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Former US President Trump Kicks As FBI Searches His Home, Says ‘Assault Can Only Take Place In Broken Third World Countries’

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He also described it as an assault that can only take place in ‘broken third world countries’.  

Former President of the United States of America, Donald Trump has described the search carried out in his Palm Beach home in Florida by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, FBI, as unnecessary and inappropriate. 

 

He also described it as an assault that can only take place in ‘broken third world countries’.  

 

According to New York Times, Trump alleged that the search by the F.B.I. on Monday was an effort to stop him from running for US President in 2024. 

 

 

 

“After working and cooperating with the relevant government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate,” he said.  

 

 

 

 

Trump said, maintaining it was an effort to stop him from running for president in 2024.  

 

“Such an assault could only take place in broken, third-world countries. 

 

“They even broke into my safe!” he wrote. 

 

 

 

Eric Trump, one of his sons, told Fox News that he was the one who informed his father that the search was taking place, and he said the search warrant was related to presidential documents. 

 

 

 

The search was at least in part for whether any records remained at the club, a person familiar with it said. It took place on Monday morning, the person said, although Trump said agents were still there many hours later. 

 

 

Mr. Trump did not share any details about what the FBI agents said they were searching for. 

 

 

 

 

The search, according to multiple people familiar with the investigation, appeared to be focused on material that Mr. Trump had brought with him to Mar-a-Lago, his private club and residence, when he left the White House. Those boxes contained many pages of classified documents, according to a person familiar with their contents, New York Times reports.  

 

 

 

 

Trump delayed returning 15 boxes of material requested by officials with the National Archives for many months, only doing so when there became a threat of action to retrieve them. The case was referred to the Justice Department by the archives early this year. 

 

 

 

 

The search marked the latest remarkable turn in the long-running investigations into Mr. Trump’s actions before, during and after his presidency — and even as he weighs announcing another candidacy for the White House. 

 

 

 

 

It came as the Justice Department has stepped up its separate inquiry into Trump’s efforts to remain in office after his defeat at the polls in the 2020 election and as the former president also faces an accelerating criminal inquiry in Georgia and civil actions in New York. 

 

 

 

 

Mr. Trump has long cast the F.B.I. as a tool of Democrats who have been out to get him, and the search set off a furious reaction among his supporters in the Republican Party and on the far right of American politics. Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the Republican leader in the House, suggested that he intended to investigate Attorney General Merrick B. Garland if Republicans took control of the House in November. 

 

 

 

 

The F.B.I. would have needed to convince a judge that it had probable cause that a crime had been committed, and that agents might find evidence at Mar-a-Lago, to get a search warrant. Proceeding with a search of a former president’s home would almost surely have required sign-off from top officials at the bureau and the Justice Department. 

 

 

 

 

The search, however, does not mean prosecutors have determined that Mr. Trump committed a crime. 

 

 

 

 

An F.B.I. representative declined to comment, as did Justice Department officials. The F.B.I. director, Christopher A. Wray, was appointed by Trump. 

 

 

 

 

Aides to President Biden said they were stunned by the development and learned of it from Twitter. 

 

 

 

 

The search came as the Justice Department has also been stepping up questioning of former Trump aides who had been witnesses to discussions and planning in the White House of Mr. Trump’s efforts to overturn his election loss. 

 

 

 

 

Trump has been the focus of questions asked by federal prosecutors in connection with a scheme to send “fake” electors to Congress for the certification of the Electoral College.  

 

 

 

 

The House committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol also continues its work and is interviewing witnesses this week. 

 

 

 

 

The law governing the preservation of White House materials, the Presidential Records Act, lacks teeth, but criminal statutes can come into play, especially in the case of classified material. 

 

 

 

 

Criminal codes, which carry jail time, can be used to prosecute anyone who “willfully injures or commits any depredation against any property of the United States” and anyone who “willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates or destroys” government documents. 

 

 

 

 

In 2007, Donald Keyser, an Asia expert and former senior State Department official, was sentenced to prison after he confessed to keeping more than 3,000 sensitive documents — ranging from the classified to the top secret — in his basement. 

 

 

 

 

In January of this year, the archives retrieved 15 boxes that Trump took with him to Mar-a-Lago from the White House residence when his term ended. The boxes included material subject to the Presidential Records Act, which requires that all documents and records pertaining to official business be turned over to the archives. 

 

 

 

 

The items in the boxes included documents, mementos, gifts and letters. The archives did not describe the classified material it found other than to say that it was “classified national security information.” 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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