FBI search of Mar-a-Lago

Evidence seized, arrayed, and photographed by the FBI at Mar-a-Lago

On August 8, 2022, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) executed a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago, the residence of former U.S. president Donald Trump in Palm Beach, Florida.

The search warrant application was authorized by U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland and approved by Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart, following a criminal referral by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). The order, unsealed a few days after the search, showed that the FBI obtained the search warrant as part of an investigation into Trump relating to three federal criminal statutes:

• violations of the Espionage Act regarding unauthorized retention of national defense information;
• destroying or concealing records "with the intent to impede obstruct or influence" federal government activity;
• illegal removal or destruction of federal government records (without respect to cause).

Later, courts made public a heavily redacted version of the affidavit explaining the FBI's goals in this search and a detailed list of what the FBI seized.

In 2021, NARA tried to recover material, and Trump went through the material in his possession at the end of that year. Surveillance footage subpoenaed by the Justice Department in June 2022 showed boxes were moved in and out of a storage room at some point. The Justice Department said the classified documents at Mar-a-Lago were likely "concealed and removed" to block investigation.

Over 13,000 government documents were recovered. They included nuclear-related information and FBI, CIA, and NSA information about national security interests. Of these documents, 325 were classified: 184 handed over in January 2022, 38 turned over under subpoena in June 2022, and 103 seized in the August search of Mar-a-Lago.

Background

Handling, storage, and disposition of U.S. government records

See also: Donald Trump § Post-presidential investigations

The Presidential Records Act (44 U.S.C. ch. 22) establishes that presidential records belong to the United States and must be surrendered to the Archivist of the United States at the end of a president's term of office (or second term of office, if consecutive). Unauthorized removal and retention of classified information of the United States government is a criminal offense under U.S. federal law; it has been a felony since the enactment of the FISA Amendments Reauthorization Act of 2017, which was signed into law by President Donald Trump in January 2018 and increased the maximum term of imprisonment for this offense from one year to five years.

Criminal laws listed on search warrant

See also: Espionage Act of 1917 and Sarbanes–Oxley Act

The search warrant and accompanying affidavit listed three federal criminal statutes as the basis of the investigation: "18 U.S.C. §§ 793, 2071, [and] 1519". The Sections cited are:

• § 793, enacted as part of the Espionage Act of 1917, makes the unauthorized retention or disclosure of documents related to national defense, which could be used to harm the United States or aid a foreign adversary, a crime. The maximum penalty is 10 years in prison. The Espionage Act was passed before the development of the modern classification system of the United States government, and thus does not refer to the classification status of the documents; unclassified "national defense information" would still be covered under the Espionage Act. As noted by the Congressional Research Service, the "affidavit supporting the warrant focuses on subsection (e), which applies when an individual is in unauthorized possession of certain national defense information".
• § 2071 criminalizes the theft or destruction of government records, regardless of their relevance to national security. The maximum penalty is 10 years in prison.
• § 1519, enacted as part of the Sarbanes–Oxley Act, criminalizes the act of destroying or concealing documents or records, regardless of their relevance to national security, "with the intent to impede, obstruct or influence the investigation or proper administration of any matter" within the jurisdiction of any federal department or agency. The maximum penalty is 20 years in prison.

Classified material and the presidency

See also: Classified information in the United States and Special access program

Beginning in 1940, U.S. presidents have used the constitutional and statutory powers of the president of the United States to create classification systems through executive orders. The Code of Federal Regulations contains rules for classified material as 32 CFR 2001.

Generally, the president and the United States National Security Council set information security policy such as the sharing and classification of information. The day-to-day oversight of the government-wide classification system is handled by the Information Security Oversight Office (ISOO), a component of the National Archives.

Declassification, presidential powers and regulations

Since the 1988 Supreme Court decision in Department of the Navy v. Egan, there is consensus that a sitting president has broad Constitutional powers to classify (and declassify) information. However, there are procedures for doing so. Following former President Trump's claims that the documents found at Mar-a-Lago had been declassified, the Congressional Research Service issued a policy paper in August 2022 highlighting relevant regulations: per 32 CFR 2001.25, the declassification process requires markings "uniformly and conspicuously applied to leave no doubt about the declassified status of the information and who authorized the declassification".

In 2003, Scooter Libby, former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, claimed to have received a direct but unrecorded disclosure order from President George W. Bush and Cheney to leak classified information to reporters. In what became known as the Plame affair, Libby was ultimately not charged for releasing classified information. Steven Aftergood, a critic of U.S. government secrecy policy, said the case "highlights the fact that the president purports to, or does, stand outside of the classification system".

Protocols for loss or compromise of classified material

Federal regulations require that "any person who has knowledge that classified information has been or may have been lost, possibly compromised or disclosed to an unauthorized person(s) shall immediately report the circumstances to an official designated for this purpose." Regulations also require notification of the Director of the ISOO if the specific classified information could attract "significant public attention", if the information in question is voluminous, or if a key vulnerability has been exposed. The Department of Justice is also to be consulted if criminality is suspected.

Trump's handling of U.S. government records during his term in office

See also: Donald Trump's disclosures of classified information and National Archives and Records Administration § Trump administration

During his term in office, Trump's attitude toward and handling of classified information had worried U.S. federal intelligence officials. His behavior led to mistrust in intelligence and law enforcement agencies who were also alarmed by Trump's mixing with guests during his frequent trips to Mar-a-Lago, viewing the practice as "ripe to be exploited by a foreign spy service eager for access to the epicenter of American power".

In December 2019, Trump spoke to Washington Post journalist Bob Woodward privately in the Oval Office. Trump showed a photograph of himself with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un, telling Woodward: "This is me and him. That’s the line, right? Then I walked over the line. Pretty cool." Trump also showed Woodward letters that Kim had written to him, which the U.S. government had classified, adding: "And don’t say I gave them to you, okay?" Woodward dictated the letters into his tape recorder, and in 2020, CNN published a transcript of two of these letters.

In 2021, Trump reportedly told close associates that he regarded some presidential documents, such as the correspondence with Kim, to be his personal property.

Destruction of presidential records

Trump regularly shredded "both sensitive and mundane" papers while at the White House, at Mar-a-Lago, and on Air Force One, despite repeated admonishments from at least two of his chiefs of staff and from White House counsel. His aides had developed special practices and protocols early in his presidency to retrieve the piles of torn paper and attempt to tape documents back together with the help of staffers from the Office of the Staff Secretary or the Oval Office Operations team.

Not all materials were recovered; Trump White House staffers frequently used "burn bags" to destroy documents. On at least two occasions, Trump allegedly flushed documents down the toilet at the White House residence.

Departure from office

Trump's presidential term ended at noon on January 20, 2021. His departure from the White House was "rushed and chaotic". In the last weeks of the Trump presidency, White House staff quit and aides resigned, leaving an increasing amount of work to a decreasing number of staff. A former Trump aide said they were "30 days behind what a typical administration would be", with White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and Trump taking little interest in the preservation of presidential records. The Wall Street Journal quoted a former aide as saying: "If you only start packing with two days left to go, you're just running low on time. And if he's the one just throwing things in boxes, who knows what could happen?"

The day before he left office, Trump designated seven senior Trump administration officials, including Meadows, White House counsel Pat Cipollone, and Deputy White House Counsel Patrick F. Philbin, "as his representatives to handle all future requests for presidential records" for compliance with the Presidential Records Act. Trump subsequently notified NARA to add Kash Patel, a former Trump administration official, and journalist John Solomon as "representatives for access to Presidential records of my administration".

