The Justice Department said Monday it opposes the release of an FBI affidavit justifying a search warrant used to remove documents from former President Trump’s home in Florida last week.
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Though the department asked a federal court to release the search warrant last week, it said in a filing that the affidavit “presents a very different set of considerations.”
“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,” according to the filing in federal court in West Palm Beach, Fla.
The Justice Department also said the affidavit — typically a road map of an investigation — includes “highly sensitive information about witnesses, including witnesses interviewed by the government.”
The department was responding to a request filed by the conservative group Judicial Watch and some media organizations seeking the release of all materials related to the unprecedented search of a former president’s residence, which resulted in the seizure of 11 sets of classified documents.
In the week since the search on Trump’s property, some Republican lawmakers have called for the release of the document and Senate Intelligence Committee leaders made a bipartisan request over the weekend to the government for members to privately access the classified documents.
Trump’s lawyer, Alina Habba, didn’t immediately respond to a message seeking comment.
Last week, a Florida judge released the search warrant and a list of materials seized during the search after a request from the Justice Department that Trump didn’t oppose. But the underlying affidavit would reveal the most extensive information used to justify the action, possibly including sources used by FBI agents and details about the documents and classified information.
Releasing an affidavit at this stage of an investigation would be highly unusual and require the approval of a federal judge. Unlike the warrant itself and the seizure receipt, which the FBI gave to Trump’s lawyer during the search and Trump was free to share, the former president wouldn’t have seen a copy of that document.
“There is simply no alternative to sealing that could ensure the integrity of the government’s investigation and that would prevent the inevitable efforts to read between the lines and discern the identities of certain individuals, dates or other critical, case-specific information,” the Justice Department said in the filing.
It isn’t possible to make a redacted version of the affidavit public because the redactions would be “so extensive as to render the document devoid of content that would meaningfully enhance the public’s understanding of these events,” the department said.
The FBI’s seizure of classified material from Trump has thrown U.S. politics into turmoil, and court filings revealed the former president may be under investigation for mishandling government records and potentially compromising national security information.
“There is simply no alternative to sealing that could ensure the integrity of the government’s investigation…”
Integrity? Government? Using both in the same sentence?
OPP’S!
Trump called them on it. He said open the entire issue for public review. The Democrats so badly want to kill the legacy of “drain the swamp” they are willing to use Stalinist tactics.
It is a Hollywood moment. Armed Agents of Washington “Storming” the “Compound” of that dictator called Trump. Unfortunately for the Never Trumpers and the Democrats President Trump did not play their game.
Whether you believe Trump is the right candidate for 2024 or not is not the issue here.
The Democrats have exposed themselves for what they are. Triple down on destroying the separation of powers, and Radical Socialist/Communists that is what D for Democrat now stands for.
Unless you are dogmatic or stupid this raid is the end of the Democrat Party. Hopefully the voters will get it.
The american voter has proven to be incredibly difficult to educate when it involves freebies from the government. If Democrats campaigned on seizing people’s homes, they would still be elected. The parasite class will never change.
A Democrat Party fanatic FL Magistrate read the entire Affidavit which supposedly contained a listed accounting of the “nuclear secrets” documents Trump retained inside his locked, Secret Service and video-secured home, but the public is denied such reading! Why? What is the Magistrates “Security Clearance Classification”????? Obviously, Trump is no “lone wolf” foreign spy, so that means the Democrat Party, channeling a Progressive version of the late Senator McCarthy, will of necessity have to pursue all others involved. Do you suppose there might even be more than a few Democrat Party operatives…hiding in the eternal bureaucracy of Washington DC who will be found guilty????? Will Democrat Party “patriots” demand the return of actual Death Penalty executions, perhaps all done in Blue States, televised to please their base voters????