A federal judge on Friday unsealed a more detailed inventory of what the FBI seized in the search of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate last month.
The judge, who is considering the Trump legal team’s request to name a third party to review the materials, ordered the release in a court hearing in Florida Thursday.
Judge Aileen Cannon also ordered unsealed a status review of the records seized during the Aug. 8 search of Mar-a-Lago.
She has not yet ruled on the question of a review by an independent “special master.”
The expanded property list gives further detail of the volume of material seized by agents in the search and how it was intermingled with seemingly innocuous items such as newspaper clippings, photographs, books and clothing. It describes hundreds upon hundreds of U.S. government documents collected by investigators without any classification markings that were grouped in some cases with only a few documents that bore classification markings ranging from Confidential to Top Secret/SCI.
In the status update, officials write that as of Tuesday the investigative team had completed their “preliminary review” of materials seized from Mar-a-Lago with the exception of potentially privileged materials singled out by the separate filter team.
All documents bearing classification markings, they write, have been separated from the other items seized and stored “in accordance with the appropriate procedures governing the security of classified material.”
They note that under standard investigative practice their team is continuing to evaluate all of the items seized and will utilize them as they take further steps such as “additional witness interviews and grand jury practice.”
“Additionally, all evidence pertaining to the seized items — including, but not limited to, the nature and manner in which they were stored, as well as any evidence with respect to particular documents or items of interest — will inform the government’s investigation,” they say.
This story was originally published on ABC News.