Post-presidency

The US head of state does not hold a formal security clearance, and is neither "read in" or "read out" of classified matters, but according to former chief of staff John F. Kelly, Trump should have received an exit briefing "in some hopes that he would not violate all these rules on classified materials. The important message would have been, 'Once you're not the president anymore, all the rules apply to you'".

At the beginning of his term in office, President Joe Biden barred Trump from receiving the courtesy intelligence briefings traditionally given to former presidents, citing Trump's "erratic behavior". This is the first time a former president's access to the classified briefings has been denied.

Events leading to the search

NARA actions to retrieve presidential records from Mar-a-Lago

By May 2021, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), the federal agency that preserves government records, had realized they were missing the correspondence sent from North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un to Trump. They also knew they were missing other presidential documents like the altered Hurricane Dorian map. NARA contacted Trump's representatives. On May 6, NARA emailed Trump's lawyers with the request for their "immediate assistance" to return the Kim letters along with "roughly two dozen" boxes that were in Trump's White House residence during the final days of his presidency and that were sent to Florida, although Cipollone had determined they should have been sent to NARA. In June 2021, NARA instructed a former lawyer in Trump's White House counsel's office to send them the Kim letters via FedEx. Amid continued negotiations between NARA and Trump's lawyers, Trump reportedly went through the boxes at Mar-a-Lago at the end of 2021.

In January 2022, NARA retrieved 15 boxes of documents, gifts, and other government property from Mar-a-Lago that should have been transferred to NARA at the end of Trump's term. The boxes included documents from the CIA, the FBI, and the National Security Agency on a variety of topics of national security interest. Archivists and federal agents determined that 184 unique documents (totaling 700 pages) had classification markings, of which 25 documents were marked "top secret", 92 "secret" and 67 "confidential". This material included:

• "sensitive national security information", including signals intelligence and the Kim letters
• documents governed by special access programs (SAP), a type of protocol reserved for extremely sensitive U.S. operations conducted abroad, intended to significantly limit access to the information
• documents marked as "HCS, FISA, ORCON, NOFORN, and SI"

The documents were stored in a sensitive compartmented information facility (SCIF) while DOJ officials considered how to proceed.

Trump's statement regarding return of records to NARA

According to The Washington Post, Trump attorney Alex Cannon helped to facilitate transfer of the 15 boxes of presidential records to the National Archives. Trump then dictated a statement he wanted to be released, stating that "everything" requested by NARA had been returned, and told Cannon to send a similar statement to NARA. Cannon declined because he was not sure all requested material had been returned, and a different statement was released three days later, saying that "[t]he papers were given easily and without conflict and on a very friendly basis". On February 8, NARA lawyer Gary Stern told colleagues that Cannon had told him he was unsure whether all relevant documents had been turned over.

FBI/DOJ launches criminal investigation and issues subpoenas

May 10, 2022, letter, from Debra Steidel Wall, Acting Archivist of the United States, to M. Evan Corcoran, attorney for former president Donald J. Trump.

On February 9, 2022, the National Archives sent a criminal referral to the Department of Justice (DOJ). Following an initial review, the DOJ opened a criminal investigation and initiated a grand jury process in April 2022. The same month, the DOJ instructed NARA not to share further details about the materials recovered from Mar-a-Lago with the House Oversight Committee, indicating that the FBI had opened a criminal investigation. The FBI interviewed Trump administration officials and aides at Mar-a-Lago about the handling of presidential records, including former White House Counsel Pat Cipollone and his former deputy Patrick Philbin.

Tom Fitton, president of activist group Judicial Watch, advised Trump in February 2022 not to give any more records to NARA. As justification, Fitton cited a 2012 case in which a federal judge said that NARA had no authority to designate materials as "presidential records" nor did it have the right to seize materials. That case concerned audio tapes of historian Taylor Branch privately interviewing his friend, Bill Clinton, during Clinton's presidency. Though NARA had previously said the tapes were private property, Judicial Watch demanded NARA seize the tapes and hand them over to Judicial Watch. The judge dismissed the lawsuit.

On April 12, 2022, NARA said it would let the FBI access the documents retrieved from Mar-a-Lago. Trump's lawyers sought to delay this outcome. On May 10, Debra Steidel Wall, the acting Archivist of the United States, wrote Trump's attorney M. Evan Corcoran to reiterate that Trump had taken hundreds of pages of classified materials with him, including highly classified Special Access Programs materials, and that their extended negotiations over alleged executive privilege was delaying investigations and threat assessments already underway. She said that based on legal counsel she had decided not to honor their request for further delays. An ally of Trump made the letter public on August 22. When NARA provided the FBI with access to the records it retrieved, the FBI provided copies to individual agencies of the US Intelligence Community to conduct classification reviews and determine whether their disclosure could put at risk sensitive sources.

On May 11, the DOJ subpoenaed Trump for "any and all documents or writings in the custody or control of Donald J. Trump and/or the Office of Donald J. Trump bearing classification markings". Trump's advisers repeatedly urged him to fully comply with the subpoena, despite his desire to keep some documents. According to The New York Times, Trump told his advisers in the spring of 2022 that he had returned all government records and did not want to discuss the matter further. On May 12, the DOJ issued a grand jury subpoena to the National Archives for the classified documents they had provided to the House select committee investigating the January 6 United States Capitol attack.

After the subpoena was issued, "Walt" (Waltine) Nauta, a former Navy sailor who served as a White House valet and personal aide to Trump at Mar-a-Lago, was recorded on Mar-a-Lago security cameras and seen to have been moving boxes from a storage room to Trump's private residence, claiming it was at Trump's request. He has reportedly spoken with the FBI.

Investigators from the DOJ and the FBI met with Trump's attorneys at Mar-a-Lago on June 3 about the classified material that was subpoenaed on May 11. One of those lawyers gave the agents 38 classified documents with HCS, SI and FISA markings in "a single Redweld envelope, double-wrapped in tape". During this visit, however, FBI agents noticed over 50 boxes in the storage room but were prohibited from looking inside the boxes. With the help of an informant, the DOJ came to believe that more classified documents remained on the premises.

During the June 3 meeting, Trump's custodian of records, Christina Bobb, gave the DOJ a signed declaration that had been drafted by Trump attorney Evan Corcoran, attesting that all classified material had been returned. Two months later, after the falsehood came to light, The New York Times reported that the signed declaration possibly indicated that Trump's legal team had not been forthright with federal investigators about the material.

On June 8, the FBI told Trump's team to better secure the storage area, so Trump aides added a padlock to the room. Less than two weeks later, Trump notified NARA to add Kash Patel, a former Trump administration official, and journalist John Solomon as "representatives for access to Presidential records of my administration." On June 24, the FBI served a subpoena (issued two days previously) to the Trump Organization for surveillance footage at Mar-a-Lago, including views from outside the storage room between January 10 and June 24. In response, on July 6, the Trump Organization provided a hard drive. The footage showed that boxes had been moved in and out of the room after one instance when the Justice Department had been in contact with Trump's representatives.

FBI/DOJ obtains search warrant from federal court

Federal agents established probable cause to obtain a search warrant against Trump because, while he had turned over some classified documents to federal authorities, agents suspected he was unlawfully withholding other classified information. The warrant was obtained by the Justice Department's National Security Division at the request of NARA to collect material that Trump had potentially not turned over to NARA. The New York Times reported: "Two people briefed on the classified documents that investigators believe remained at Mar-a-Lago indicated that they were so sensitive in nature, and related to national security, that the Justice Department had to act". However, Attorney General Merrick Garland had contemplated for weeks whether to approve the application for the search warrant, after many meetings between senior DOJ and FBI officials.

