Did the FBI miss additional evidence when agents searched Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property in 2022? If so, the government might not be able to go back in now, unless they have current information indicating the unsearched areas contain criminal evidence.
The question arises in light of an ABC News report, which hasn’t been independently verified by NBC News or MSNBC, which says that special counsel Jack Smith’s team “has questioned several witnesses about a closet and a so-called ‘hidden room’ inside the former president’s residence at Mar-a-Lago that the FBI didn’t check while searching the estate in August 2022.”
As an initial matter, it’s shocking that a warrant this important wouldn’t be fully executed. But whatever the political or other reasons for that, you might read this new reporting and wonder: Well, why don’t they just go back in and search those areas now?
It’s not that simple. To get a search warrant, law enforcement needs reason to believe not only that the target area contains certain evidence, but that it does so currently. Going before a judge and saying “we messed up a year and a half ago” wouldn’t cut it on its own.
At any rate, the classified documents case won’t be won or lost with whatever happens or doesn’t happen here. Prosecutors already have a ton of evidence against the former president, who has pleaded not guilty. Their issue isn’t needing more evidence but rather needing a judge who will let the case proceed to trial in a timely fashion, which they don’t appear to have in Aileen Cannon. Subscribe to the Deadline: Legal Newsletter for weekly updates on the top legal stories, including news from the Supreme Court, the Donald Trump cases and more.
Jordan Rubin is the Deadline: Legal Blog writer. He was a prosecutor for the New York County District Attorney’s Office in Manhattan and is the author of “Bizarro," a book about the secret war on synthetic drugs. Before he joined MS NOW, he was a legal reporter for Bloomberg Law.
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