Donald Trump’s search file to be kept sealed

The US Justice ­Department has opposed requests to unseal the affidavit used to justify last week’s FBI search of ­Donald Trump’s Florida resort.

Former US president Donald Trump. Picture: AFP

The US Justice ­Department has opposed requests to unseal the affidavit used to justify last week’s FBI search of ­Donald Trump’s Florida resort.

Several US media outlets and Republican members of congress have asked a Florida judge to ­release the affidavit behind the raid, which ignited a political firestorm in an already bitterly ­divided country.

The Justice Department noted in a filing with a US District Court that the search warrant and a ­receipt for items seized from Mr Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home during last week’s search have ­already been made public.

It argued that the affidavit, which lays out the FBI’s argument for why the search warrant should be approved, presented a “very different set of considerations”.

“There remain compelling ­reasons, including to protect the ­integrity of an ongoing law ­enforcement investigation that implicates national security, that support keeping the affidavit sealed,” the department said.

The affidavit, it added, contained “critically important and detailed investigative facts” as well as “highly sensitive information about witnesses, including witnesses interviewed by the government”.

The department said should the court order the ­release of the affidavit, the ­required redactions would “be so extensive as to render the remaining unsealed text devoid of meaningful content”.

Among records seized during the search were documents marked “Top ­Secret,” “Secret” and “Confidential”.

Mr Trump, who is weighing another White House run in 2024, vehemently denounced the FBI raid and claimed that all of the material confiscated during the search had been previously ­“declassified”.

He claimed overnight on Monday that agents had seized his passports during the search. “Wow! In the raid by the FBI of Mar-a-Lago, they stole my three Passports (one expired), along with everything else,” Mr Trump said in a posting on his Truth Social platform.

“This is an assault on a political ­opponent at a level never seen before in our Country. Third World!”

In addition to investigations into his business practices, Mr Trump faces legal scrutiny for his efforts to overturn the results of the November 2020 election, and for last year’s January 6 attack on the US Capitol by his supporters.

AFP