The United States Justice Department said that “government records were likely concealed and removed” at Mara-a-Lago to block the ongoing investigation. FBI officials searched former US President Donald Trump’s Florida residence this month for confidential documents.
The new Justice Department filing says that 33 boxes containing more than 100 classified records were found in the search. Three additional classified documents were also kept in office drawers. The new filing has laid out the clearest version of the stained interactions between Justice Department officials and Trump representatives.
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The Justice Department revealed a photo showing the cover pages of a smattering of paperclip-bound classified documents — some marked as “TOP SECRET//SCI” with bright yellow borders, and one marked as “SECRET//SCI” with a rust-colored border — along with whited-out pages, splayed out on a carpet at Mar-a-Lago. Beside them sits a cardboard box filled with gold-framed pictures, including a Time Magazine cover.
The filing offers yet another indication of the sheer volume of classified records retrieved from Mar-a-Lago. It shows how investigators conducting a criminal probe have focused not just on why the records were improperly stored there, but also on the question of whether the Trump team intentionally misled them about the continued, and unlawful, presence of government secrets.
The document sheds new details on the events of this past May and June, when FBI and Justice Department officials issued a subpoena for the missing records and then visited a storage room at Mar-a-Lago that contained top-secret documents and other information.
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The Justice Department said it had “developed evidence that government records were likely concealed and removed from the Storage Room and that efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation”, news agency Associated Press reported.
The filing responds to a request from the Trump legal team for a special master to review the documents seized during the August 8 search of Mar-a-Lago. US District Judge Aileen Cannon is set to hear arguments on the matter.