The search warrant showed that the FBI was investigating Trump for suspected violations of three Title 18 federal laws – , Section 793 (a part of the Espionage Act of 1917); Section 1519 (part of the fiscal oversight Sarbanes–Oxley Act); and Section 2071. Trump had not been charged with any crime. If charged and convicted under the third law, Trump would be "disqualified from holding any office under the United States". However, a number of legal scholars have questioned the constitutionality of that provision in the statute.

Federal magistrate judge Bruce Reinhart of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida approved the warrant on August 5, 2022. Reinhart, who has a reputation for being particularly careful, had previously been a federal prosecutor for a decade, was misidentified by some sources as being a Trump appointee, but the position in fact is one filled by the courts themselves.

Reviewing and approving search warrants is a typical duty of federal magistrate judges. Legal experts noted that, given the high profile of the operation, the application for a search warrant (granted on probable cause) would have been first scrupulously scrutinized by federal authorities. Will Hurd, a former CIA agent and former Texas Republican congressman, said: "Trump and his lawyers admitted to and then handed over presidential documents improperly taken from and stored outside the White House. Of course the FBI had probable cause to go in looking for more".

Search of Mar-a-Lago

Classified cover sheets and documents found and photographed in the search of Mar-a-Lago. White areas are redactions.

On August 8, 2022, at 9 a.m., FBI agents searched Trump's residence at Mar-a-Lago for the material specified in a warrant, including classified material. The material pertained to special access programs according to The New York Times and – according to The Washington Post – nuclear weapons. The FBI notified the Secret Service of the search a few hours in advance. The Secret Service facilitated the FBI's access to Mar-a-Lago, but did not participate in the search.

Trump's son Eric Trump said on Fox News that he received a call about the search and informed his father shortly thereafter. Two of Trump's lawyers, Christina Bobb and Lindsey Halligan, were present for the search but were not allowed inside. Trump and his family watched most of the FBI search from New York remotely via a live video feed transmitted from Mar-a-Lago's system of security cameras. Trump and his attorneys refused the FBI's requests to turn off the cameras. Eric Trump later said that his family would release the footage "at the right time".

FBI agents conducted the search using "taint teams" to ensure that no privileged correspondence between Trump and his lawyers were removed. The New York Times reported the FBI agents "carried out the search in a relatively low-key manner" and intentionally did not wear the usual navy-blue agency jackets. FBI agents searched a storage unit in the basement, where they broke through the newly installed padlock. They further searched what was called Trump's "45 Office," where they opened a "hotel-style" safe containing "nothing of consequence", and finally Trump's residence. Classified documents were also recovered from unsecured locations, and were found outside of the locked storage room. In accordance with the usual procedure for executing search warrants, the FBI provided Trump's counsel with a copy of the warrant and a detailed three-page manifest, called a property receipt, which listed the inventory of seized records. The FBI agents left the property around 6:30 p.m. with the boxes.

Peter Schorsch, the publisher of FloridaPolitics.com, was the first to report on the event. Trump also publicly acknowledged the search.

The FBI afterwards issued another subpoena for surveillance video from Mar-a-Lago for the weeks leading up to the search, suggesting Trump may still be withholding additional government documents.

Release of search warrant, property receipt, and affidavit

Release of search warrant and property receipt

The August 12, 2022, order to unseal along with the unsealed search and seizure warrant, and property receipt.

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland announcing the DOJ motion to unseal the search warrant.

In keeping with longstanding DOJ reticence to comment on ongoing investigations, as well as the tight limits Attorney General Merrick Garland placed on such public statements, the government did not initially comment on the search.

While the DOJ remained silent, a person close to Trump contacted a DOJ official to send a message from Trump to Garland. Trump wanted Garland to know that people around the country were angered by the search and what Trump could do to "reduce the heat".

On August 11, the DOJ filed a motion in court to unseal the search warrant and property receipt, unless Trump objected to making them public. On the same day, Garland held a press conference, in which he said that the department had filed a motion to unseal the warrant and the property receipt "in light of the former president's public confirmation of the search, the surrounding circumstances, and the substantial public interest in this matter", and that he had personally approved the decision to seek the search warrant. Garland also said that "upholding the rule of law means applying the law evenly, without fear or favor" and criticized "recent unfounded attacks on the professionalism of the FBI and Justice Department agents and prosecutors".

Trump later said on social media that he supported the release of the warrant and related documents, though he declined to release them himself, and his legal team agreed that the court should release them. The search warrant and property receipt were unsealed (made publicly available) on the afternoon of August 12, with the signatures of two FBI agents redacted.

Seized materials

FBI agents seized over 13,000 government documents, among which they found 103 classified government documents. Documents and empty folders with classified markings were found both in the basement storage room and in Trump's 45 Office. The classified material was grouped into 11 sets. Of the classified material:

• 18 documents (grouped into five sets) were marked top secret, and one these sets had the control system protocol "top secret/SCI" (i.e., sensitive compartmented information).
• 54 documents (grouped into three sets) were marked secret.
• 31 documents (grouped into three sets) were marked confidential.

Some documents were related to Trump's pardon of his ally Roger Stone and some were related to the president of France. The property receipt, signed by Trump's attorney Christina Bobb at 6:19 p.m. at the end of the search, showed that Trump possessed documents marked "TS/SCI" and another item labeled "Info re: President of France".

During the search, one personal and two official passports belonging to Trump, the personal and one official one expired, were taken from a desk drawer in Trump's office and later returned to him. In an August 30 court filing, the DOJ noted that the passports were located in a desk drawer in Trump's office that "contained classified documents and governmental records commingled with other documents" and thus subject to the terms of the warrant.

Of the 13,000 documents seized, the Justice Department's filter team set aside 520 pages as potentially subject to attorney-client privilege.

On September 6, The Washington Post reported that some of the seized documents contained details of special-access programs requiring special clearances on a need-to-know basis that could only be granted by "the president, some members of his Cabinet or a near-Cabinet-level official". They would normally be kept in a "secure compartmented information facility, with a designated control officer to keep careful tabs on their location." One of the documents described "a foreign government's military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities". Topics included Iran's missile program and U.S. intelligence operations involving China.

Missing materials

On October 1, 2022, The Washington Post reported that, according to two unnamed sources, NARA had informed the House Oversight Committee that some presidential records had not been recovered. On October 6, The New York Times reported that, according to two unnamed sources, the Justice Department informed Trump's lawyers "in recent weeks" that Trump is still holding material.

Motions to release search warrant affidavit

Many newspapers and media organizations motioned to unseal the probable-cause affidavit which had been submitted to the judge on August 5 in support of the search warrant application.

In court filings, DOJ opposed the affidavit's release, writing that "this investigation implicates highly classified materials" and that disclosure would compromise the integrity of the criminal investigation and the cooperation of witnesses in the matter and "other high-profile investigations"; the DOJ also cited "widely reported threats made against law enforcement personnel in the wake of the August 8 search". The DOJ said that if the magistrate judge ordered the release of the affidavit, the necessary redactions would render the unsealed text "devoid of any meaningful context", saying the "redacted version would not serve any public interest". The DOJ requested the magistrate to instead unseal other information, including a cover sheet, the DOJ's August 5 motion to seal the warrant and the judge's sealing order of the same day.

On August 18, the federal magistrate judge held a hearing to discuss requests to unseal investigators' probable cause affidavit. Jay Bratt, head of the DOJ's counterintelligence division, said the investigation was in its "early stages". He argued that releasing the affidavit could reveal investigative techniques, jeopardize the identities of "several witnesses" from their specific accounts of events, as well as expose federal agents to threats. Bratt revealed that the affidavit contained "substantial grand jury information", including details about how "evidence of obstruction" would be found at Mar-a-Lago. Several media organizations asked the judge to unseal it with the necessary redactions, citing the public interest. The judge signalled that he planned to unseal portions of the affidavit and gave the DOJ a week to submit proposed redactions. Trump on social media repeatedly called for the release of the unredacted affidavit but his lawyers did not file a motion asking the court to do so.

