A US court has made public a detailed inventory of the material seized by the FBI from former President Donald Trump’s Florida home last month.
According to the filing, agents took 33 boxes of documents including dozens of empty folders marked classified.
It also reveals several documents marked secret and top secret were recovered from Mr Trump’s office.
Mr Trump, who is being investigated over his handling of classified records, denies wrongdoing.
Among the items recovered after the unprecedented 8 August search of Mar-a-Lago were:
- 3 documents marked confidential
- 17 documents marked secret
- 7 documents marked top secret
- 43 empty folders with classified banners
- 28 empty folders labelled “Return to staff secretary/military aide”
Upon leaving office, US presidents must transfer all of their documents and emails to the National Archives. The justice department is looking into whether Mr Trump improperly handled records by taking them from the White House to his Mar-a-Lago estate after he left office in January 2021.
Prosecutors allege Mr Trump and his lawyers failed to provide relevant documents voluntarily, and “likely concealed or removed” records as part of an effort to obstruct the investigation.
Mr Trump has rebuked these claims, arguing he had already declassified the documents in his possession.
The former president has also argued that files were kept securely in a storage room at Mar-a-Lago.
But the inventory unsealed on Friday shows that FBI agents retrieved about 1,500 documents, as well as classified folders that were empty, from Mr Trump’s office.
The court filing also confirms previous reports that many records were “intermixed” with personal effects, including clothes, books and newspapers.
Trump records probe timeline
- January 2022 – The National Archives retrieves 15 boxes of White House records from Mar-a-Lago, and says some of the documents it received at the end of Trump administration had been torn up
- February – Reports emerge that classified files were found in the Mar-a-Lago cache and National Archives has asked DoJ to investigate
- April – US media report the FBI has begun a preliminary investigation
- 3 June – A senior DoJ official and three FBI agents travel to Mar-a-Lago to review items in a basement. According to Mr Trump, he told them: “Whatever you need, just let us know”
- 8 June – Federal investigators write to a Trump aide to ask that a stronger lock be used to secure the room storing the items. Trump says that request was quickly fulfilled
- 22 June – The Trump Organization receives a DoJ summons for CCTV footage from Mar-a-Lago
- 8 August – Dozens of agents search Mar-a-Lago, seizing more than 20 boxes, some containing top secret files, according to the warrant
- 12 August – Warrant released, showing that 11 sets of classified documents were taken
- 25 August – Judge orders justice department to release a redacted version of court papers that convinced him to authorise a search of the Trump estate
Source: Ghana News
