Trump says FBI agents raided his Mar-a-Lago Florida home: “not necessary or appropriate”

Classified material from Trump’s presidency was found at his Florida residence in February, a possible breach of the Presidential Records Act.

In an “unannounced raid,” a “large group” of federal officials invaded Donald Trump’s Florida home, the former US president claimed on his social media account on Monday.

According to a statement from US President Donald Trump in a move that “was not necessary or appropriate,” FBI agents entered the home.

Confusion existed over the raid’s circumstances.

When the officers arrived at Mar a Lago, Trump was not there. On Monday, he was spotted exiting Trump Tower in New York City, where he also lives.

According to BBC, the search into how confidential papers came up in more than a dozen boxes found at Mar-a-Lago earlier this year has been ongoing for months.

The FBI and Justice Department would not immediately confirm the search. It happened in the middle of a separate but growing investigation into efforts to change the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, adding to the possible legal risk for Trump as he gets ready to run for president again in 2024.

The US National Archives retrieved 15 boxes of Trump-related official documents from Mar-a-Lago in February, and among them were classified files. All correspondence related to presidential duties must be preserved, per US law. The National Archives had referred the incident to the US Justice Department.

According to the Associated Press, Justice Department spokesperson Dena Iverson declined to comment on the raid, including if Attorney General Merrick Garland had personally approved the search.

Trump claimed his home, the Mar-a-Lago estate, was “under siege, raided and occupied” calling it a “weaponization of the Justice System” that could only happen in “broken, Third-World Countries”.

He claimed that Democrats who “desperately” do not want him to compete for reelection in 2024 supported the FBI action in his remarks.

He exclaimed, “They even broke into my safe!”

According to Trump’s son Eric Trump, the search was connected to the records that the National Archives was looking for.

Without a search warrant or affidavit, Melanie Sloan, a former prosecutor and expert in government ethics, told Reuters that it was difficult to determine the reasons behind the raid, but that the circumstances indicated it had to be “more than run of the mill.”

“He can be prosecuted for improperly taking and destroying documents,” she said. “That is not something that is prosecuted frequently and to prosecute the former president for it would be a huge deal so there must be some kind of issue about the content of these documents and what is in them that he is attempting to destroy.”

The handling of sensitive government documents and classified records is governed by a number of federal laws in the US, some of which make it illegal to remove such information and store it elsewhere without authorization.

Although a search warrant does not imply that criminal charges are imminent or even expected, authorities must first convince a judge that they believe they will find evidence that a crime was committed in order to get the warrant.

“The FBI would not have sought a search warrant, (and) a judge would not have signed the search warrant if there weren’t probable cause for the FBI to search the premises for documents that would disclose a serious crime,” Richard Painter of the University of Minnesota Law School and a former ethics adviser to George W Bush, told Al Jazeera.

The search took place earlier on Monday, according to two people with knowledge of the situation who spoke to the AP under the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation. Agents were also checking Trump’s estate to determine if there were any other presidential records or classified documents.

Trump frequently tore up documents that had to be afterward taped back together, according to White House aides.

Photos that were made public on Monday morning allegedly showed torn-apart Trump handwritten messages at the base of a toilet bowl. Axios first reported the allegations included in an upcoming book by New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman.

The former president is also linked to investigations into allegedly illegal business activities, his efforts to manipulate the US elections in 2020, and his participation in the assault on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.

In the congressional investigation into the causes of the riot on the Capitol, a number of former advisers and staff have testified. Much of the focus has been on the former president, his actions leading up to it, and his refusal for hours to control his mob of supporters as they stormed the Capitol.