Guardsman Jack Teixeira Cites Trump’s Treatment in Seeking Release in Leak Case

Lawyers for the Air National Guardsman charged with leaking classified intelligence information say he should be afforded the same pretrial privileges as a higher-profile defendant also facing charges of mishandling sensitive documents: former President Donald Trump.

Jack Teixeira, 21 years old, is currently awaiting trial in jail, ordered to remain there by a federal judge in Massachusetts who agreed with prosecutors that he posed a flight and national-security risk if released. Meanwhile, Trump is traveling the country campaigning as the Republican front-runner for president. 

Teixeira’s lawyers argued in a Monday court filing that he should be free just like Trump, who was indicted in June on charges that he illegally retained and shared classified national-security documents after leaving the White House. Both Teixeira and Trump have pleaded not guilty.

“The disparate approach to pretrial release in these cases exposes that the government’s argument for Mr. Teixeira’s detention…is illusory,” the lawyers wrote. 

Some legal experts have warned that defendants would cite Trump’s treatment in their own cases. Special counsel Jack Smith has been taking a careful approach to the unprecedented case against a former president and current presidential candidate. The government charged him with 37 felony counts but deferred to Trump’s legal team in ways that are unusual compared with how the Justice Department treats most federal criminal defendants facing similar charges. 

Prosecutors, for example, didn’t seek to have Trump detained and requested few restrictions on his release, allowing him to travel and keep his passport. By then, of course, Trump was a declared candidate, and the front-runner, for the Republican 2024 presidential nomination. A judge allowed him to remain free during the court proceedings—and the campaign.

Trump’s personal aide, Walt Nauta, who was charged alongside him, was also released on his own recognizance. He, too, has pleaded not guilty.

Spokesmen for Smith and Trump didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment. 

Teixeira was arrested in April on charges that he took and shared the material on an internet message group, a breach that sent the U.S. government scrambling to protect its secrets. In seeking his continued detention, prosecutor argued that foreign governments could be interested in what Teixeira knows and might help him flee the country, overcoming the typically high bar for keeping a defendant detained before trial. 

His lawyers argued Monday that Trump and Nauta had access to far more sensitive national-security secrets that would be “invaluable to any foreign adversary,” yet the government “advocated for their release on personal recognizance and without restriction.”

Unlike Teixeira, they continued, Trump and Nauta “possess extraordinary means to flee the United States with Trump’s properties in several countries and his access to a private plane.”

“Yet, the risk of flight posed by their knowledge of national security information, and their abnormal ability to flee, didn’t even result in a request that either surrender their passport,” the lawyers wrote.  

—Jon Kamp contributed to this article.

Write to Sadie Gurman at [email protected]