'This is insane': Watchdog group stunned by details in Mar-a-Lago search warrant
Multiple news outlets that reviewed the warrant authorizing a federal search of Mar-a-Lago reported Friday that former President Donald Trump is being investigated for potential violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction of justice, and unlawful removal of government records.
"This is insane. If you're not fed up, you're not paying enough attention," tweeted the advocacy group Public Citizen in response to the Espionage Act revelation.
Some reports about the warrant and an inventory of what agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation removed from the Florida residence—including from Breitbart, Fox News, and The Wall Street Journal—came before a federal judge's 3:00 pm ET deadline for Trump's legal team to respond to a U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) request to unseal the documents.
Trump made clear in social media posts and a legal filing that he did not oppose making the documents public, which led government attorneys to request that the court do so. As details of the leaked materials circulated Friday afternoon, U.S. Judge Bruce Reinhart ordered the official release.
As Charlie Savage at The New York Times summarized:
The search warrant for Trump's residence cited three criminal laws, all from Title 18 of the United States Code. Section 793, better known as the Espionage Act, which covers the unlawful retention of defense-related information that could harm the United States or aid a foreign adversary; Section 1519, which covers destroying or concealing documents to obstruct government investigations or administrative proceedings; and Section 2071, which covers the unlawful removal of government records. Notably, none of those laws turn on whether information was deemed to be unclassified.According to Politico, a receipt accompanying the warrant "shows that Trump possessed documents including a handwritten note; documents marked with 'TS/SCI,' which indicate one of the highest levels of government classification; and another item labeled 'Info re: President of France.'"
Details of the search warrant and inventory followed reporting by The Washington Post late Thursday that FBI agents were attempting to recover classified nuclear weapons documents from Trump's home on Monday.
Read More Here: https://www.politico.com/news/2022/08/12/search-warrant-shows-trump-under-investigation-for-potential-obstruction-of-justice-espionage-act-violations-00051507Inventory shows FBI took 11 sets of classified documents out of Mar-a-Lago: report
During their search of the Donald Trump's Palm Beach resort this week, FBI agents recovered 11 sets of classified documents, including some marked as top secret and meant to "be only available in special government facilities," the Wall Street Journal reports.
Around 20 boxes of items, binders of photos, a handwritten note and the executive grant of clemency for Mr. Trump’s ally Roger Stone, were on a list of confiscated items that was reviewed by the newspaper. Also on the three-page list was information about the “President of France."
One set of documents recovered was marked, “Various classified/TS/SCI documents,” which, as the Wall Street Journal points out, is an abbreviation that refers to "top-secret/sensitive compartmented information."
The search warrant states that that FBI agents wanted to search “the 45 Office,” as well as “all storage rooms and all other rooms or areas within the premises used or available to be used by [the former president] and his staff and in which boxes or documents could be stored, including all structures or buildings on the estate.”
People familiar with the matter say the search was intended to recover classified information that Trump allegedly mishandled.
Officials were poised Friday to make public a sealed warrant explaining the unprecedented raid on Trump's estate, which triggered accusations of political persecution by the former president and his supporters.
The 76-year-old Trump supported the release of the search warrant, although he has had a copy of the document for days and could have revealed its contents himself previously.
The search on Monday was believed to be focused on classified papers Trump may have removed from the White House, with one report suggesting they included documents related to nuclear weapons.
The highly unusual move to unseal the search warrant and the receipt listing the property seized by FBI agents was announced by Attorney General Merrick Garland -- the country's top law enforcement officer -- who said he had "personally approved" the dramatic raid on Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort home.
"Release the documents now!" Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform, as he slammed the raid on his home as a "political weaponization of law enforcement."
Andrew Weissmann, a former Justice Department official, said Garland had "called Trump's bluff" by putting the onus on the former president to object or consent to release of the document.
Read More Here: https://www.wsj.com/articles/fbi-recovered-eleven-sets-of-classified-documents-in-trump-search-inventory-shows-11660324501Trump repeats three debunked defenses after search warrant revealed
Unable to post on Twitter following his lifetime suspension for inciting Jan. 6 violence, former President Donald Trump took to his Truth Social website to respond after The Wall Street Journal and other conservative outlets obtained copies of the Mar-a-Lago search warrant and property receipt.
"FBI agents who searched former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home Monday removed 11 sets of classified documents, including some marked as top secret and meant to be only available in special government facilities, according to documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. The Federal Bureau of Investigation agents took around 20 boxes of items, binders of photos, a handwritten note and the executive grant of clemency for Mr. Trump’s ally Roger Stone, a list of items removed from the property shows. Also included in the list was information about the 'President of France,' according to the three-page list," the newspaper reported.
Trump responded by repeating debunked talking points.
"Number one, it was all declassified," Trump claimed.
But it has been reported that some documents concern nuclear weapons and Trump does not have the power to unilaterally declassify such documents. The second is that if the documents were still marked classified, it would still be a crime to possess them.
In its article about the search warrant, The Journal reported, "The list includes references to one set of documents marked as 'Various classified/TS/SCI documents,' an abbreviation that refers to top-secret/sensitive compartmented information. It also says agents collected four sets of top secret documents, three sets of secret documents, and three sets of confidential documents."
Trump also claimed the FBI "didn’t need to 'seize' anything. They could have had it anytime they wanted without playing politics and breaking into Mar-a-Lago," Trump said, referring to a valid search warrant as a robbery.
That argument appears undermined by reporting that the DOJ served a subpoena months ago but still reportedly left with 11 sets of classified documents.
"All they had to do was ask," Trump still argued, in all capital letters.
Trump then cited former President Barack Obama.
"The bigger problem is, what are they going to do with the 33 million pages of documents, many of which are classified, that President Obama took to Chicago?" Trump asked.
But the federal government debunked Trump's conspiracy theory in a statement released Friday.
"The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) assumed exclusive legal and physical custody of Obama presidential records when President Barack Obama left office in 2017, in accordance with the Presidential Records Act (PRA)," the agency said.
"NARA moved approximately 30 million pages of unclassified records to a NARA facility in the Chicago area where they are maintained exclusively by NARA. Additionally, NARA maintains the classified Obama Presidential records in a NARA facility in the Washington, DC, area," the agency explained. "As required by the PRA, former President Obama has no control over where and how NARA stores the Presidential records of his Administration."
AFPTrump could not have unilaterally declassified nuclear secrets — here's why
While it is still not known what information the FBI seized in its search of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort, some of the former president's defenders have already started claiming that Trump could have simply declared all of the information he took declassified right before leaving office.
While the president does have very broad declassification powers, that defense would not hold up at all if the documents in question involved nuclear weapons.
As The Atlantic's Graeme Wood explains, American presidents cannot simply declassify nuclear-related information with the wave of a hand as they might be able to do with other classified information.
"The Atomic Energy Acts of 1946 and 1954 produced an even stranger category of classified knowledge," he writes. "Anything related to the production or use of nuclear weapons and nuclear power is inherently classified, and Trump could utter whatever words he pleased yet still be in possession of classified material."
This means that any classification related to nuclear weapons would have to go through a formal process with oversight from other agencies and not just be subject to the president's will.
"The restrictions on documents of this type are incredibly tight," Wood notes. "If Trump was keeping nuclear secrets in the storeroom of his country club, without even the benefit of a padlock, and resisted attempts to secure those secrets against infiltrators and spies, a prosecutor might reasonably take more interest."
AFP
