We don’t know precisely what classified documents the FBI spirited away in a dozen boxes from Mar-a-Lago, but here’s what we know for sure: A search warrant against a former president would not have been OK’d unless the attorney general, plus the FBI director (a Trump appointee), plus a federal judge had all determined that there was probable cause that a crime had been committed, and that the search of Mar-a-Lago would produce evidence of that crime.
David Laufman, who ran the Justice Department’s counterintelligence section until the midpoint of Trump’s only term, says: “For the department to pursue a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago tells me that the quantum and quality of the evidence they were reciting – in a search warrant and affidavit that an FBI agent swore to – was likely so pulverizing in its force as to eviscerate any notion that the search warrant and this investigation is politically motivated.”
But Trump’s twisted fans, including most prominent Republicans, aren’t interested in facts, especially any facts that might further taint their tinpot hero. Waiting for actual details about the search – which Trump could share whenever he wants, because he has a copy of the warrant – is not the way they roll. On Monday, as soon as Trump himself announced the “siege” of his “beautiful” home (so that he could spin the narrative, playing the PR game as always), the rabble and its GOP enablers detonated their own heads with the power of a thousand suns. The worst of them (“summertime was made for killing fields”) have vowed to get locked ‘n’ loaded and go lib-hunting on our once-shining city on the hill.
The most pathetic enabler, by far, is Mike Pence, who intoned: “I share the deep concern of millions of Americans over the unprecedented search of the personal residence of President Trump. No former President of the United States has ever been subject to a raid of their personal residence in American history.” (Gee, I wonder why.) All we need to say about Pence is that it takes a special breed of worm to cozy up to the thug who didn’t care a whit whether he was hung by the neck until dead.
But the weirdest talking point – dutifully echoed by various lockstep lickspittles – goes like this: “If they can do it to a former President, imagine what they can do to you.” That’s how the House GOP is spinning the incident. Aside from the obvious rejoinder, that no person is above the law, permit me to offer this response: If you or I were to steal classified documents from the federal government, in violation of the Presidential Records Act (Title 18, Section 2071 of the U.S. Code), and hide the goods somewhere, especially after earning a reputation for ripping up documents and flushing them down the toilet, then yes, you or I could surely imagine the FBI showing up with a warrant.
Trump also hints that anything found to be incriminating will surely have been ”planted” by the FBI. His fans are already echoing that baseless BS. According to actual evidence, the only thing planted on Trump property is Ivana.
The FBI and the Justice Department conducted its search by the book, on the QT. It didn’t announce the search or leak word in advance. Merrick Garland has long been roasted for being cautious, but now his methodical manner looks like an asset that buttresses his credibility. When someone so cautious gives the OK for such a search, it signals that Trump is indeed in deep trouble. The search underscores Garland’s recently stated vow to go wherever the evidence leads.
But, as Trump surely knew when he announced the search – getting “out in front of the story,” as it were – the FBI’s reticence left a vacuum that he was only to happy to fill with his trademark cheap theatrics. His political team is also trying to raise money off the search. (“Return the power to the people! Will you fight with me? Donate.”) How sad and dangerous it is that a major party has been reduced to a fact-free cult that’s still in thrall to a suspected criminal – or, to be more specific, someone for whom there’s probable cause to believe he’s a criminal. Lawlessness is now a badge of honor.
Caroline Fredrickson, a senior fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice, offers this warning: “Trump may well be indicted (at some point)…But as much as we who value rule of law might find such a development comforting in such unsettled times, we need to prepare for what is to come. Trump will embrace the charges, run for president on them and for that reason gain votes in the Republican primary.”
Trump could end the latest mystery by simply sharing the details of the warrant, and the inventory of what was found. The FBI was required to give him both. If this search was just a “witch hunt” or a “Gestapo” raid or whatever, then he can simply release the warrant and the inventory. Tell us what statutes the feds believe he has violated. Let us all decide for ourselves whether it was all justified. In short, put up or shut up.
But I’ll take a wild guess: He’ll release that material as soon as his detectives get back from Hawaii with his long-promised bombshell about Barack Obama’s birth.
And I’ll cede the last word to Greg Nunziata, a former Republican counsel on Capitol Hill: “The FBI may be right, or it may be wrong, in its raid at Mar-a-Lago. But Republicans who rush to condemn the FBI, but still comfort themselves to excuse or ignore Trump’s many wrongs, including those leading to the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol, disgrace only themselves.”
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Meanwhile, this morning, when questioned by the New York attorney general’s office about his finances, Trump pleaded the Fifth Amendment.
Here’s Trump in 2016: “Fifth Amendment, Fifth Amendment, Fifth Amendment. Horrible, horrible. The mob pleads the Fifth Amendment. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?”