<mediadc-video-embed data-state="{"cms.site.owner":{"_ref":"00000161-3486-d333-a9e9-76c6fbf30000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b93390000"},"cms.content.publishDate":1661954757519,"cms.content.publishUser":{"_ref":"0000017b-7410-df17-a7ff-7edd9d280000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b933a0007"},"cms.content.updateDate":1661954757519,"cms.content.updateUser":{"_ref":"0000017b-7410-df17-a7ff-7edd9d280000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b933a0007"},"rawHtml":"
var _bp = _bp||[]; _bp.push({ "div": "Brid_61954358", "obj": {"id":"27789","width":"16","height":"9","video":"1087477"} }); ","_id":"00000182-f438-db4f-a5de-f6fcd27a0000","_type":"2f5a8339-a89a-3738-9cd2-3ddf0c8da574"}”>Video EmbedFormer President Donald Trump claimed that the image of classified documents found at his Mar-a-Lago resort, released on Tuesday by the Justice Department, was staged by federal officials.
The image displays the cover pages of multiple classified documents, and some of them were outlined with yellow borders and labeled “top secret.” The documents were scattered out on a carpet at the Mar-a-Lago resort, which the former president claimed he had not done.
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“Terrible the way the FBI, during the raid of Mar-a-Lago, threw documents haphazardly all over the floor (perhaps pretending it was me that did it!), and then started taking pictures of them for the public to see,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “Thought they wanted them kept Secret? Lucky I Declassified!”
READ IN FULL: JUSTICE DEPARTMENT’S FILING IN RESPONSE TO TRUMP’S RAID DEMAND
The Justice Department said the photo was a “redacted FBI photograph of certain documents and classified cover sheets recovered from a container in the ’45 office,” the court filing read. But it did not specifically allege the documents were sprawled by Trump.
The former president has previously claimed he declassified the documents the moment the documents left the Oval Office due to a standing order he signed as president. However, former officials within his administration have denied that a standing order existed.
The Justice Department further rejected that claim in its Tuesday court filing, claiming that Trump never tried to invoke “executive privilege” nor claimed that the documents obtained in 15 boxes during an exchange with the National Archives and Records Administration in January were declassified.
“When producing the Fifteen Boxes, the former President never asserted executive privilege over any of the documents nor claimed that any of the documents in the boxes containing classification markings had been declassified,” read the filing.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
The raid, which occurred on Aug. 8 at Trump’s South Florida home of Mar-a-Lago, was part of an investigation over whether Trump violated the Espionage Act and qualified for a obstruction of justice charge.
The obstruction of justice investigation concerns the “improper removal and storage of classified information in unauthorized spaces, as well as the unlawful concealment or removal of government records,” according to a DOJ affidavit.
