U.S. judge says he leans toward releasing some evidence for Trump search
'There are portions of the affidavit that could be unsealed,' judge says
A U.S. judge on Thursday said he is leaning toward releasing some of the evidence presented by the U.S. Justice Department to justify its search of Donald Trump's Florida home last week, in a case pitting news organizations against federal prosecutors.
Despite objections by the Justice Department, U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart said he believes "there are portions of the affidavit that could be unsealed," referring to the sworn statement laying out the evidence for why there was probable cause to search Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort.
Reinhart ordered the Justice Department to file a redacted version of the affidavit under seal by noon next Thursday, but said the Justice Department will be given the opportunity to appeal if prosecutors don't agree with his proposed version.
The judge's order seemed to mark a victory for news outlets, who appeared in federal court in West Palm Beach on Thursday to persuade the judge that the public interest in the affidavit outweighs the benefits of keeping it sealed.
The Justice Department opposes the release of the evidence.
Jay Bratt, a top Justice Department national security prosecutor, argued that the affidavit should remain hidden from the public. Unsealing it, he said, would provide a "road map" of the investigation — which he said was in its "early stages" — and expose the next steps to be taken by federal agents and prosecutors.
"There is another public interest at stake and that is the public interest that criminal investigations are able to go forward unimpeded," he said.
The search was part of a federal investigation into whether Trump illegally removed documents when he left office in January 2021 after losing the presidential election to Democrat Joe Biden.
The Justice Department is investigating violations of three laws, including a provision in the Espionage Act that prohibits the possession of national defence information and another statute that makes it a crime to knowingly destroy, conceal or falsify records with the intent to obstruct an investigation.
Media outlets press for release of records
Attorneys for several media outlets, including The New York Times, the publisher of the Wall Street Journal, ABC News and NBC News, told Reinhart on Thursday that the public's right to know and the historic significance of the search outweigh any arguments to keep the records sealed.
"The public could not have a more compelling interest in ensuring maximum transparency over this event," said Charles Tobin, one of the attorneys arguing for the media companies.
Trump, in statements on social media, has called on the court to unseal the unredacted version of the affidavit "in the interest of transparency."
But none of his attorneys have filed any motions asking the West Palm Beach federal court to do so. His attorney Christina Bobb, however, was present in the courtroom on Thursday to observe the proceedings.
The former president says the search was politically motivated. He has also said, without providing evidence, that he had a standing order to declassify the documents in question.
However, none of the three laws cited by the Justice Department in the search warrant require a showing that the documents were in fact classified.
Threats directed at FBI agents have increased since the raid.
In Ohio last week, police shot an armed man dead after he tried to breach an FBI building. A second man in Pennsylvania, meanwhile, has since been charged with making threats against FBI agents.
Witness safety a concern, Justice Department says
Bratt said on Thursday that the two agents whose names appeared on a leaked copy of the unredacted warrant have also since received threats.
In addition, he said, the Justice Department "is very concerned about the safety of the witnesses in the case."
Trump's rhetoric against the FBI has caught on with Republican voters, 54 per cent of whom say federal law enforcement officials behaved irresponsibly in the case, a Reuters/Ipsos poll found this week.
The Mar-a-Lago search marked a significant escalation in one of the many federal and state investigations Trump is facing from his time in office and in private business. The Republican former president has suggested he might run for the White House again in 2024, but has not made any commitment.
Last week, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland took the highly unusual step of publicly moving to unseal the search warrant, two attachments and a redacted version of the receipt showing the items the FBI seized during its search on Aug. 8.
The records showed that the FBI seized boxes containing 11 sets of classified materials, some of which were labelled "top secret" — the highest level of classification reserved for the most closely held U.S. national security information.
Such documents are typically kept in special government facilities because disclosure could cause grave damage to national security.
Earlier this week, the Justice Department said it is open to releasing some additional redacted materials from the warrant, such as cover sheets, the government's motion to seal and the court's sealing order.
The media outlets in the case have asked for those records to be unsealed as well.
At the start of Thursday's proceedings, Reinhart said he would unseal those other portions of the documents with some redactions.