FBI Director Kash Patel confirmed reports that officials raised probable cause concerns with the 2022 raid on President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago.
Responding to a reporter’s claim that the FBI “did not believe it had probable cause” to raid the property, Patel wrote on X, “It’s true – we just turned over documents to Capitol Hill to be made public showing the FBI told DOJ they did not have probable cause for raiding President Trump’s home in Mar A Lago but DOJ ‘didn’t give a [removed]’ and did it anyway.”
2022 records released by Senator Chuck Grassley’s (R-IA) office revealed that the FBI’s Washington Field Office “has been drafting a search warrant affidavit related to these potential boxes, but has some concerns that the information is single source, has not been corroborated, and may be dated.”
“DOJ CES opines, however, that the SW’s meet the probable cause standard,” the email read, referring to the Justice Department’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section and search warrant.
“At a minimum, even if the former president’s attorney is correct and the documents were all declassified (or believed to be declassified), it can be reasonably argued that the documents remain sensitive and should be properly secured until the matter of classification is sorted out,” the email added. “This conversation could easily be accomplished at the same time that WFO presses forward with the investigation and continues building out the search warrant.”
“Absent a witness coming forward with recent information about classified on site, at what point is it fair to table this?” an FBI agent wrote in a later email. “It is time consuming for the team, and not productive if there are no new facts supporting [probable cause]?”
The documents go on to declare that the Washington Field Office did not believe that it “established probable cause for the search warrant for classified records at Mar a Lago.”
Sharing the files on social media, Grassley wrote, “Received shocking new docs 2day from DOJ & FBI showing FBI DID NOT BELIEVE IT HAD PROBABLE CAUSE to raid Pres Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home but Biden DOJ pushed for it anyway.”
“Based on the records Mar-a-Lago raid was a miscarriage of justice,” he asserted.
