UPDATED: A redacted version of the affidavit used to justify the August 8 search of Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property was unsealed Friday.
The heavily blacked-out document nevertheless showed that, in the 15 boxes that Trump initially sent to the National Archives, 184 documents had classification markings, including 25 marked as top secret.
The affidavit is here.
The unsealing drew intense interest, covered by cable news networks and, given journalists’ desire to see the document, overloaded PACER, the database used by federal courts.
More to come.
PREVIOUSLY: A judge on Thursday ordered the release of a redacted version of the FBI affidavit used to justify the Aug. 8 search of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property, in which FBI agents retrieved 11 sets of classified documents.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart’s ruling came after the Justice Department submitted a proposed redacted version of the affidavit, which was used to justify to the court why a search warrant was needed of the Trump property.
Reinhart wrote that the DOJ had “met its burden” of showing why portions of the affidavit should be redacted, including that the disclosure would reveal identities of witnesses, law enforcement agents and uncharged parties, and that it also would reveal protected grand jury information and the investigation’s “strategy, scope, sources and methods.”
The release was ordered by noon on Friday. The Justice Department, who opposed release of the affidavit at all, can still appeal.
Earlier this month, Reinhart ordered the unsealing of the search warrant and property receipt, which showed what was collected from the Trump property.
Trump claimed on his Truth Social platform that he did “nothing wrong” and that the search of his home was illegal. The action followed months of dispute between Trump’s team, the Justice Department and the National Archives over his complaints with the Presidential Records Act, which mandates that presidential records belong to the government, not the former president. DOJ attorneys issued a subpoena for additional records last spring, as well as security footage, but reportedly had reason to believe that additional boxes were being held at Mar-a-Lago.