Donald Trump says his residence in Mar-A-Lago has been abruptly raided by “a large group of FBI agents,” characterizing the intrusion as a politically calculated move to stunt the former president’s future political ambitions.
Trump posted a statement to his Truth Social platform Monday evening denouncing the raid on his home as “not necessary or appropriate.” While the reason for federal law enforcement descending on Trump’s estate in Palm Beach, Florida, it follows months of speculation that federal prosecutors had turned their attention to the former president for his actions in the effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
“Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States before,” Trump said in the statement. “After working and cooperating with the relevant Government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate.”
Calling the raid “prosecutorial misconduct” and a “weaponization of the Justice System,” Trump said the raid was hatched by “Radical Left Democrats” seeking to prevent him from running for president in 2024. Trump likened his treatment to corruption in “broken, Third-World Countries.”
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“They even broke into my safe!” said Trump. “What is the difference between this and Watergate, where operatives broke into the Democrat National Committee? Here, in reverse, Democrats broke into the home of the 45th President of the United States.”
Trump was referring to the Watergate scandal that led to the undoing of President Richard Nixon. In 1972, a team of men broke into Washington, D.C.’s Watergate complex where the Democratic National Committee had offices. The burglars were acting on the orders of G. Gordon Liddy, an FBI agent who worked on Nixon’s re-election committee, to bug DNC telephones.
The arrests of five men led to one of the worst political scandals in U.S. history.
Trump did not offer an official reason for the raid. But the House January 6 committee has held a series of nationally televised hearings that have cast Trump as attempting to prevent Congress from certifying the 2020 presidential election.
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