The FBI executed a search warrant on former President Trump’s home in Florida on Monday, the ex-president said, lashing out at law enforcement for what he called “political persecution.”
“These are dark times for our Nation, as my beautiful home, Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, is currently under siege, raided, and occupied by a large group of FBI agents,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
“After working and cooperating with the relevant Government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate,” Trump said.
The alleged raid by the FBI came two days after Trump’s latest hint at a 2024 run, in which he stopped short of giving an official announcement.
“Well, it’s not a long period, regardless, whether you go before or after, certainly not a very long period of time,” the former president said when responding to questions from the press before he took the stage at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Dallas, Texas, on Saturday.
“It’s coming,” Trump said, “and I think people are going to be very happy.”
“Our country has never been in a position like this. We lost everything. We’ve lost energy independence. We’ve lost our prestige. We’ve lost every single thing you can lose,” Trump said during the event, noting the withdrawal from Afghanistan, which he previously called “the greatest tactical mistake in history,” and the border crisis.
Trump’s lawyer Christina Bobb confirmed with CNN on Monday night that the FBI seized documents from Mar-a-Lago.
“President Trump and his legal team have been cooperative with FBI and DOJ officials every step of the way. The FBI did conduct an unannounced raid and seized paper,” Bobb said.
The 45th president said during his speech that he may be the “most persecuted” person in the history of America.
“A friend of mine recently said that I was the most persecuted person in the history of our country,” Trump said during his speech at CPAC. “And then I thought about it, because I didn’t have time to think much because I’m always being persecuted, and I felt he may very well be right.”
Trump called the raid “prosecutorial misconduct, the weaponization of the Justice System, and an attack by Radical Left Democrats who desperately don’t want [him] to run for President in 2024, especially based on recent polls,” adding that Democrats “will likewise do anything to stop Republicans and Conservatives in the upcoming Midterm Elections.”
“Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States before,” Trump said.
The remarkable execution of a search warrant at a former president’s home comes as the Justice Department has accelerated its investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and the actions Trump took to overturn the 2020 election results to remain in power.
It was not immediately clear what was examined during the search, nor what the search warrant specified, but Trump said the law enforcement officials “even broke into my safe.”
The Department of Justice (DOJ) declined to comment.
The New York Times reported that the search appeared to be focused on records that Trump brought with him to the Mar-a-Lago estate after leaving the White House.
Last year, the National Archives reportedly asked the Justice Department to investigate after authorities recovered 15 boxes of materials from Trump’s Florida home that should have been left with government records keepers. Among the retrieved materials were some that were classified.
The search would appear to be the first of its kind against a former president, but it remains unclear whether it’s a prelude to criminal charges, another scenario without precedent in U.S. history.
In order to have secured a search warrant, federal law enforcement would have had to show probable cause supporting their suspicion of criminal activity and get authorization from a federal magistrate judge.
In recent weeks, DOJ has been focusing on Trump’s efforts to remain in power through a false elector scheme, transmitting what campaign officials referred to as “fake” election certificates in order to reverse the 2020 election in key states won by President Biden. The department has reportedly convened a federal grand jury to investigate the scheme, in addition to the grand jury investigation into the Jan. 6 attack.
It also previously executed search warrants on two lawyers who worked with the former president.
DOJ seized the phone of John Eastman, who crafted memos for the campaign detailing the false elector strategy as well as a plan for then-Vice President Mike Pence to buck his ceremonial duty to certify the election results. And it also searched the home of Jeffrey Clark, an assistant attorney general Trump weighed installing as attorney general so he could forward an investigation into his baseless claims of election fraud.
But there are signs the department may have expanded its probe.
Last week, Trump’s former White House counsel, Pat Cipollone, was reportedly called to testify before a federal grand jury, as was his deputy Patrick Philbin.
The two men may be able to offer a more wide-ranging look at Trump’s actions leading up to Jan. 6. Cipollone pushed back against another plan by Trump campaign attorneys to seize voting machines. He also had concerns about the legality of Trump’s plans to march to the Capitol on Jan. 6, according to testimony from White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson before the House select committee investigating the attack.
Kenneth Klukowski, a former deputy to Clark, is also reportedly cooperating with the DOJ investigation.
In his lengthy statement, Trump railed against the search, comparing it to Watergate.
“Here, in reverse, Democrats broke into the home of the 45th President of the United States,” he wrote.
The White House said late Monday they “did not have notice of the reported action.”
Attorney General Merrick Garland in recent weeks appeared to be more responsive to criticism that DOJ’s probe was lagging that of those by House investigators but has consistently denied the presence of any political motivations within the Jan. 6 investigation.
“We pursue justice without fear or favor,” Garland said in an interview with NBC News late last month. “We intend to hold everyone, anyone who was criminally responsible for the events surrounding Jan. 6 or any attempt to interfere with the lawful transfer of power from one administration to another accountable. That’s what we do.” Sanctions squeeze has Russia stripping planes for spare parts: report Energy & Environment — Senate passes biggest climate package in history
“It is inevitable in this kind of investigation that there’ll be speculation about what we are doing, who we are investigating, what our theories are,” he added. “The reason there is this speculation and uncertainty is that it’s a fundamental tenet of what we do as prosecutors and investigators is to do it outside of the public eye.”