FBI returns to Trump all documents seized in the Mar-A-Lago raid
President Donald Trump said Friday that the Department of Justice (DOJ) has returned boxes of documents seized by the FBI from his Mar-a-Lago home during a 2022 investigation.
Trump said the DOJ “ just returned the boxes that “Deranged” Jack Smith made a lot of noise about ,” referring to the former special counsel who led the investigation into Trump's alleged retention of classified documents during his first presidential term and his attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
“They were brought to Florida and will one day be part of the Trump Presidential Library. In the end, justice won,” Trump declared on his Truth Social platform.
Trump reiterated his position that the FBI investigation of him was politically motivated.
“I did absolutely nothing wrong. It was just an attack on a political opponent which obviously didn't work out well. Now justice in our country will be restored ,” the president said.
Alina Habba, a counselor to the president, said she personally loaded some of the "infamous boxes" onto Air Force One before Trump's return flight to Florida on Friday.
“Justice has been and will continue to be restored in this country under President Trump. Truth and justice always win in the end. God bless America ,” Habba said on social media platform X.
I just personally loaded the infamous “boxes” back onto Air Force 1 to head home where they belong. Justice has been and will continue to be restored in this country under President Trump. TRUTH AND JUSTICE ALWAYS WIN IN THE END. God Bless America
— Alina Habba (@AlinaHabba) February 28, 2025
In August 2022, the FBI raided Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, as part of an investigation into his alleged mishandling of classified documents after leaving office during his first term in 2021.
During the raid, FBI agents seized more than 11,000 unmarked documents and photographs classified, as well as more than 100 documents marked classified. Some of these documents were labeled “top secret.” The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) also recovered 15 boxes of government documents from Trump's Mar-a-Lago property in January 2022.
The documents seized in 2022
The raid followed a warrant issued by U.S. Examining Judge Bruce Reinhart, which allowed officers to seize any documents with classification markings, as well as the containers in which the documents were located and any containers stored or found with the documents.
In 2023, Smith indicted Trump on felony charges for his alleged unlawful retention of national defense information, conspiracy to obstruct justice, and withholding a document in a federal investigation.
Trump has denied any wrongdoing in these cases and has characterized the investigation as politically motivated. In a June 2023 interview with Fox News, Trump defended his handling of the documents and said he believed he had rights to the retained documents.
“Everything has been declassified because I have the right to declassify,” he told the news anchor. “This is purely a Presidential Records Act issue. It's not a criminal thing.”
Smith dropped both cases after Trump won a second presidential term in the 2024 election, citing Justice Department policy against prosecuting a sitting president. The special counsel resigned from the Justice Department before Trump's inauguration on January 20.
Before his resignation, Smith completed a final report on his investigation into Trump's criminal cases. Former U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, who appointed Smith to the investigation, told congressional leaders in January that the report would be made public after approval by the courts.
In a Jan. 6 letter, Trump's lawyers told Garland that they had reviewed a draft of the report and identified some problems. They argued that making the report public would be “unwise and illegal.”
“The draft report violates fundamental rules on the presumption of innocence, including against third parties needlessly called into question by Smith's false statements,” the lawyers said.
They said releasing the report would violate the Presidential Transition Law and the doctrine of presidential immunity. Trump's lawyers also argued that Smith lacks the authority to issue the report due to his alleged invalid nomination.
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The article FBI Returns All Documents Seized in the Mar-A-Lago Raid to Trump comes from Economic Scenarios .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/fbi-restituisce-a-trump-tutti-i-documenti-sequestrati-nel-raid-a-mar-a-lago/ on Sun, 02 Mar 2025 09:00:43 +0000.