Also on August 18, the magistrate judge unsealed several procedural documents related to the warrant affidavit, including the criminal cover sheet, a redacted copy of the August 5 warrant application, the DOJ's original motion to seal warrant documents, and the order granting the sealing request. The documents showed that the FBI was specifically investigating whether there was "willful retention of national defense information", concealment or removal of government records, and obstruction of a federal investigation.

In a 13-page order, released on August 22, the judge said he "carefully reviewed" the affidavit before approving the search warrant and was "satisfied that the facts sworn by the affiant are reliable". He said that the DOJ had shown a "compelling interest that overrides any public interest" in fully unsealing the affidavit. He indicated that he might agree with the DOJ that the necessary redactions would render the document useless. He rejected the DOJ's argument that partially unsealing the affidavit would set a dangerous precedent, highlighting the significance of this case. He requested the DOJ to submit proposed redactions and provide additional evidence and arguments within a week.

On August 25, the Justice Department submitted a legal brief proposing redactions to the affidavit. The brief was under seal, and multiple media companies requested the judge to unseal it, as well as direct the DOJ to make public any other sealed documents. The judge soon agreed to the proposed redactions and ordered the DOJ to release the redacted affidavit the following day. The judge's decision to release the affidavit was seen as surprising, because probable-cause affidavits are typically kept under seal (i.e., not made public) before charges are filed.

Release of redacted search warrant affidavit

The redacted search warrant affidavit, released on August 26, 2022.

The redacted search warrant affidavit, along with a redacted copy of the legal brief that justified redactions to the affidavit, were unsealed and made public on August 26. The New York Times, The Washington Post, and CNN released annotated versions of the search warrant affidavit as well.

The legal brief had argued that the DOJ's proposed redactions were necessary to protect the identities of cooperating witnesses and FBI agents who might otherwise be exposed to threats and retaliation, as well as to prevent obstruction of the investigation, protect privacy interests, protect grand jury information, and maintain the safety of law enforcement personnel.

The affidavit listed four main goals of the FBI investigation:

1. To "determine how the documents with classification markings and records were removed from the White House (or any other authorized location(s) for the storage of classified materials) and came to be stored at [Mar-a-Lago]";
2. To "determine whether the storage location(s) at [Mar-a-Lago] were authorized locations for the storage of classified information";
3. To "determine whether any additional classified documents or records may have been stored in an unauthorized location at [Mar-a-Lago] or another unknown location, and whether they remain at any such location";
4. And to "identify any person(s) who may have removed or retained classified information without authorization and/or in an unauthorized space".

The FBI said there was "probable cause to believe" that classified national security materials were improperly transferred to "unauthorized" locations at Mar-a-Lago, that materials relating to national defense or presidential records "subject to record retention requirements" still remained at Mar-a-Lago, and that "evidence of obstruction" would be found at Mar-a-Lago. The FBI noted that several of the seized documents contained Trump's "handwritten notes" and were "unfoldered, intermixed with other records, and otherwise unproperly [sic] identified".

The FBI attached to the affidavit a May 25 letter to the DOJ from Trump lawyer Evan Corcoran. In the letter, Corcoran argued against proceeding with a criminal investigation, saying that presidents have the "absolute authority" to declassify documents, although he did not clarify whether Trump had done so.

Special counsel investigation

On November 18, 2022, Garland appointed a special counsel, federal prosecutor Jack Smith, to oversee the federal criminal investigation.

Trump lawsuit

See also: FBI investigation into Donald Trump's handling of government documents § Court proceedings

On August 22, Trump filed a motion in the Southern District of Florida asking for, among other relief, the appointment of a special master to review all material seized for material not covered by the warrant or potentially privileged under attorney-client confidentiality or excluded under executive privilege. He also asked that the Justice Department provide a property receipt with more detail than the brief list that was handed to his lawyer when the search concluded. The case was assigned to District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee.

On August 23, Cannon ordered Trump's legal team to refine their arguments, asking them to explain how Trump is affected by the case before Judge Reinhart, what they want Judge Cannon to do about it, and why they believe she is empowered to do it.

Trump responded on August 26, asserting that the district judge had jurisdiction to appoint a special master. His court filing argued that the redacted affidavit "raise[d] more questions than answers" and "provides almost no information ... to understand why the raid took place, or what was taken from his home". Trump did not request immediate action from the judge or clarify what the special master should filter out. Trump's brief did not suggest he had any "standing order" to declassify materials, a defense he had initially proposed.

Trump's lawyers also cited a 1991 decision of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, regarding the powers of a sitting president. The court had ruled that while in office, the president has "virtually complete control" over the administration's records. Trump's lawyers claimed that this ruling further suggests the Presidential Records Act is not criminally enforceable. According to Politico, "there are complications with the Trump team's argument. The 1991 ruling did not discuss criminal enforcement of the Presidential Records Act or address the actions of former presidents ... the decision also offered no view on whether retaining White House records without authority might violate one of the laws the FBI and prosecutors did cite as the basis for the warrant: a broad prohibition on stealing, misusing or concealing government records".

On August 27, Judge Cannon said she was inclined to approve Trump's request. She asked the DOJ to provide the detailed property receipt Trump had requested as well as a status of any and all DOJ review of that material, including whether DOJ had filtered the documents for potentially privileged information. Legal experts believed Trump's demand for a special master was a strategic error, according to The New York Times.

DOJ filing about its review of materials

A three-page legal brief filed by the Justice Department on August 29 said that the review of seized materials had already been completed. It explained that the FBI filter team had finished their examination of documents, "identified a limited set of materials that potentially contain attorney-client privileged information", and were following relevant procedures to deal with privilege disputes. Criminal investigators would not be allowed to access or review such protected documents. According to The Washington Post, the Justice Department's acknowledgement of a completed document review process may "undercut the former president's efforts to have a special master appointed to review the files".

The DOJ also confirmed that they and the US intelligence community were conducting a classification review and damage assessment. They had been conducting a rolling review of the classified records taken from Mar-a-Lago since mid-May to determine their classification level and mitigate any immediate risk of the documents being held there. The filing also revealed that some of the recovered materials were so sensitive in nature that "FBI counterintelligence personnel and DOJ attorneys conducting the review required additional clearances before they were permitted to review certain documents".

DOJ response to request for special master

On August 30, the Department of Justice filed their response along with a detailed timeline of events leading up to the search. According to The New York Times, the 36-page filing "made clear that prosecutors are now unmistakably focused on the possibility that Mr. Trump and those around him took criminal steps to obstruct their investigation".

The DOJ stated that, when they were present in the storage room at Mar-a-Lago during the June 3 handover of classified documents, they "developed evidence that government records were likely concealed and removed from the Storage Room and that efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government's investigation". The DOJ stated that Trump's counsel or custodian had never asserted that Trump declassified the documents or asserted executive privilege over them, but rather "handled them in a manner that suggested counsel believed that the documents were classified: the production included a single Redweld envelope, double-wrapped in tape, containing the document". The DOJ claimed that Trump's lawyers "explicitly prohibited government personnel from opening or looking inside any of the boxes that remained in the storage room" to confirm whether classified documents remained there. Though Trump's lawyers certified they had conducted a "diligent search" following the May 11 subpoena to prepare to hand over all subpoenaed material on June 3, the DOJ said that the FBI's search on August 8 "cast serious doubt" on those claims.

