Two former advisors to ex-president Donald Trump warn that he probably has secret classified documents stashed away in other residences, and the FBI should keep looking.
The FBI did a search on August 8 of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, and uncovered 11 sets of classified material. Some concerned nuclear weapons.
The Justice Department (DOJ) and FBI had been trying to obtain the records for several months before they resorted to the raid. They had previously received 15 boxes of documents stolen from the White House, and knew there was more that the Trump team was not handing over.
The DOJ told a federal judge on Tuesday that Trump’s failure to hand over the remaining documents voluntarily is an obstruction of justice. A grand jury had subpoenaed the records, which resulted in the Trump team handing over a sealed envelope. The envelope contained 38 different classified documents. Some were labeled “top secret” and contained sensitive information.
However, a brief, filed by the head of counterintelligence of the DOJ, Jay Bratt, and a Florida US Attorney, Joan Gonzalez, said that DOJ officials were shown a storage room where documents were kept, but they wouldn’t let them have access to them. Trump’s lawyers, “Explicitly prohibited government personnel from opening or looking inside any of the boxes that remained in the storage room, giving no opportunity for the government to confirm that no documents with classification markings remained,” Bratt and Gonzalez wrote.
Trump has said that he declassified the documents before removing them, but officials say there is no evidence of that so far.
The affidavit for the search warrant allowing the FBI to raid Mar-a-Lago, was recently published, heavily redacted.
The DOJ also released a photograph from their Mar-a-Lago search. The photo showed several folders labeled “top secret” all across the floor.
Michael Cohen, the ex-president’s former lawyer, said it’s very likely that Trump could have classified documents hidden in other locations, including his other residences, such as Bedminster, New Jersey, his Fifth Avenue apartment, and even the homes of relatives.
“I have been saying this since the @FBI raid,” Michael Cohen, tweeted Wednesday. “I believe Trump has copies, potentially other documents as well, at other locations including his children’s homes.”
John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser, said he “wouldn’t be surprised if there were more highly classified documents at Bedminster or some other residence of his.”
