The affidavit behind the FBI’s unprecedented raid of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home was publicly released by the Justice Department on Friday.
Although the document was heavily redacted, it did cite “national defense information” found in boxes obtained from Mar-a-Lago earlier this year as justification for seeking the warrant.
“The government is conducting a criminal investigation concerning the improper removal and storage of classified information in unauthorized spaces, as well as the unlawful concealment or removal of government records,” the newly unsealed affidavit dated Aug. 5 said, revealing that the investigation “began as a result of a referral” from the National Archives and Records Administration to the Justice Department on Feb. 9.
The 32-page affidavit, written by a special agent with the FBI’s Washington Field Office whose name is redacted, said the National Archives referral said that on Jan. 18, it received “fifteen boxes of records” from Trump that had been transported from Mar-a-Lago and were reported by the National Archives to contain “highly classified documents intermingled with other records.”
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The Justice Department filed its proposed redactions to the Trump raid affidavit under seal Thursday morning, and Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart of West Palm Beach ruled Thursday afternoon that the DOJ had to file that redacted affidavit on the public docket by noon Friday. The records were unsealed after noon because the court docket website repeatedly crashed.
The special agent who authored the affidavit wrote that the FBI “opened a criminal investigation to, among other things, determine how the documents with classification markings and records were removed from the White House … and came to be stored” at Mar-a-Lago, determine whether the storage locations at Mar-a-Lago were “authorized locations” for storing classified information, figure out if additional classified documents “may have been stored in an unauthorized location” at Mar-a-Lago or elsewhere, and “identify any person(s) who may have removed or retained classified information without authorization and/or in an unauthorized space.”
“The FBI’s investigation has established that documents bearing classification markings, which appear to contain National Defense Information, were among the materials contained in the FIFTEEN BOXES and were stored at the PREMISES in an unauthorized location,” the affidavit said.
The bureau agent also argued there is “probable cause” to think additional documents containing classified national defense information or “presidential records subject to record retention requirements” remained at Mar-a-Lago. The agent also said that “there is also probable cause to believe that evidence of obstruction will be found” at Trump’s Florida home.
Large parts of the rest of the affidavit are heavily redacted.
The magistrate judge, who had also signed the search warrant for the Aug. 8 raid, indicated he agreed with the DOJ’s decision to black out swaths of the affidavit.
TRUMP WANTS SPECIAL MASTER TO REVIEW MAR-A-LAGO RAID EVIDENCE
Trump had called for the affidavit to be released in full.
“Affidavit heavily redacted!!!” Trump said on his Truth Social account Friday afternoon immediately after the release. “Nothing mentioned on ‘Nuclear,’ a total public relations subterfuge by the FBI & DOJ, or our close working relationship regarding document turnover — WE GAVE THEM MUCH. Judge Bruce Reinhart should NEVER have allowed the Break-In of my home.”
Trump’s nuclear mention is in reference to a Washington Post article that reported “classified documents relating to nuclear weapons were among the items FBI agents sought” in the Mar-a-Lago raid, according to “people familiar with the investigation.”
Trump immediately denied that, saying the “nuclear weapons issue is a hoax.”
The FBI said in its affidavit that the special agent in charge of the National Archives Office of Inspector General sent the referral via email to the Justice Department on Feb. 9, stating that the White House Liaison division director for the National Archives conducted a “preliminary review” of the 15 boxes, telling the DOJ that “of most significant concern was that highly classified records were unfoldered, intermixed with other records, and otherwise unproperly identified.”
The affidavit said FBI agents conducted their own “preliminary review” of the 15 boxes in mid-May and identified “documents with classification markings in fourteen of the FIFTEEN BOXES.” The agent wrote that “a preliminary triage” found “184 unique documents bearing classification markings, including 67 documents marked as CONFIDENTIAL, 92 documents marked as SECRET, and 25 documents marked as TOP SECRET.”
The bureau added that FBI agents also “observed markings reflecting compartments/dissemination controls,” which included “HCS [HUMINT Control System], FISA [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act], ORCON [Originator Controlled], NOFORN [not for release to foreign nationals], and SI [Special Intelligence].” The agent said that “I know that documents classified at these levels typically contain” national defense information and that several records contained what appeared to be Trump’s “handwritten notes.”
The FBI special agent believed the Mar-a-Lago storage room, Trump’s residential suite, the “Pine Hall” area of the Florida resort, the “45 Office,” and other spaces at the Florida resort “are not currently authorized locations for the storage of classified information or national defense information.”
Last week, the DOJ announced its opposition to the release of the underlying justification for its search, just days after it agreed to unseal the FBI warrant for the search of Trump’s Florida resort.
The unsealed search warrant application cover sheet provided more details on what the Justice Department was looking for in the raid.
The records show Trump was being investigated under 18 U.S.C. 793, part of the Espionage Act, and said it was related to “willful retention of national defense information.” The unsealed cover sheet pointed to 18 U.S.C. 2071, specifically the “concealment or removal of government records,” as well as 18 U.S.C. 1519, specifically related to “obstruction of federal investigation.”
Trump filed a motion on Monday seeking an order from a judge to appoint a special master and stop the Justice Department from further review of the information it had seized until the special master is appointed. Trump also asked the judge to require the DOJ to provide a more detailed receipt for the property it had seized and to order federal investigators to return all items to him that had been taken but were outside the search warrant’s scope.
DOJ spokesman Anthony Coley said the warrant “was authorized by a federal court” and that the Justice Department will respond in court.
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Federal investigators said the items seized by the FBI earlier this month included “various classified/[top secret]/[sensitive compartmented information] documents,” among other documents.
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.” Several former Trump administration officials have cast doubt on that notion.
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