Federal Judge Bruce Reinhart had ordered the Department of Justice to release this key document, supposed to detail the reasons which led to the investigation of Donald Trump, citing public interest in the unprecedented search of the home of a former president. American.
But the magistrate had accepted the ministry’s request to redact important parts of the document – which could otherwise have revealed the identity of certain actors in the case – in the name of a “compelling” need to protect the investigations.
Authorities waited until the last minute, releasing the 38-page document shortly after 12:00 p.m. (4:00 p.m. GMT), the deadline set by Judge Reinhart.
They had opposed the publication of said document, arguing that it would require a redaction “so extensive that the rest of the leaked text would be devoid of any significant content”.
On August 8, the FBI raided Donald Trump’s Florida residence, Mar-a-Lago, seizing boxes of confidential documents that the Republican had not returned after leaving the White House, despite multiple requests.
The document released on Friday indicates that the investigations began when the National Archives Agency (NARA) informed the Ministry of Justice, on February 9, 2022, that it had received from Donald Trump’s teams, 15 boxes of documents containing including, according to NARA, “top secret documents”.
The federal police then opened an investigation aimed at determining “among other things, how the classified documents had left the White House (…) and had been stored” in the Mar-a-Lago club.
– “Amateurs and thugs” –
The ex-real estate magnate had again assured Friday on his Truth Social network, before the publication of these court documents, that “political amateurs and thugs had no right (…) to take ‘storm Mar-a-Lago and steal anything that came within reach’.
On Monday, the former US president had asked that an independent expert be appointed to examine the documents seized by the FBI and determine which could be kept “confidential” and thus not be used in the investigations.
The list of items seized by the FBI, already made public, mentions many documents classified as “top secret”. The whole question is to know what these documents are about.
Investigators suspect the Republican of having violated an American law on espionage which very strictly regulates the possession of confidential documents. Donald Trump assured that these documents had been declassified.
Donald Trump is also under investigation into his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election and his role in his supporters’ assault on the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
Donald Trump, who flirts with the idea of a candidacy for the presidential election of 2024, has long castigated this search, which he sees as the illustration of a “witch hunt” targeting him.
He is currently not being prosecuted in any case.