The DOJ stated that Trump lacked standing over presidential records since they are considered government property under the Presidential Records Act. They urged the judge to reject Trump's executive privilege claims: “The former President cites no case – and the government is aware of none – in which executive privilege has been successfully invoked to prohibit the sharing of documents within the Executive Branch." The DOJ argued that appointing a special master was "unnecessary" and would impede the ongoing criminal investigation and delay the intelligence community's classification review.

The DOJ attached a photo of a spread of classified documents laid out on the floor as evidence. Multiple red and yellow cover sheets bore classified markings of “Top Secret,” “Secret” and “Sensitive Compartmented Information.” Some were White House records marked "Confidential". Other records were marked with ORCON and NOFORN controls. Another "Top Secret" document had HCS-P/SI/TK control markings, indicating that they included details of human sources, electronic surveillance, and spy satellites.

The DOJ included a copy of its May subpoena to Trump from a DC federal grand jury after authorization for it to be made public from Chief Judge Beryl Howell in the DC District Court.

The DOJ also filed a more detailed Receipt for Property and a summary of the government's search, both under seal; on August 31, the News Media filed a motion opposing the sealing.

Trump reply

On August 31, Trump's lawyers filed a 19-page reply. They claimed that "this 'discovery' [of classified information within the material recovered in January] was to be fully anticipated given the very nature of Presidential records", as such records often "contain sensitive information". They referred to the place where the documents were found at Mar-a-Lago as a "secure setting" and said it was "unjustified" for the government to "criminaliz[e]" the former president's possession of classified documents. Given their claim that it is not a crime for Trump to keep classified material in his personal residence, they said that if NARA believed its January 2022 negotiations had been unsuccessful in recovering all material, NARA should have asked Trump once again for his cooperation rather than referring the matter to the Justice Department. Trump's attorneys characterized the months they had resisted the government's efforts to reclaim his presidential records as the "standard give-and-take between former Presidents and (the National Archives and Records Administration) regarding Presidential library contents."

They also said that, should Trump's request for a special master be granted, he "agrees that it would be appropriate for the special master to possess a Top Secret/SCI security clearance". They rejected the DOJ's assertion that it had screened out any attorney-client privileged records, arguing that their filter team had "virtually unchecked discretion" in addressing potential privilege disputes. Trump's lawyers requested copies of the seized materials, the search warrant, and unredacted copies of the underlying application materials.

Hearing on September 1

The DOJ argued that the FBI had already reviewed 520 pages from 64 document sets to look for privileged material and that Trump had no right to keep them or exert executive privilege over them, an assertion that Cannon pushed back against. Trump's lawyers argued the government had misconstrued the role of the Presidential Records Act. They also stated that Trump, while president, was allowed to designate records as "personal" outside the review of a court. They compared the conflict over the documents with an "overdue library book scenario".

Cannon ordered the DOJ to release the detailed property list they had previously filed under seal. Neither DOJ nor Trump's team objected to making it public.

Release of detailed property list

The detailed property list was unsealed on September 2. The list showed how classified items had been intermingled with other items like documents and photographs without classification markings, news clippings, unspecified "gift items", items of clothing, and a book. A box found in Trump's office is listed as containing "43 empty folders with classified banners; 28 empty folders labeled 'Return to Staff Secretary/Mili[t]ary Aide'; 24 government documents marked confidential, secret or top secret; 99 news articles and other printed media; and 69 government documents or photos that were not classified."

Judge halts criminal investigation

In a ruling on September 5, Cannon ordered the DOJ to halt its review of the materials while allowing the intelligence community to continue its assessment of the potential harm caused to national security. She announced that she would grant Trump's request for a special master to review the seized documents for attorney-client and executive privilege and ordered the DOJ and Trump to file a joint list of candidates "with the requisite security clearances and legal expertise" by September 9.

Among other reasons for appointing a special master, she cited an "interest in ensuring the integrity of an orderly process amidst swirling allegations of bias and media leaks" and the historic nature of the case, and that the Supreme Court "did not rule out the possibility of a former President overcoming an incumbent President on executive privilege matters." Cannon noted that the filter team had screened out medical documents, correspondence on taxes, and accounting information among "[p]ersonal effects without evidentiary value" as well as 500 pages of material potentially subject to attorney-client privilege. She criticized that in two instances the investigative team "had been exposed to" potentially privileged materials it then gave to the filter team.

Expert reactions

Legal experts called the judgment deeply flawed and giving special treatment to Trump. Other experts said that the judge did not seem to understand the nature of executive privilege and that there was no basis for her "to expand a special master's authority to screen materials that were also potentially subject to executive privilege". The New York Times noted that "The Justice Department is itself part of the executive branch, and a court has never held that a former president can invoke the privilege to keep records from his time in office away from the executive branch itself." Stanford law professor David Alan Sklansky emphasized the contradictions with a ruling that allows "the executive branch to use the files [to assess the risk to national security] while blocking it from using them for an active criminal investigation." Former Trump administration attorney general William Barr said that the judge was wrong in deciding that a former president can keep the executive branch from reviewing documents while investigating a potential crime by invoking executive privilege over those documents.

Motions filed after the ruling

On September 8, the DOJ asked the judge to rescind her rulings to have the special master review classified material and halt FBI access to classified material seized during the search by September 15, arguing that it was "inextricably linked with the criminal investigation" and that her orders had also halted the intelligence community's review of classified material. They said that they would appeal those rulings to an appellate court if she did not repeal them herself. They did not oppose the appointment of a special master to review personal documents and "some other items".

On September 9, the DOJ and Trump's lawyers submitted their joint filing, each side proposing two different candidates and differing views on the tasks and duration of the special master's review. The DOJ suggested Barbara Jones and Thomas Griffith and Trump's legal team suggested Raymond Dearie and Paul Huck Jr..

On September 12, the DOJ filed court papers saying that they would accept one of the two people proposed by Trump, former chief federal judge Raymond J. Dearie, while Trump's lawyers filed a document rejecting both judges proposed by the DOJ. Trump's filing also suggested that some documents marked classified may not be and that Trump may have the right to have them in his possession.

Appointment of special master

On September 15, Cannon appointed Dearie special master and tasked him to review all documents seized in the August 8 search. She upheld her September 5 ruling blocking the use of any of the material for investigative purposes until they had been reviewed, refusing to grant even the DOJ's request of a limited stay to allow them to again access the approximately 100 documents bearing classification markings. She ruled that Dearie should finish the review by November 30 and that Trump will have to pay the costs of the review. Dearie accepted the appointment.

DOJ appeal

On September 16, the DOJ asked the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals to immediately allow the criminal investigation to proceed. Regarding the classified documents, DOJ requested the right to review them; to have them exempted from review by the special master; and not to disclose them to Trump's lawyers, who may be "witnesses to 'relevant events' in the criminal probe." On September 21, the federal appeals court granted the DOJ's request. The three-judge panel unanimously declared it was in the public interest for the DOJ "to determine whether any of the records were improperly disclosed, risking national security damage."

On September 30, the DOJ asked the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals for an expedited ruling on its appeal to overturn Cannon's order installing a special master and the "expansive powers" she had given him. Trump's lawyers opposed the request. On October 5, the court agreed to expedite the case. The DOJ filed its brief asking the 11th Circuit to reverse the court's order, Trump's team responded, and then the court heard oral arguments on November 22.

Trump application to Supreme Court

On October 4, Trump asked the U.S. Supreme Court to vacate the 11th Circuit's stay of the special master, arguing that the appeals court lacked jurisdiction over Cannon's order. On October 11, the DOJ urged the Supreme Court to stay out of the case. On October 13, the Supreme Court denied Trump's request, without offering further details nor recording any dissents.

