Somewhere Lady Justice is weeping. If the news of the National Security crimes of Donald Trump stealing and hiding classified documents/information at his Mar A Lago joint wasn’t bad enough it’s gotten worse. According to what we’ve been told the FBI had a carefully thought out search planned, and they performed a thorough search. It turns out that’s not true. They missed a couple of places, and while one hidden area was behind a Trump bedroom closet door with a big piece of furniture in front, another was a locked door. Which staff told the FBI was an empty space.
The FBI agent(s) simply accepted that and moved on. However as this report from ABC News makes clear there’s more to the story. A lot more it seems. Special Counsel Jack Smith’s team has been questioning several witnesses about a closet and “hidden room” at Mar A Lago that FBI agents didn’t search.
Special counsel Jack Smith’s team has questioned several witnesses about a closet and a so-called “hidden room” inside former President Donald Trump‘s residence at Mar-a-Lago that the FBI didn’t check while searching the estate in August 2022, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News. It seems prior to the Florida indictment, and long after the FBI seized dozens of boxes and well over 100 classified documents Smith’s team was trying to determine if there might still be more classified documents there. Keep in mind Smith wasn’t yet appointed Special Counsel. We’ll get to that.
What matters isn’t just that we’re only now learning about this. What’s eyebrow raising is what took place at that crucial time between when Team Trump attested under pain and penalty of perjury that everything classified had been turned back in and the search. And the search itself. Starting with the actual search, investigators came to believe a closet locked on the day of the search should have been opened and searched. Why? As ABC reports:
As investigators would later learn, Trump allegedly had the closet’s lock changed while his attorney was in Mar-a-Lago’s basement, searching for classified documents in a storage room that he was told would have all such documents. Trump’s alleged efforts to conceal classified documents from both the FBI and his own attorney are a key part of Smith’s indictment against Trump in Florida.
Funny how the staff didn’t mention to anyone conducting the search that some locks had been changed. (Or maybe they did and the agents blew it off?) However, watching the first part of Lawrence O’Donnell Andrew Weisman stated flat-out he had read the search warrant and the FBI had authority to open any room they wanted to look in to. In other words if no one would provide a key they had every legal right to break open any locked doors. The federal warrant approved the FBI’s plan to search Trump’s office and “all storage rooms and any other rooms or locations where boxes or records may be stored.”
Now let’s backtrack. Trump attorney Evan Corcoran (who actually was competent – no doubt why he’s long gone from Team Trump) had gone to Mar A Lago to deal with ensuring classified documents there were collected and returned. As I noted an affidavit was filed saying that was the case BUT the FBI had credible information that wasn’t true. That’s what led to the search warrant and actual search. What’s significant is what happened while Corcoran was there trying to keep Trump from harming himself legally. As we know aid Walt Nauta (and others) were engaged in moving stuff around to hide it from Corcoran!
However, he was told about a certain storage room and that’s where Corcoran spent considerable time, finding thirty or so classified documents. What he DIDN’T know is Trump was ahead of him trying to ensure he wouldn’t find everything:
Through their investigation, Smith’s team learned that while Corcoran was still in the storage room, Trump asked a longtime Mar-a-Lago employee to change the lock on the closet, sources said. For years, the lock on the closet was managed by the Secret Service, but on June 2, 2022, Trump had it changed and wanted the key, the sources said.
The linked article then dryly notes “One former maintenance worker described Trump’s request as unusual, according to the sources.” Well DUH! Then there’s the part that points out that unlike the locked closet, the FBI didn’t even know the about the so-called “hidden room” until after they left Mar-a-Lago. I have to admit that given Trump’s penchant for clutter a hidden space in a big closet who’s door was covered by a large piece of furniture maybe, just maybe failing to find it was if not excusable a bit understandable. Maybe.
The locked door however is another story entirely. ABC spoke to Jordan Strauss, a former federal prosecutor and former national security official in the Justice Department. He said the (alleged) failure of the FBI agents to search the closet “a bit astonishing.” More bluntly he said: “You’re searching a former president’s house. You [should] get it right the first time,” Strauss told ABC News. I couldn’t agree more. The article later reports his comments about being surprised because in his experience agents are always exceptionally thorough. That begs the question of why in this case they weren’t?
From where I sit FBI Director Chris Wray has some explaining to do and for that matter so does the FBI agent in charge of the search. AND the pre-Jack Smith DOJ official in charge of the matter at the time. My mind keeps saying WTF? again and again tonight thinking about all this. Especially since while regular folks like you and me are just finding out about it, you can be sure in court filings either sealed or redacted that a certain federal judge, a real Trump lapdog has known about this ever since fate (? – I still doubt the “random selection” was actually random) put the case in the hands of judge Aileen “Loose” Cannon who has made it abundantly clear she’s not about to put Trump on trial. No, she hopes he’ll win in November and shut the whole case down. And (in her drugs stolen from Don Jr.’s stash fueled delusional dreams) get herself picked for the next SCOTUS opening.
Of more interest to me however is the FBI. Conservatives rage that it’s hell bent on “getting Trump”, a corrupt to the core out of control liberal organization. WTF? It’s long been known most agents lean or are Republican. BUT, most of them check that stuff when they are on the job. Most. Not all. For years there existed that group up in NYC that the SDNY had to rely on much of the time and who hated, and I mean HATED all things Clinton. Who swore to find a way to bring down the Clintons and with them in New York and the Clinton Global Initiative headquartered there put in a lot of effort investigating. They never got ole Bill, but Hillary? Who do you think gave Rudy G. the information he used to devastating effect in 2016 when he was still able at time to accomplish his goals?
