Raid on Donald Trump – Department of Justice: Documents hidden and removed

In the legal dispute over secret documents discovered during a search of former US President Donald Trump’s property, investigators are seeing indications of possible obstruction of justice.

The Justice Department wrote late Tuesday night (local time): “Evidence has been found that government records may have been hidden and removed from storage (at Trump Palace) and that efforts may have been made to obstruct the investigation (…)” document published court.

In early August, the FBI searched Trump’s Mar-a-Lago mansion in Palm Beach, Florida. The FBI confiscated several sets of documents classified as top secret. Since Trump reportedly kept the documents in his private property after his tenure in office, he may have broken the law. This is now under investigation. Trump criticized the authorities’ actions as politically motivated. The Republican was president from 2017 to 2021, and could run for a second term in 2024.

“Trump has no right”

During the search, the emergency services confiscated many boxes containing more than a hundred secret documents, some of which were subject to the highest levels of secrecy, the ministry has now written. Contrary to assurances by a Trump lawyer in early June that such documents would only be kept in a storage room at Mar-a-Lago, classified documents were also found in Trump’s office there.

Last week, Trump asked a Florida court to appoint a special representative to review documents seized during the search. On Saturday, Judge Eileen Cannon announced her initial intent to appoint such an impartial examiner. In the court document now filed against Trump’s request, the department argued that Trump, as a former president, no longer had the right to the documents because they “do not belong to him” but belong to the government.

SDA / nlu

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