Former US President Donald Trump delivered his written closing argument to the court on Wednesday in connection with the classified material found at his Mar-a-Lago residence in August. The 76-year-old said that the National Archives should have expected classified material in the documents at Mar-a-Lago as they were presidential documents.
The court filing was part of a civil lawsuit that Donald Trump filed in court in August, seeking the appointment of a special master to review the documents the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) seized from his Mar-a-Lago residence. Ahead of the hearing of the lawsuit that is scheduled for September 1, Trump’s lawyers also argued that the special master needs to hold a top secret or SCI security clearance.
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His lawyers also mentioned that the government should provide both the special master and the former President with copies of FBI seized materials.
Apart from the copy of the FBI-seized materials, Trump is also seeking a copy of the search warrant and an unredacted version of the materials that were used to obtain it. This will also include the affidavit which was released recently with redaction.
“The Government should provide to the special master and to Movant a copy of the Seized Materials, a copy of the Search Warrant, and an unredacted copy of the underlying application materials,” Trump’s written filing to the court read.
The US Department of Justice (DoJ) has presented an argument that releasing the unredacted version of the affidavit will damage the ongoing investigation into the seized documents. The department also said that it will put several witnesses in harm’s way.
A lawyer of Trump’s legal team previously said in a television interview that they wanted to know the identities of the witnesses.
The US Justice Department also spoke against the former President’s allegations that the prosecutors blew a Presidential Records Act dispute out of proportion by making it a criminal investigation.
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“This investigation is not simply about efforts to recover improperly retained Presidential records,” the prosecutors said on Tuesday in a court filing.
They also cancelled Trump’s allegations by pointing toward the federal law about mishandling government records. According to the prosecutors, concealing or removing presidential records makes it a crime.
