Judge unseals Trump Mar-a-Lago search warrant

An aerial view of Mar-a-Lago on Wednesday.

A federal judge on Friday unsealed the search warrant and property receipt from the FBI search of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida.

The search, documents show, was an evidence-gathering step in a national security investigation about the mishandling of classified documents. Trump owns the sprawling estate, and it is his primary residence as well as a members-only club and resort.

The FBI recovered 11 sets of classified documents from its search, including some materials marked as “top secret/SCI” — one of the highest levels of classification, according to documents from the search warrant that were released Friday.

Here are some key things we learned from the unsealed documents:

Crimes identified in the warrant: The search warrant identifies three federal crimes that the Justice Department is looking at as part of its investigation:

The inclusion of the crimes indicates the Justice Department has probable cause to investigate those offenses as it was gathering evidence in the search, but no one has been charged.

What the FBI recovered: One of the newly unsealed documents is a search warrant “receipt” listing the items that the FBI collected from Mar-a-Lago. That document reveals FBI agents removed more than 20 boxes from Trump’s resort and residence in Palm Beach, as well as binders of photos, sets of classified government materials and at least one handwritten note.

According to the search warrant receipt, federal agents seized:

The warrant receipt didn’t detail what such classified documents were about, but these were among the items that were taken:

Areas authorized for search: The court documents also offer new details about the search itself and revealed that FBI agents were only allowed access to specific locations within Mar-a-Lago as they combed Trump’s resort residence for potential evidence of crimes.

The judge authorized the FBI to search what the bureau called the “45 Office,” as well as “all other rooms or areas” at Mar-a-Lago that were available to Trump and his staff for storing boxes and documents. The FBI’s warrant application to the judge specifically said that federal agents would avoid areas being rented or used by third parties, “such as Mar-a-Lago members” and “private guest suites.”

Read more about what is in the search warrant here.

The US government has a formal system of protecting information that, if disclosed, could hurt national security.

The system can apply to documents regarding intelligence activities, foreign relations, military plans and programs for safeguarding nuclear materials, for example. By classifying information, the government restricts who can see the documents and where he or she can see them.

The Justice Department recently removed some classified documents from former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence while executing a search warrant for possible violations of the Espionage Act and other crimes.

There are three basic levels of classification, based on the damage that could be done to national security if the information was leaked:

Top Secret: This is the highest level of classification. Information is classified as Top Secret if it “reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security,” according to a 2009 executive order that describes the classification system.

A subset of Top Secret documents known as SCI, or sensitive compartmented information, is reserved for certain information derived from intelligence sources. Access to an SCI document can be even further restricted to a smaller group of people with specific security clearances.

Some of the materials recovered from Trump’s Florida home were marked as Top Secret SCI.

Secret: Information is classified as Secret if the information is deemed to be able to cause “serious damage” to national security if revealed.

Confidential: Confidential is the least sensitive level of classification, applied to information that is reasonably expected to cause “damage” to national security if disclosed.

Learn more about the classification system here.

The French embassy in Washington declined to respond Friday to news the FBI removed information pertaining to French President Emmanuel Macron during a search of Mar-a-Lago earlier this week. 

A spokesperson said they had no comment. 

An unsealed search warrant listed “Info. re French President” among the items removed from Trump’s estate in Florida on Monday. 

The FBI is investigating an “unprecedented” number of threats against bureau personnel and property in the wake of the search of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, including against agents listed in court records as being involved in the search, a law enforcement source tells CNN. 

Just today, the names of the two agents who signed the search warrant paperwork were circulating on line. The names were included in a version of the search warrant that was leaked prior to the official unsealing of the documents. The version released by the court redacted the agents’ names. 

 In a memo sent to FBI employees this week, Director Chris Wray said the bureau is “vigilant” and will adjust security as needed.

The FBI declined to comment on any specific threats against bureau employees, but told CNN in a statement: 

“The FBI is always concerned about violence and threats of violence to law enforcement, including the men and women of the FBI. We work closely with our law enforcement partners to assess and respond to such threats, which are reprehensible and dangerous. As always, we would like to remind members of the public that if they observe anything suspicious to report it to law enforcement immediately.”

Kash Patel speaks during a campaign event for Republican election candidates in Tucson, Arizona, on July 31.

Kash Patel, who has been designated by former President Trump to handle issues with his presidential records, blamed the General Services Administration (GSA) for boxes being at the Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, where the FBI recovered classified material during a search on Monday.

“The GSA mistakenly packed some boxes and moved them to Mar-a-Lago. That’s not on the President. That’s on the National Archives to sort that out,” Patel said on Fox. 

A GSA spokesperson responded Friday to Patel’s claims, saying that the responsibility for what is moved when a president leaves office “rests entirely with the outgoing president and their supporting staff.”

Patel, a former national security official in the Trump administration, said that at the end of Trump’s presidency in December 2020 and January 2021, Trump declassified sets of documents. He wouldn’t say whether the boxes recovered at Mar-a-Lago were part of that declassification. 

In regard to whether some of the material in those boxes is classified, Patel said, “It doesn’t seem to be the case when Donald Trump issued sweeping declassification orders on multiple occasions.” 

When asked about the declassification process, Patel said that while there is a “normal” process for government employees, the president has “unilateral classification authority to classify or declassify. If he says something is declassified, that’s it, then it’s declassified.”

There are federal regulations that lay out a process for a president to declassify documents.

Former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence in Palm Beach, Florida, on August 9.

