An increasingly high-stakes standoff between Donald Trump and federal investigators lands in court on Thursday, after days of headline-grabbing revelations surrounding highly classified documents seized by the FBI from the former president\u2019s Florida home.
\nTrump\u2019s lawyers are asking that an outside party \u2014 a \u201cspecial master\u201d \u2014 be named to reassess the government\u2019s screening of sensitive documents to determine if any were \u201chighly personal information\u201d that should be returned or protected by claims of privilege.
\nThe federal court has already indicated its \u201cpreliminary intent\u201d to agree to the independent review, meaning there is little intrigue with respect to the stated purpose of the hearing. But the request has significantly upped the ante.
\nSome analysts see the move as an attempt by Team Trump to complicate the probe.
\nIt also prompted a searing disclosure by the Justice Department of the evidence against the Republican former president recovered from the search of his Mar-a-Lago residence in south Florida last month.
\nGovernment officials said in a filing on Tuesday they had evidence of efforts to hide classified documents despite a grand jury demand in May that Trump produce records removed from the White House in January 2021.
\nSome of the files were so sensitive, they noted, that federal agents and Justice Department personnel needed their security clearances elevated to even look at the material.
\nThe filing also stated that FBI agents located classified documents in Trump\u2019s desk drawers with his passports. \u201cThe location of the passports is relevant evidence in an investigation of unauthorised retention and mishandling of national defense information,\u201d the department said.
\nThe filing provided the most detailed account yet of a year-and-a-half long effort to recover hundreds of classified files that were improperly taken to Mar-a-Lago when Trump left office. And the claim of obstructing the FBI search piles further legal pressure on the former president, who denies all wrongdoing.
\nThe two sides are expected to wrangle over the scope of the review and whether it will determine if parts of the cache are covered by \u201cprivilege\u201d that can shield some presidential and attorney-client communications from investigation. Prosecutors say Trump \u201chas no property interest in any presidential records (including classified records) seized from the premises\u201d and that he cannot assert executive privilege against the executive branch itself.
\nBut the real drama could emerge in US District Judge Aileen Cannon\u2019s questioning of the 76-year-old billionaire\u2019s attorneys, when she will have the opportunity to quiz them over whether he declassified some of the documents, as he has claimed.
\nTrump\u2019s latest legal filing on Wednesday didn\u2019t address the most damaging aspects of the government\u2019s potential obstruction case and did not claim that he declassified the documents while he was in office.
\nCannon, a Trump appointee, may also scrutinize the certification that his lawyers delivered to the Justice Department on June 3, falsely stating that all files with classified markings had been returned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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