Judge says ‘preliminary intent’ to appoint special master in Donald Trump probe

Donald
Trump’s request to appoint a “special master” to oversee the Justice Department’s
probe into the documents he moved from the White House to his residence in Palm
Beach, Florida, may well be granted. A federal judge scheduled a hearing for
Thursday on Trump’s suit and put both parties on notice. In doing so, she said
she had “preliminary intent” to appoint a special master. A special master is a
third-party attorney who would filter out privileged material seized in the
search.

US District
Judge Aileen Cannon has asked the Department of Justice (DOJ) to file a public
response to Trump’s plea for a special master and additionally file under seal
records detailing what was found during the FBI raid at Mar-a-Lago and provide
status review of seized material, including the process of filtering out privileged
information.

Also Read | Why Justice Department redacted Donald Trump home search warrant

Initially,
Judge Cannon had found several deficiencies in Donald Trump’s court filing
requesting a special master. On Friday, the former US president responded to
Cannon’s request to elaborate by pointing to some additional discussion on case
law that he said supported the request.

Trump’s
submission came hours after the DOJ revealed a redacted version of the
affidavit it used to obtain the search warrant allowing FBI’s raid of the
former president’s residence. Trump has claimed that the newly-released
redacted affidavit “raises more questions than answers.”

Also Read | Donald Trump home search warrant: FBI says there could be ‘evidence of obstruction’

“The
Redacted Affidavit underscores why this Motion should be granted, as it
provides almost no information that would allow Movant to understand why the
raid took place, or what was taken from his home,” Trump wrote on the filing.

The DOJ
affidavit released Friday lays out details of boxes preliminarily reviewed by
FBI when Trump returned them to Mar-a-Lago in May. The affidavit says the 15
boxes contained 184 documents marked classified. Of them, 67 documents were
marked CONFIDENTIAL, 92 marked SECRET and 25 documents marked TOP SECRET.

Following
the release of the affidavit, Donald Trump said the investigation was political
and a “total public relations subterfuge.”