alleged conspiracy came to light. 

Waltine Torres Nauta, Jr. enlisted in the U.S. Navy and served for 20 years. Born and raised in Guam, Nauta reached the Navy’s rank of “senior chief culinary specialist” and worked at the White House as part of the Presidential Food Service which is a section within the White House Military Office. 

These sailors run the Navy Mess and provide for food service needs on the White House campus, at Camp David and when the president travels. During Trump's presidency, Nauta was chosen to serve as one of two military valets who had close and direct daily contact with Trump for his personal needs like meals in the Oval Office and organizing his clothing for travel, a former senior Trump aide told NBC News. (The White House Executive Residence also employs butlers who provide similar services and tasks, but are not military.)

When Trump left the White House, Nauta was part of the post-presidency transition, serving for another six months while still in the Navy. Trump indicated in a social media post that at some point, Nauta "retired" from military service and “then transitioned into private life as a personal aide.”  

Federal Election Commission records show that beginning in August 2021, Nauta was paid by Trump's “Save America PAC,” compensation that included salary, travel expense reimbursement and bonus. He later appeared on Trump's 2024 campaign payroll. He has remained on the payroll in 2023. It is unclear if he received any funds from 45 Office, Trump's official post-presidency office. 

Nauta has been seen traveling with the former president for many public trips, campaign stops and at Mar-a-Lago events. 

According to the indictment, Nauta was among the people, including Trump himself, who “packed items” from the White House for shipment to Florida. 

It also details how the former president had instructed “Walt” about his preferred location for boxes of papers. Nauta, the indictment alleges, discovered that some boxes with classified materials had fallen and the contents had spilled out in the storage room. 

The indictment also alleges that Nauta and another aide moved boxes from storage to the Trump residence for him to review.

According to text messages cited in the indictment, Nauta indicated that he was aware that the former president was going through the materials in his residence, writing at point that Trump “knocked out two boxes yesterday.” Prosecutors allege that Nauta made false statements denying knowledge of the boxes and moved dozens of boxes at the former president’s direction after it was clear that the National Archives was seeking the return of government records.

The FBI interview Nauta gave, the indictment makes clear, was voluntary, and he was represented by counsel. The indictment also contends that Trump directed many of Nauta’s actions.

Trump legal team shake up

Trump said Thursday night that his attorneys were informed that he has been indicted in the special counsel’s investigation into his handling of classified documents. A source familiar with the matter said Trump had received a summons to appear in U.S. District Court on Tuesday.

Hours after that news broke, Trump, on Friday morning, shook up his legal team, shedding a pair of attorneys who'd so far represented the ex-commander-in-chief through the investigation.

In posts to his Truth Social platform, Trump continued to rail against the charges and announced that attorneys Jim Trusty and John Rowley were no longer representing him. Trusty appeared on NBC News on Friday morning to defend Trump. Both lawyers said they had tendered their resignations in a statement.

“For purposes of fighting the Greatest Witch Hunt of all time, now moving to the Florida Courts, I will be represented by Todd Blanche, Esq., and a firm to be named later,” Trump wrote. “I want to thank Jim Trusty and John Rowley for their work, but they were up against a very dishonest, corrupt, evil, and sick’ group of people.”

Former President Donald Trump  speaks with reporters on his plane after a campaign rally in Waco, Texas, on March 25, 2023.
Former President Donald Trump announced Thursday that he is under federal indictment in connection with a classified documents investigation. Evan Vucci / AP file

Trump added that he would be “announcing additional lawyers in the coming days.”

That announcement came just after news emerged that the case against him would be overseen — initially — by a federal judge he appointed who’d come under criticism by a higher court for ruling in his favor on a series of issues earlier in the investigation.

Trump’s case was assigned Friday to U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, two sources familiar with the situation told NBC News.

Last year, Cannon, during the earliest stages of the federal investigation into the ex-president’s handling of classified documents, granted his request to have a special master review all the evidence seized from his Mar-a-Lago estate.

Her September 2022 decision to appoint the special master temporarily blocked parts of the Justice Department’s investigation into the trove of top secret and classified documents retrieved by federal agents from the former president’s South Florida residence.

The decision by Cannon, whom Trump appointed to the bench in 2020, sparked immediate criticism from legal experts and, three months later, was dismissed by a federal appeals court, which ruled that Cannon’s decision had been incorrect and lifted the restrictions on the probe, allowing investigators to proceed more quickly.

The charges, the second time Trump has been indicted since he left office, focus on how he handled some of the country’s most sensitive secrets as he was leaving the White House.

Two sources briefed on the seven charges said the indictment includes false statements and conspiracy to obstruct. All charges are related to retaining documents and obstructing justice. The number of counts remains unknown.

After Trump left office, the federal government attempted, multiple times, to obtain files he had kept from his time in the White House, providing him and his legal team several opportunities to hand them over. The government eventually seized more than 11,000 pages of government documents from Mar-a-Lago, including more than 100 classified documents, after Trump’s team attested that it had done a thorough search for classified documents at the location.