Joshua Skule, a former FBI executive assistant director of intelligence, told CNN there is a hierarchy of security levels when it comes to how documents are classified by the government, with one of the highest classification being “top secret/SCI.” SCI stands for Sensitive Compartmented Information.

The FBI recovered 11 sets of classified documents from its search of Mar-a-Lago earlier this week, including some materials marked with that “top secret/SCI” distinction, according to documents from the search warrant that were released Friday.

Skule said top secret/SCI is one of the nation’s most highly sensitive material.

Other classification levels include “secret” — meaning the information may cause “serious damage to national security” — and “confidential,” both which gauge national security concern, retired Lt. General Mark Hertling told CNN, adding classifications are defined by legal definitions.

He said “top secret/SCI” is restricted to not only people who have top secret clearance, but also a “need-to-know of certain details.”

“I personally could have a top secret clearance, could go in and read any top secret document, but as soon as one of them says SCI, that means there’s something special about that,” Herling said, adding access to that information would only be given to people who need to know the “methods and people involved.”

Federal agents seized just one set of “top secret/SCI” documents, according to the search warrant receipt. Agents took four sets of “top secret” documents, three sets of “secret” documents, and three sets of “confidential” documents. 

The warrant receipt didn’t detail what these classified documents were about.

CNN’s Marshall Cohen and Katelyn Polantz contributed reporting to this post.

While details about the search warrant documents themselves remain scarce, the laws cited in the warrant offer new insight into what the FBI was looking for when it searched former President Donald Trump’s Florida home earlier this week, an unprecedented step that has prompted a firestorm of criticism from his closest allies.

The laws cover “destroying or concealing documents to obstruct government investigations” and the unlawful removal of government records, according to the search warrant released Friday.

Also among the laws listed is one known as the Espionage Act, which relates to the “retrieval, storage, or transmission of national defense information or classified material.”

All three criminal laws cited in the warrant are from Title 18 of the United States Code. None of them solely hinge on whether information was deemed to be unclassified.

One of the less-sensitive items taken from Trump’s resort, according to a property receipt, was a document about pardoning Roger Stone, a staunch Trump ally who was convicted in 2019 of lying to Congress during its probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election. (Trump pardoned Stone before leaving office, shielding Stone from a three-year prison term.)

It’s unclear how the Stone-related document seized during the search is tied to the broader criminal probe into Trump’s potential mishandling of classified materials.

During the search, FBI agents also recovered material about the “President of France,” according to the warrant receipt.

Read more about the unsealed documents here.

Local police presence stay outside Mar-a-Lago, the residence of former President Donald Trump, on August 9.

The search of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, documents show, was an evidence-gathering step in a national security investigation about the mishandling of classified documents. Trump owns the sprawling estate, and it is his primary residence as well as a members-only club and resort.

Here’s a timeline of the search warrant’s execution and release:

CNN has reported that there has been an uptick in violent rhetoric against Reinhart on the pro-Trump internet. Amid those threats, the official website for the Southern District of Florida removed Reinhart’s biography page, his contact information and his office address, CNN previously reported.

CNN previously did not name Reinhart because of the security concerns, but is doing so now because his name is now part of the public court record.

Read a full timeline here of the Department of Justice’s criminal inquiry into Trump taking classified docs to Mar-a-Lago.

The search warrant for former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property identifies three federal crimes the Justice Department is looking at as part of its investigation.

The first one is espionage and part of the Espionage Act, according to analysis by CNN’s legal analyst Elie Honig. He said the espionage piece of the warrant applies to someone who gathered, lost or destroyed defense information.

But the most important part for this to stick legally is the idea of intent, he said, adding that the person had to have the “intent or reason to believe, or reckless of the likelihood that, that information could be used to injure the national interests of the United States.”

The second crime in the warrant is obstruction, Honig said, defining it as essentially an obstruction of justice or “destroying, moving, concealing a document in order to interfere with some sort of ongoing investigation,” he said.

The destruction of a federal document is the third crime in the warrant, Honig said, which the document identifies as criminal handling of government records.

Keep in mind: The prosecutors who wrote the search warrant only needed to have probable cause to include the crimes. This means they realized a certain document was missing, brought that information to a judge, and the judge agreed there was probable cause to include it in the warrant, Honig said.

“It is a lower standard of proof. It’s probable cause, not proof beyond a reasonable doubt,” Honig said. This means if there is ultimately no proof on any of the criminal accusations, the prosecutors “don’t have to and won’t charge it,” he said.

Additionally, “if prosecutors find evidence sufficient to charge other crimes, they can do that too. This is a starting point. This is for the search warrant only,” he added.

Watch more in the video below:

Former President Donald Trump's attorney Christina Bobb signed two "receipts for property" on August 8.

The warrant receipts were signed by former President Trump attorney Christina Bobb, who has since spoken out about her presence at Mar-a-Lago during the search.

Bobb has complained about the fact that she and other Trump lawyers weren’t permitted to observe the search while it happened, but it is not standard FBI procedure to allow observers during a search.

She signed two “receipts for property,” which lists the items that the FBI took from Mar-a-Lago. Bobb signed these receipts at 6:19 p.m., when the federal agents were wrapping up their all-day search.

Bobb is a well-known promoter of pro-Trump conspiracy theories, including during her previous position at OAN, the far-right TV channel. CNN has previously reported that Bobb played a leading role in the Trump’s campaign efforts in December 2020 to put forward slates of fake GOP electors in seven states.