Special master review

On September 20, at the first hearing about the special master's review, Dearie indicated that if Trump's lawyers "decide not to advance a claim of declassification", then he would accept the government's prima facie evidence that the documents remain classified, once that evidence is provided. During the hearing, Dearie said that he "can't allow litigation strategy to dictate the outcome of [his review and] recommendations to Judge Cannon", referring to vague declassification claims by Trump's side.

On September 22, Dearie gave Trump one week to formally submit any specific claim of inaccuracies with the inventory of seized documents, including if any of the materials listed "were not seized from the Premises on August 8, 2022". The DOJ was also instructed to submit electronic copies of all unclassified documents to both Dearie and the Trump legal team by September 26.

On September 28, Trump's team objected, arguing that Cannon initially had not ordered them to confirm the inventory, that they could not review the classified documents because they no longer had access to them, and that Dearie had not given them enough time to review what they claimed to be nearly "200,000 pages". Their 200,000 page estimate was disputed at the time as much too large for the volume of materials seized, and in its October 14 pleading before the 11th Circuit, the DOJ noted that there were approximately 13,000 documents totaling 22,000 pages. On September 29, Cannon blocked several of Dearie's orders, agreeing with Trump's legal team on multiple issues. Dearie later clarified the actual number of pages to be 21,792, with the DOJ saying the discrepancy in page count arose following an overestimation by a company hired to digitize and database the documents.

On November 14, a pair of legal briefs were partially unsealed. In the arguments made to the special master, Trump's attorneys claimed that some of the seized documents were designated as "personal property" per the Presidential Records Act, and may also be protected by executive privilege claims; while the Department of Justice argued to reject such reasoning on multiple grounds. According to The Wall Street Journal, the DOJ legal filing "revealed that Mr. Trump’s legal team has only asserted privilege on a tiny subset of the thousands of documents seized during the search" and that "Mr. Trump's lawyers have claimed that 121 documents are protected by executive privilege and only one document is protected by attorney-client privilege".

Reactions

Congress

NARA's revaluation of presidential records retrieved from Mar-a-Lago raised concern within Congress; the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, chaired by U.S. Representative Carolyn B. Maloney, began an investigation. In a February 24 letter to NARA, Maloney wrote, "I am deeply concerned that former President Trump may have violated the law through his intentional efforts to remove and destroy records that belong to the American people". She requested the National Archives to provide documents about discussions among top Trump advisers about preserving and storing White House records. Maloney and Rep. Adam Schiff, chair of the House Intelligence Committee, later sent a letter to Avril Haines, director of National Intelligence (DNI) requesting a classified congressional briefing and a damage assessment. Haines responded that the DOJ and Intelligence Community were conducting a classification review of materials taken to Mar-a-Lago and a damage assessment of the potential risk to national security.

Mark Warner and Marco Rubio, chair and ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, sent a private letter to Garland and Haines requesting that the DOJ and the Office of the DNI provide the committee with the classified documents seized and a damage assessment of potential risks to national security. According to an August 26 letter from Haines, a classification review and damage assessment inquiry is ongoing. The eight congressional leaders who are briefed on classified intelligence matters, colloquially known as the Gang of Eight, have asked the Biden administration for access to the seized documents.

The Congressional Research Service issued a "Sidebar" bulletin to brief members and Committees of Congress on the legal aspects of the case.

White House

The White House said that President Biden and White House officials were not aware of the search until it was reported on the news. Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said "those investigations should be free from political influence" and did not comment on the search itself except that the independent Department of Justice was carrying out the investigation.

On August 17, the White House, in a statement to CNN, condemned calls from some members of the Republican Party to "defund the FBI".

White House officials were privately concerned over the classified material stored in Mar-a-Lago, including whether it could put at risk the sources and methods of the US intelligence community. On August 26, Biden mocked Trump for saying he had declassified all of the material he took with him to Mar-a-Lago and said he would let the DOJ make a determination on the risk to national security.

In another speech on August 30, Biden condemned the threats against law enforcement and calls to defund the FBI as "sickening". He criticized Republicans for their hypocrisy in their calls for "riots in the streets" and refusal to condemn the January 6 United States Capitol attack.

National Archives

The National Archives made multiple press statements concerning Trump's presidential records in response to media queries. They have also released numerous records relevant to the Trump administration's adherence to the Presidential Records Act in response to FOIA requests.

On August 24, NARA staff told the House Committee on Oversight and Reform they could not be certain they had all of Trump's presidential records. The same day, in an internal letter to all NARA employees, acting Archivist Debra Wall said NARA had received both threats and praise from members of the public for its role in the ongoing FBI investigation.

On September 13, Rep. Carolyn Maloney of the House Oversight and Reform Committee wrote a letter to NARA, requesting an "urgent review" of all recovered documents and an assessment regarding any and all "presidential records [that] remain unaccounted for and potentially in the possession of the former president". On September 30, the National Archives responded to the committee's request, writing in part: "While there is no easy way to establish absolute accountability, we do know that we do not have custody of everything we should ... With respect to the second issue concerning whether former President Trump has surrendered all presidential records, we respectfully refer you to the Department of Justice in light of its ongoing investigation".

Trump, his family, and his attorneys

On August 14, Trump demanded the return of boxes of seized documents that were alleged covered by attorney-client privilege and executive privilege.

Beginning with his first announcement after the search, Trump and his attorneys made a variety of statements relating to the search and the F.B.I. investigation; these statements have been criticized as "shifting" over time and "often contradictory and unsupported". Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Maggie Haberman, writing for The New York Times, said that the former President's response "follow[s] a familiar playbook" which "[h]e has used ... over decades", including during the investigation into whether the Trump campaign conspired with Russia and during his first impeachment trial. They also said that Trump's statements did not explain why he kept the documents after the government began investigating him. In an August 30 Fox News appearance, Trump attorney Jim Trusty said that his client's actions were comparable to someone with "an overdue library book" in their possession, and suggested that government prosecutors are holding Trump to a different standard of scrutiny than they would apply to others.

According to The Washington Post, Trump has struggled to assemble an experienced legal defense team, with many of his former lawyers declining to take part in the case. Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich said that Trump's lead counsel were exceptionally talented and had "litigated some of the most complex cases in American history". The New York Times credits political advisor Boris Epshteyn for his role in assembling Trump's legal team. Epshteyn previously assisted in the defense of Trump's false claims of a stolen election in 2020. Former Trump attorney David Schoen has said the current situation remains problematic, with members of the defense team "rotating in and out", and lacking clear leadership. Trump later added former Florida solicitor general Chris Kise to his legal team for the case, but within a month, Kise's role was reportedly reduced. According to The New York Times, Kise had "suggested hiring a forensic firm to search for additional documents" following requests from Jay Bratt at the Justice Department, who expressed concern that more documents were still missing. Disagreement between Trump's lawyers reportedly led to a minimization of Kise's participation on the defense team, due to his more conciliatory approach.

Trump's political action committee, the Save America PAC, sent out more than 100 fundraising emails in the days following the FBI search. Daily donations increased from an average of $200,000–$300,000 to more than $1,000,000 for at least two days. The emails claimed that former president Trump was being politically persecuted. In July, the Save America PAC paid almost $1,000,000 to civil and criminal lawyers representing Trump and the Trump Organization in lawsuits.

Claims of political motivation, planted evidence, and Obama precedent

Trump likened the search to the 1970s Watergate scandal. He made unsubstantiated allegations that it was politically motivated to stop him from running for president in 2024, and a "politically motivated move" by the Biden administration. He criticized the FBI for searching his wife Melania Trump's rooms and belongings in Mar-a-Lago.

On August 11, Trump made the unsubstantiated claim that the FBI might have doctored evidence to support its search warrant and might have planted incriminating materials and recording devices at Mar-a-Lago. Trump's allies echoed these conspiracist claims. On August 12, he claimed that his lawyers had been fully cooperating with federal investigators prior to the search: "The government could have had whatever they wanted, if we had it".

