Following the bombshell news from CNN that agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation executed a search warrant raid on ex-President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home/resort in Palm Beach, Florida, last night, multiple reports have since indicated that the search warrant was in relation to the National Archives documents that Donald Trump illegally took from the White House upon the transfer of power to Joe Biden.
Up until now, it was unclear as to what documents, exactly, the search warrant was looking for, or what the FBI officials managed to find in the raid — though, the speculations and theories were wide and plentiful.
But now, the Washington Post is out with explosive new reporting, based on inside information from two different sources with knowledge on the matter, stating that “some f the presidential records recovered from former president Donald Trump’s residence at Mar-a-Lago are so sensitive they may not be able to be described in forthcoming inventory reports in an unclassified way.”
Washington Post reports:
The Archives has publicly confirmed earlier reporting by The Washington Post that classified materials were found within the boxes and that torn-up records had been transferred to the Archives but not reconstructed by the Trump White House. The inventory is expected to provide more information on the volume and scope of classified documents, including details on the level of classification, according to the two people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive topic. There are records at the very highest levels of classification, including some that can be viewed by only a small number of government officials, the two people said.”
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The publication reports one source saying, “There are records that only a very few have clearances” to review. According to the report, “The documents are so sensitive that they may not be able to describe them in an unclassified way, and, therefore, such documents might be described broadly in a classified addendum to the inventory, according to the two people.”
This news comes as Democratic Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney sent a request to the National Archives and Records Administration seeking further information on the 15 boxes of records and documents that were already recovered from Trump’s resort/home last month. Her request comes in connection to a congressional investigation into Trump’s handling of White House records.
“I am deeply concerned that former president Trump may have violated the law through his intentional efforts to remove and destroy records that belong to the American people,” Maloney wrote in the letter to the National Archives. “This Committee plans to get to the bottom of what happened and assess whether further action is needed to prevent the destruction of additional presidential records and recover those records that are still missing.”
You can read the full report from the Washington Post here.
Featured image via Flickr/Gage Skidmore, under Creative Commons license 2.0