DOJ Investigations of Donald Trump and the Mar-a-Lago/Milley Correspondence: The Case for a Subpoena
The Justice Department is looking at possible obstruction of justice and possible mishandling of national security records. FBI agents recovered more than 100 classified documents during the search of Mar-a-Lago. Since then, Trump’s legal team has turned over additional classified material.
The special counsel prosecutors are focused on how Trump handled the classified records around Mar-a-Lago and the people who might have witnessed the former president with them, according to multiple sources.
While the former president’s team returned some classified documents following the May 2022 subpoena, the FBI’s August search turned up more that hadn’t been returned.
The Post said that the evidence shows that Trump told others to lie to government officials about his time in the White House before they were subpoenaed.
According to CNN, investigators have messages from Molly Michael who was an aide to the former president. Those texts and notes, which investigators have had for several months, detail what Trump was doing and who he was meeting with, which could be significant for understanding his whereabouts in relation to the documents.
At least two dozen people from both Mar-a-Lago and Trump’s Florida estate have been subpoenaed to testify by a federal grand jury that is investigating his handling of classified documents, CNN reported last month.
The staffers are of interest to investigators because of the things that they might have said or heard while working around the estate, such as boxes or documents in the office suite.
The Washington Post reported that officials in the investigation asked witnesses if Trump showed interest in documents related to Gen. Mark Milley.
The team working for special counsel Jack Smith is focusing on a new set of evidence, not the ones obtained in the past about Evan Corcoran, a source told CNN. The DOJ believes that Donald Trump used the lawyer to try to advance a crime, after it was discovered that the former president spoke with the lawyer the day of the Mar-a-Lago subpoena.
When asked to respond to recent developments in the classified documents investigation, Steven Cheung accused the Justice Department of “prosecutorial Miesy” and leaking information.