On August 12, Trump falsely claimed that former president Barack Obama had taken "33 million pages of documents, much of them classified" to Chicago; the falsehoods were amplified by conservative commentators on Fox News. NARA responded that they had taken "exclusive legal and physical custody" of Obama's records when he left office in 2017, and that Obama had "no control over where and how" NARA stored the records, with NARA "exclusively" maintaining around 30 million pages of unclassified Obama records near Chicago, while classified Obama records were maintained by NARA in its Washington, D.C facility.

After The Washington Post reported that nuclear documents were being sought in the search of Mar-a-Lago, Trump said on August 12: "Nuclear weapons issue is a Hoax". Trump also claimed that former president Obama had retained "lots" of nuclear documents, however, the National Archives refutes that accusation.

Claims of declassifying all documents

On August 12, Trump posted to Truth Social claiming that the documents he brought to Mar-a-Lago were "all declassified" before he left office. That day, his office issued a statement admitting that he had frequently taken home classified documents and further claiming that he had issued a "standing order" that anything he took home was automatically and "instantly" declassified. (His lawyers said on September 20 that they were refraining from mentioning Trump's claim of a "standing order" in court as it might reveal a potential defense in a future indictment.)

Kash Patel told Breitbart in May 2022 that Trump, before leaving office, had declassified material but that "White House counsel failed to generate the paperwork to change the classification markings" and this is why some documents recovered by the National Archives in January 2022 had classification markings. Sections of the Code of Federal Regulation addressing declassification require markings that are "uniformly and conspicuously applied to leave no doubt about the declassified status of the information and who authorized the declassification".

Except for Kash Patel, former Trump administration officials said they never heard of such a "standing order" issued by Trump, and labeled the claim false.

• John Bolton, who was Trump's national security advisor, said that Trump's claim was a "complete fiction" and "almost certainly a lie". Bolton said he never heard of such an order before, during, or after his tenure as national security advisor. Bolton said: "When somebody begins to concoct lies like this, it shows a real level of desperation".
• Glenn S. Gerstell, who served as the general counsel for the National Security Agency from 2015 to 2020, called Trump's claim "preposterous", as declassification requires recordkeeping as well as notifying the agencies that used the information.
• Leon Panetta, former Secretary of Defense and Director of the CIA under the Obama administration, similarly said Trump's claim was "pretty much BS". He explained that the declassification process requires authorization by various agencies. "There is nothing that I'm aware of that indicates that a formal step was taken by this president to, in fact, declassify anything", Panetta said.

A Congressional Research Service memo noted that a proper declassification process would have required Trump to communicate his intent to declassify specific documents. The same memo points out that the government had a legal basis to seize presidential records regardless of whether they are classified, and that classified material could furthermore indicate a violation of the Espionage Act.

On September 21, Trump appeared on the Hannity show on Fox News, claiming that "there doesn't have to be a process" and a president "can declassify just by saying, 'It's declassified.' Even by thinking about it." However, this notion was "mocked" by legal experts and further, a three-judge appellate panel of the Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit noted that there was "no evidence that any of these records were declassified", and also wrote that when lawyers for Mr. Trump appeared before Judge Dearie on September 20, they too "resisted providing any evidence that he had declassified any of these documents." Lawyers noted that "even if Trump did somehow declassify the documents, he had no right to take them when he left office on Jan. 20, 2020 ... [Trump] had no (legal) interest in these documents." Judges of the Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit noted that "the declassification argument is a 'red herring'."

Trump allies and supporters

On the day of the search, a group of about two dozen Trump supporters gathered in protest in front of Mar-a-Lago; others held protests in front of FBI offices in Phoenix, Arizona, and Washington D.C. Over the next few days, Trump supporters continued to demonstrate outside Mar-a-Lago, and at several pickets outside a number of FBI field offices in various states. A small group of armed Trump supporters protested outside the FBI office in Phoenix.

CBS News reporter Robert Costa reported that within Trump's circle, "Some allies are urging him to speed up his decision on 2024 in the wake of this, that no one in [the] GOP will challenge him now... others are telling him to stay cool, wait".

Trump allies in Congress and in right-wing media spread a wide variety of misinformation and baseless conspiracy theories: that the FBI may have planted evidence; that the FBI search aimed to stop Trump from exposing criminals in government; that the FBI conducted a "military occupation" of Mar-a-lago; that the FBI entered Mar-a-lago "unannounced" and was "taking whatever they want for themselves"; and that some FBI agents went "rogue". Patel repeatedly blamed the General Services Administration (GSA) for "mistakenly pack[ing] some boxes and mov[ing] them to Mar-a-Lago". The GSA replied that it was the outgoing presidential transition team and their volunteers who packed the boxes, put them on pallets, and shrink-wrapped them.

Many of Trump's allies, including Steve Bannon, urged Trump to publicly release some of the surveillance footage of the search or use it in political campaign ads. Others cautioned him that releasing the tapes could backfire by revealing the sheer volume of classified information removed from his residence and countering some of his unsupported claims. The footage could further expose the identities of FBI agents videotaped and subject them to further threats and harassment.

Fox News host Brian Kilmeade, while guest hosting Tucker Carlson Tonight, showed a doctored photo depicting the federal magistrate judge who approved the warrant together with convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell; Kilmeade later described the fake photo as "a meme" shared "in jest".

The FBI search ignited apocalyptic, violent rhetoric among Trump supporters, including members of the far-right, on media including Fox News, Newsmax, PJ Media, the Blaze, and right-wing talk radio. Talk of civil war and violence spiked online among far-right users on platforms such as Truth Social, Gab, Telegram, and Twitter, including from conservative commentator Steven Crowder and white supremacist commentator Nick Fuentes. The New York Young Republican Club blamed the search on "internationalist forces and their allies intent on undermining the foundation of our Republic". Experts on political violence said that the extremist rhetoric creates a dangerous atmosphere and heightens the risk of violent acts.

Threats against government officials

FBI Director Christopher A. Wray denounced online threats against federal agents and DOJ employees. Wray said the FBI would "stay vigilant and adjust our security posture accordingly" given a surge of threats to FBI employees and property following the search of Mar-a-Lago. The names of the two FBI agents who signed the warrant paperwork were redacted in the official court-released documents; the right-wing outlet Breitbart published leaked versions of the documents that revealed the agents' names, exposing them to harassment.

The federal magistrate judge who approved the search was the target of antisemitic vitriol, misinformation, and threats on sites such as 4chan; due to online threats against him, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida removed information about the magistrate from its online directory for his protection. The synagogue he attended had also received threats and is under additional security.

The FBI and Department of Homeland Security issued a joint bulletin warning of an "unprecedented" increase in threats and acts of violence against federal law enforcement officials, including "calls for the targeted killing of judicial, law enforcement, and government officials associated with the Palm Beach search, including the federal judge who approved the Palm Beach search warrant". Multiple possible targets of violence had their personal information posted online. The bulletin noted a threat to place a dirty bomb in front of FBI Headquarters.

A man in Mercer County, Pennsylvania, was charged in US District Court with making online threats against FBI agents on the Gab social networking site.

On August 19, lawmakers on the House Oversight Committee contacted social media companies and requested information about recent threats made against law enforcement officials by users of their platforms. Letters sent by lawmakers specifically cited threats published on Truth Social, which has seen a significant increase in app downloads following the Mar-a-Lago search. The letter expressed concern because "reckless statements by the former president and Republican Members of Congress have unleashed a flood of violent threats on social media" and they urged platforms to take immediate, concrete action to limit incitement of violence against law enforcement agencies.

