Attorney General Merrick Garland, former President Donald Trump.
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images, Brandon Bell/Getty Images
The DOJ has appealed a federal judge’s order for a special master to review Mar-a-Lago records.
Judge Aileen Cannon’s decision to appoint a special master effectively paused the DOJ’s criminal inquiry into Trump’s handling of national security records.
But DOJ could face an uphill battle as it goes up against an appeals court stacked with Trump appointees.
The Justice Department on Thursday appealed a federal judge’s ruling ordering the appointment of a special master to review records seized from Mar-a-Lago last month and sift out those that could be protected by attorney-client or executive privilege.
In a 21-page court filing, the Justice Department also requested a partial stay on Judge Aileen Cannon’s ruling, saying that her order had effectively prevented the intelligence community from conducting a separate assessment of the potential national security risks posed by former President Donald Trump’s handling of classified materials.
“The intelligence community’s review and assessment cannot be readily segregated from the Department of Justice’s and Federal Bureau of Investigation’s activities in connection with the ongoing criminal investigation, and uncertainty regarding the bounds of the court’s order and its implications for the activities of the FBI has caused the intelligence Community, in consultation with DOJ, to pause temporarily this critically important work,” the Justice Department said.
It continued: “Moreover, the government and the public are irreparably injured when a criminal investigation of matters involving risks to national security is enjoined.”
Thursday’s filing is the latest development in the whirlwind month since FBI agents took the extraordinary step of executing a search warrant at the former president’s Florida residence. The warrant, which was unsealed days later, indicated that the feds are investigating if Trump violated the Espionage Act when he moved national security documents to Mar-a-Lago, as well as two other federal laws barring the concealment, alteration, or destruction of government records.
Trump has denied wrongdoing and accused the FBI and Justice Department of political persecution and prosecutorial misconduct. He’s also cycled through a string of defenses — including that there were no government records at his home, that the FBI had “planted” evidence,” and that all the materials he took were declassified — in the weeks since the search.
His defense team later filed a lawsuit asking Cannon to appoint a special master to sift out documents from the seized materials that could be protected by attorney-client or executive privilege.
But the Justice Department pushed back forcefully, urging Cannon to reject the request and saying Trump did not have the right to assert executive privilege over any of the records because “they do not belong to him” and were the property of the US government. They also revealed in a 36-page filing that they had evidence of “likely” efforts to obstruct their ongoing investigation into Trump’s handling of national security information.
This story is developing. Check back for updates.