The affidavit underpinning the FBI’s raid on former President Donald Trump’s home in Mar-a-Lago could be made public today.
Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart, who signed the Aug. 5 warrant for the Aug. 8 raid, is holding a hearing today in Florida to decide whether the Department of Justice should be forced to release the affidavit. The DOJ announced this week it was opposing the release of the underlying justification for its unprecedented search, just days after it agreed to unseal the FBI warrant for the search of Trump’s Florida resort.
A number of news outlets, such as the Wall Street Journal, Associated Press, New York Times, and Washington Post, joined together to push for the affidavit’s release. The Washington Examiner also argued the affidavit must be unsealed.
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“The affidavit of probable cause should be released to the public, with only those redactions that are necessary to protect a compelling interest articulated by the government,” the media outlets said.
The groups pointed out that the DOJ had said there was a “clear and powerful interest in understanding what occurred in” the search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home, which “weighs heavily in favor of unsealing” the warrant.
“That same public interest extends to the affidavit of probable cause in this matter, which outlines the government’s basis for the extraordinary step of seeking the warrant to search a former President’s home,” the outlets said.
Trump is being investigated for a possible Espionage Act violation and possible obstruction of justice, according to the warrant unsealed Friday.
The Department of Justice is fighting the release of the affidavit.
“There remain compelling reasons, including to protect the integrity of an ongoing law enforcement investigation that implicates national security, that support keeping the affidavit sealed,” DOJ lawyers declared on Monday, also indicating, however, that they would be open to releasing redacted portions of other related documents.
The DOJ argued that, unlike unsealing the warrant, “disclosure at this juncture of the affidavit supporting probable cause would, by contrast, cause significant and irreparable damage to this ongoing criminal investigation” and worried the affidavit could serve as a “roadmap to the government’s ongoing investigation.”
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Thursday’s hearing comes after Attorney General Merrick Garland said last week that he “personally approved the decision to seek a search warrant.”
The items seized by the FBI last week allegedly included “various classified / [top secret] / [sensitive compartmented information] documents,” four “miscellaneous top secret documents,” three “miscellaneous secret documents,” two “miscellaneous confidential documents,” and one “confidential document.”
Trump and his allies have claimed he declassified the records, with the former president contending he had a “standing order” throughout his presidency that “documents removed from the Oval Office and taken to the residence were deemed to be declassified the moment he removed them.”
