The Trump legal team just filed a new motion in the matter of the FBI raid on President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home.
This motion asks that the Court:
Appoints a special master; (b) orders further inspection of all seized material by the Government up to the appointment of a special master; (c) demands that the Government provide more detail Receipts for Property and (d). requires the Government return any items seized outside the purview of the Special Master.
Search Warrant.
Trump legal team asks for “Special Masters” to independently review Mar-a-Lago records. Law enforcement serves as a shield protecting Americans. It can’t be used to support political causes.”https://t.co/DjGpsVE27q pic.twitter.com/QLccea1CY0
— Catherine Herridge (@CBS_Herridge) August 22, 2022
The motion said that the government had admitted to seizing “privileged or potentially privileged materials,” plus there were also photos, handwritten notes, and even Trump’s passports, in an “already overbroad warrant.” It says all the government has provided is a scant property receipt, with no accounting for what was taken or why when Trump was fully cooperating with the government’s requests. While it attacks the government leaks used by the FBI to justify their raid, the motion does not give the reason. The motion said there was no “exigency” for the forceful raid — noting the FBI waited for three days even after getting the warrant — and that there was no basis for keeping that information from the public. Trump had been cooperating and providing documents to the government for months — the motion outlines those various exchanges.
They can also seize documents created during his presidency, which is already absurdly broad. But it’s worse. The motion notes the warrant says that the government can seize “any other containers/boxes that are collectively stored or found together with the aforementioned documents and containers/boxes.” This gave them the right to seize anything that just happened to be near the documents they wanted.
According to the motion, the FBI requested that surveillance cameras not be used during raid. The Trump team declined. It also confirms the attorneys weren’t allowed to observe the search of the home.
The motion alleges violations of the Fourth Amendment, as well as an effort to get around that the Presidential Records Act doesn’t have a criminal mechanism or penalty. The motion asks whether the FBI has been honest with the judge regarding Trump’s cooperation with the government. The motion also asks if the FBI was honest with the judge about Trump’s cooperation. This motion also highlights some past unfairness by the FBI against Trump’s team, including falsification of documents to obtain a FISA warrant or Strzok-Page text texts. It notes that this raid could involve some of those same people involved in discredit Russia probe.
It’s a good move, but they should have filed for the special master immediately after the seizure. Two weeks have passed for the FBI to inspect and take photographs of all sorts of items, even documents that were likely not theirs. This may feel a bit like closing a barn door to evict a horse who has fled. Before the Trump team made their motion to Court, they had requested that the government appoint a special Master. These requests were rejected by the DOJ. They will probably try to stop the appointment of the special master just like they did with the Affidavit. But once again, they’ll show they aren’t about transparency here.