An attempt from former President Donald Trump and his legal team at securing the selection of a so-called special master to help handle the review of materials recently seized from Mar-a-Lago isn’t off to a great start.
The FBI descended on the southern Florida Trump property known as Mar-a-Lago amid a Justice Department investigation into the handling of government records from Trump’s administration. In the search, agents found items marked as classified in a storage area on the property where authorities were previously specifically told no such material remained. A special master would be a third party named by the court to deal with potentially contentious issues. At present, the Justice Department is relying on a team of prosecutors who aren’t working on the documents probe for a review of the materials seized from Mar-a-Lago. That process involves removing items from the mix that, for whatever reason, investigators shouldn’t obtain. (Privilege arguments already came up.)
Trump’s request for a special master came weeks after the FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago, which took place August 8. Trump’s team was aware of interest by the Justice Department in examining materials previously found at Mar-a-Lago by late April, according to a May letter from the head of the National Archives that emerged this week. In the time between the National Security Division at the Justice Department writing to the Trump team, which the archivist’s letter referenced, and the raid, the Justice Department also obtained additional docs from Mar-a-Lago and subpoenaed — and obtained — surveillance footage. Even if the raid was a surprise, the Justice Department’s interest wasn’t a shock.
A Florida federal judge instituted a Friday deadline for elaborations she’s demanding of arguments filed by the Trump team in favor of a special master, CNN explains. The judge is District Court Judge Aileen Cannon in the Southern District of Florida, who demanded that Trump’s legal team further explain, among other points of contention, their argument for why there’s a legal opening for court action and the rhetorical contours of what the former president is actually after. In their original arguments, CNN notes Trump’s legal team cited rules for handling civil matters — although the search of Mar-a-Lago was conducted as part of a criminal probe and hinged on suspicions that specific crimes, including the Espionage Act, were violated. Adding onto the confusion, Trump’s lawyers didn’t actually file a request for something along the lines of a temporary restraining order, a short-term court order that would swiftly secure some level of protection for their side.
Trump’s legal team found a place, however, for arguments about previous investigations into Russian meddling in U.S. politics and suggestions that the raid was somehow designed to undercut a Trump presidential campaign in 2024 — a notion for which there’s no evidence in the real-world. CNN notes that filing the request for a special master with a judge apparently new to the case, rather than the judge who approved the warrant, also sparked “confusion” among expert observers. How incompetent actually are Trump’s lawyers? A report recently emerged in The Washington Post saying Trump was experiencing difficulties in locking down a solid legal team. These details certainly suggest the report was accurate, no matter Trump’s attempts to dispute its contents.
Featured image: Gage Skidmore/ Creative Commons