This cabal of ultra conservatives up in NYC was an open secret including while Robert Mueller ran the FBI but no one would do anything. So don’t tell me it’s CT speculation that one or more of the agents involved in the Mar A Lago search weren’t interested in it being the typical thorough search that would have normally happened. I’ll guarantee you had the FBI been searching the Clinton home, or sitting President Joe Biden’s and found a locked door they’d have broken that sucker open in a heartbeat if no key was produced!
Keep an eye out. I have a sick feeling there’s much more to this story. In the meantime it’s worth it to read the linked article in full.
Another reason NOT to vote for Humper 45: SCOTUS Justice Cannon.
FBI. Seems j Edgar Hoover’s pr machine really paid off over the years. Soooo professional… that a locked door couldn’t be open!!! (But now my memory is faulty… I thought the talking legal heads kept yammering about only searching areas where crimes were being committed and I guess files stored 🤷🏽♂️🤔🤦🏻♂️). Now I know why lady justice has a blind fold on… 😬😳
As the evening unfolded I heard at least two legal pundits point out the search warrant was clearly broad enough to allow agents to search wherever they saw fit. So, keeping in mind this WAS a well thought out search, that there was a plan that everyone was briefed on before they showed up at Trump’s place, that they knew what they were looking for and WHY they would be doing the search in the first place it begs the question: Finding a locked door, and some aide(s) saying it was a “closet” that used to have a staircase but now just had some bookshelves but “golly gee, we just don’t/can’t find a key to this door” WHY the agents didn’t break it open? One doesn’t have to be LE, much less a Special Agent of the FBI to be thinking “Locked door? To a fooking closet? Given why I’m here I’m by god going to take a look in THERE! We can do it the easy way or the hard way but I WILL be taking a look at what’s behind that door!”
So yes, I think it’s quite fair to question whether there was at least one agent involved in the search who wanted to help cover for Trump. I’m sure it’s known who decided to accept the weak ass LIE and move on. If that agent(s) still has their badge I think Wray needs to explain in OPEN testimony on the Hill WHY? Sometimes Wray seems to do his job, but sometimes not and from where I sit “seems not” too often is intentionally “does not.” Never forget from the beginning of his career in public service he’s been a Federalist Society fuckwad. I don’t trust him. He’s still young enough that he wants to cover his ass and move up to bigger and better things when his tenure is up so at times he says and does the right things. But at his core he’s Federalist Society and works to help them advance their fascist agenda. A double agent.
It’s been known for some time there are factions within the FBI and every other major federal law enforcement org, including an ever present pro-Trump fraction. And of course double-agents. It’s gotten difficult to know who to trust with information. There are those in the FBI who will sabotage an investigation for Trump given the opportunity if they believe they can get away with it. We will likely never know for sure if this was the case here with the agent(s) who did not pursue breaking the lock on the closet door or pursue the hidden room. It’s never in the best interests of any investigative agency to air its dirty laundry to the public or Congress – the blow back is always fierce.
What is for sure is Agolf Twitler still has lots of stolen U.S. highly classified documents (or copies thereof) hidden in secret places – not just at Mar-a Lago, but at over a dozen of his properties all over the US and the world. Rumors are he has some buried near the Fountain in a secret compartment underneath the bricks in front of Lamington House in Bedminster, NJ – the same property which Rump a Dump has named his “Safe Haven”.
The biggest question is why the Dirty Don felt the need !to go to all this trouble to hide documents he claimed were just personal memorabilia. We all know he’s,a,spoiled brat who regularly threw temper tantrums a,toddler would be appalled at, probably tossing things at Staff as,well as,walls (why anybody would work for him after the first assault is a,real.mystery). But even he wouldn’t have gone this far for just newspaper clippings. There has to be more to it than just him defiantly resisting anyone telling he couldn’t do it. That alone should have made the feds suspicious and if no key could be fined, they should have taken the door off its hinges or used a bettering ram to get in there because no one goes to that kind
of behavior without a damned good reason, even if he is a spoiled two-year-old
here’s to hoping J. Edgar is dancing in hell wearing a particularly itchy tutu and toe shoes five sizes too small.
Who locks a closet??? I have never even seen a closet with a lock on it! That should have been the biggest clue that OMG, we need to break the lock on this closet if they can’t give us the key to it! I mean, what were they thinking? Obviously NOT thinking! OR maybe the FBI person in charge was trying to shield Trump? I mean that seems a pretty obvious possibility.
See my comment above.
The GOP forced the Secret Service to testify against Pres Clinton about Monica.
If it is discovered that the Secret Service knew about the boxes, why wouldn’t they be criminally liable?
Funny how the magats make up conspiracy theories WITH NO EVIDENCE, and some just plain nuts, while there is plenty of evidence the Democrats have to start a few of our own. Here’s another example.
Apparently they didn’t want to break down the door to this closet. What a bunch of inept dumb-asses. If a door is locked and the key is not produced IMMEDIATELY you break the f*cker down ESPECIALLY when we’re talking about classified docs. What in the hell were those fools thinking f.f.s.?