FBI field office attack

Main article: Cincinnati FBI field office attack

Ricky Shiffer, a 42-year-old Trump supporter wearing body armor and armed with an AR-15 style rifle and a nail gun, attempted to breach the FBI field office in Cincinnati, Ohio, on August 11 and died in a subsequent confrontation with police officers. He had taken part in the January 6 United States Capitol attack, and was one of the most prolific posters on Trump's social media platform Truth Social, where he posted on about his desire to kill FBI agents after the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago. Shiffer had engaged in violent extremist rhetoric on social media for years, and the FBI received a tip about him in May 2022.

Republican elected officials and candidates

The Republican National Committee, as well as most Republicans, responded to the FBI search by attacking the FBI and depicting Trump as a victim and political martyr. Republicans said that the search made the U.S. into a "third-world country" or "banana republic", although democracies such as France, South Korea, and Israel have all investigated and prosecuted former leaders for criminal offenses. Many Republicans vowed to investigate the DOJ if the party retook control of Congress in the November 2022 elections. There is no evidence of improper conduct by federal investigators, and no evidence that the search was politically motivated.

Several Republican politicians, including U.S. Senators Rick Scott and Marco Rubio of Florida, and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis condemned the search. In a tweet, House Minority Leader, Kevin McCarthy said the Justice Department "has reached an intolerable state of weaponized politicization" and said: "When Republicans take back the House, we will conduct immediate oversight of this department, follow the facts, and leave no stone unturned. Attorney General Garland, preserve your documents and clear your calendar". Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia called for the FBI to be defunded. Senator Rand Paul called for the Espionage Act to be repealed. Anthony Sabatini, a Republican member of the Florida House of Representatives called for the state to "sever all ties with DOJ immediately" and called for FBI agents to be "arrested upon sight".

Many Republicans accused the DOJ and FBI of a double standard for their previous treatment of the Hillary Clinton email controversy, where former Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton was investigated but not charged over classified material found on her private email server during her tenure as US secretary of State. Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina predicted the likelihood of street violence if Trump was indicted.

Some Republicans took a more restrained tone upon reports that the documents seized were highly classified, but nonetheless questioned the search. Multiple Republicans called on the DOJ and FBI to release or share to Congress documents surrounding the search, particularly the affidavit used as the basis of the warrant. Mike Turner, the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, said that he was "very concerned about the method that was used in raiding Mar-a-Lago"; Brian Fitzpatrick questioned whether "the law is being enforced equally" and with "parity".

Republican congresswoman Liz Cheney, the top Republican on the House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack, criticized her party's response to the federal investigation of Trump, writing, "I have been ashamed to hear members of my party attacking the integrity of the FBI agents involved with the recent Mar-a-Lago search. These are sickening comments that put the lives of patriotic public servants at risk".

On September 22, Senators Thom Tillis and Lindsey Graham acknowledged that there's a "process" for declassification, and Senator John Thune said the process "ought to be adhered to and followed". Senator Mike Braun said he was unaware of "the proper methodology" for declassification. Senator Mike Rounds commented on the importance of storing information correctly: "People can get hurt, people can get killed if it's not stored correctly, and if that information gets out." On September 25, Senator John Barrasso, pressed by ABC host George Stephanopoulos, acknowledged: "I don't think a president can declassify documents by saying so, by 'thinking about'."

Congressional Democrats

House Democrats praised the search as a step toward accountability for Trump. Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, said in an interview after the search, "We believe in the rule of law. That's what our country is about. And no person is above the law. Not even the president of the United States. Not even a former president of the United States". Senate Democrats offered more reserved reactions; in the immediate aftermath of the search, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said he would "withhold comment until we know more".

Scholars and former officials

Following the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago, Reuters and Al Jazeera cited scholars and former officials, who said the way Trump used the residence presented a highly unique security "nightmare". Commenting on a 2017 North Korea strategy meeting between Trump and Shinzo Abe which was surrounded by guests, national security lawyer Mark Zaid stated, "What we saw was Trump be so lax in security that he was having a sensitive meeting regarding a potential war topic where non-U.S. government personnel could observe and photograph". Mary McCord, a former Department of Justice official, stated: "Clearly they thought it was very serious to get these materials back into secured space. Even just retention of highly classified documents in improper storage – particularly given Mar-a-Lago, the foreign visitors there and others who might have connections with foreign governments and foreign agents – creates a significant national security threat". In 2019, a Chinese citizen with false passports, possessing a thumb drive containing malware, was arrested attending a function there.

Experts considered Trump "the perfect profile of a security risk: He was like a disgruntled former employee, with access to sensitive government secrets, dead set on tearing down what he believed was a deep state out to get him". Columbia University political scientist David Rothkopf viewed the Mar-a-Lago search as a reminder that Trump "was, and is, a national security risk unlike any the United States has ever faced".

Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Michael Sallah of the Pittsburg Post-Dispatch discovered that a Ukrainian-born Russian speaker using a fake name who claimed to be a Rothschild family heiress had frequented the residence over a year's time, even posing there for photos with Trump and Senator Lindsey Graham.

Intelligence community

Former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency John Brennan called the storage of sensitive documents at Mar-a-Lago "the height of recklessness and irresponsibility". On Twitter, Michael Hayden, former Director of the CIA and Director of the National Security Agency, showed approval of comments by Michael Beschloss comparing Trump's actions to the espionage case of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg which ended in their execution. The comments provoked criticism from Jerry Dunleavy, a writer for the Washington Examiner.

Dan Coats, Director of National Intelligence (DNI) under Trump from 2017 to 2019, defended the FBI stating that “my first thought was Chris [Wray] would not have signed off on that unless he thought the process was not working or they were not getting the right answers back from lawyers or others and it was serious enough to take that action”.

Asha Rangappa, a former FBI agent and former associate dean at Yale Law School, stated that Trump's acknowledgment that the documents seized were covered or potentially covered by executive privilege indicated that he had kept presidential records that he was not authorized to have under 18 USC 2071. She stated: "And so it's not clear that executive privilege would even be relevant to the particular crime he's being investigated for and yet in this filing, he basically admits that he is in possession of them, which is what the government is trying to establish".

Jeffrey Smith, former general counsel to the CIA, and David Laufman, former chief of the counterespionage section at the DOJ's National Security Division, warned of the investigation not having strong enough evidence to have a conviction at trial.

Former Trump administration figures

Former Vice President Mike Pence stated that the search undermined public confidence in the justice system, noting that "no former President of the United States has ever been subject to a raid of their personal residence".

Trump's former chief of staff, John F. Kelly, said that Trump has a long track record of disregarding rules for handling sensitive documents; that Trump "didn't believe in the classification system"; and that Trump held U.S. intelligence in disdain. William Barr said in an interview that he could not think of a legitimate reason for Trump to be in possession of classified documents and that the documents, whether classified or not, belong to the government and should have been turned over to NARA.

Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton said "almost nothing would surprise me about what's in the documents at Mar-a-Lago". He recalled that although Trump usually did not read the President's Daily Brief, he would sometimes ask his briefers "to keep the highly classified visual aids, pictures, charts and graphs" that were prepared for him, and that Trump sometimes refused to return these materials when asked by his briefers.

On 3 November 2022, Trump adviser Kash Patel testified before a federal grand jury investigating the handling of records taken to Mar-a-Lago home. The judge granted Patel immunity from prosecution on any information he provides to the investigation.

External links

• Tracker: Evidence of Trump’s Knowledge and Involvement in Retaining Mar-a-Lago Documents from the Reiss Center on Law and Security at the New York University School of Law
• Trump and the Mar-a-Lago documents: A timeline The Washington Post − Key events, from Trump's departure of the White House on January 20, 2021 up to the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago on August 8, 2022