Posts tagged with "Justice Department"

Above, Google CEO Sundar Pichai. (Photo source: SugerMint)

Google loses antitrust case over search-engine dominance

August 7, 2024

A federal judge has ruled that Google engaged in illegal practices to preserve its search engine monopoly—delivering a major antitrust victory to the Justice Department in its effort to rein in Silicon Valley technology giants, reports The Wall Street Journal.

Google, which performs about 90% of the world’s Internet searches, exploited its market dominance to stomp out competitors, U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta in Washington, D.C,. said in the long-awaited ruling.

“Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” Mehta wrote in his 276-page decision released on Monday, August 5, in which he also faulted the company for destroying internal messages that could have been useful in the case.

Mehta agreed with the central argument made by the Justice Department and 38 states and territories that Google suppressed competition by paying billions of dollars to operators of web browsers and phone manufacturers to be their default search engine.

That allowed the company to maintain a dominant position in the sponsored text advertising that accompanies search results, Mehta said.

Kent Walker, president of Global Affairs at Google parent, Alphabet, said the company planned to appeal the ruling.

“This decision recognizes that Google offers the best search engine, but concludes that we shouldn’t be allowed to make it easily available,” he said in a written statement that quoted complimentary passages from Mehta’s decision. “As this process continues, we will remain focused on making products that people find helpful and easy to use.”

Justice Department Antitrust chief Jonathan Kanter said the decision “paves the path for innovation for generations to come and protects access to information for all Americans.”

Mehta now is expected to consider what remedies to impose on Google in order  to restore competition. That process could involve more court hearings over several months.

Mehta also criticized Google for automatically erasing chat messages after 24 hours—saying he was “taken aback by the lengths to which Google goes to avoid creating a paper trail for regulators and litigants.”

However, the judge said he didn’t impose punishments for that behavior requested by the government because “the sanctions Plaintiffs request do not move the needle on the court’s assessment of Google’s liability.”

Google had argued that its auto-erase policy was explicitly disclosed to plaintiffs years earlier, undercutting the argument that it intended to destroy evidence.

Google’s appeal could mean it will be years until the case is finally resolved, either via a settlement or a final judgment by the courts.

Research contact: @WSJ

Above, the appellate court found that the key section of the Voting Rights Act only can be enforced by the U.S. attorney general. (Photo source: The Texas Tribune)

Appeals court decision could limit enforcement of Voting Rights Act

Novembver 22, 2023

On Monday, November 19, a federal court issued a decision that could severely curtail enforcement of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which could affect voters of color nationwide and will probably be appealed to the Supreme Court, reports The Washington Post.

In its 2-1 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit upheld a lower court’s ruling that private citizens and groups like the NAACP cannot bring lawsuits under a provision that forbids discrimination in state and local elections laws.

The appellate court found that the key section of the act can only be enforced by the U.S. attorney general. That upheld a decision by U.S. District Judge Lee Rudofsky, who in 2022 dismissed a lawsuit challenging Arkansas’ new district map because he said that the Justice Department had to join the plaintiffs.

At the time, voting rights groups argued in their lawsuit that a new map of congressional districts weakened Black voters’ electoral power in the state. Rudofsky, an appointee of President Donald Trump, gave Attorney General Merrick Garland five days to join the groups in the case. When he refused, the case was dismissed.

The 8th Circuit’s decision to uphold Rudofsky’s ruling will probably be appealed to the Supreme Court, and the justices may be inclined to consider it, along with a conflicting ruling on the same issue by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit.

If the 8th Circuit ruling is upheld, it could weaken the tools used by voters of color and voting rights activists to ensure voting access by marginalized groups by blocking individuals and private groups from using Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which passed in 1965, that allows citizens to bring legal challenges to redistricting decisions and other actions that weaken their voting power.

In their decision, the 8th Circuit judges noted that, in the past 40 years, at least 182 successful Section 2 cases have been filed and, of those, only 15 “were brought solely” by the attorney general.

Research contact: @washingtonpost

Above, Representative George Santos (R-New York) has said he will not run for re-election. (Photo source: Jabin Botsford for theThe Washington Post)

Santos says he won’t seek re-election after release of ethics report

November 17, 2023

House investigators found “substantial evidence” that Representative George Santos (R-New York) knowingly violated a litany of ethics and criminal laws, according to a House Ethics Committee report released on Thursday, November 15, that prompted Santos to declare he would not seek re-election next year, reports The Washington Post.

“Representative Santos’ conduct warrants public condemnation, is beneath the dignity of the office, and has brought severe discredit upon the House,” Reps. Michael Guest (R-Mississippi) and Susan Wild (D-Pennsylvania), the committee’s chairman and senior Democrat, said in a joint statement.

The report recommended that the allegations against Santos be referred to the Justice Department but stopped short of calling for Santos’s expulsion from the House or other discipline. Guest told reporters Wednesday that recommending punishment for Santos would have taken the panel several more months. Instead, he said, the report would simply be publicly released so that lawmakers could read it and “take whatever action that they felt necessary.”

Santos railed against the ethics committee on Thursday in a lengthy post on X in which he called the report a “disgusting politicized smear” and claimed that he was being “stoned by those who have flaws themselves.”

He added he would not be seeking reelection to a second term in 2024 after all, reversing course from a previous announcement in April that he would. Santos stepped down from his committee assignments in January.

According to the report, Santos was given an opportunity to submit to investigators a signed written statement responding to the allegations, but he did not do so. Santos also did not respond to the committee’s requests to submit documents, to voluntarily testify, or to provide a statement under oath.

The long-awaited report lays out the conclusions of the committee’s months-long investigation in scathing language. According to the committee, investigators compiled more than 170,000 pages of documents and testimony from dozens of witnesses, including financial statements, to reach its conclusion.

“Representative Santos sought to fraudulently exploit every aspect of his House candidacy for his own personal financial profit. He blatantly stole from his campaign. He deceived donors into providing what they thought were contributions to his campaign but were in fact payments for his personal benefit,” the report stated.

It continued: “He reported fictitious loans to his political committees to induce donors and party committees to make further contributions to his campaign — and then diverted more campaign money to himself as purported ‘repayments’ of those fictitious loans.

“He used his connections to high value donors and other political campaigns to obtain additional funds for himself through fraudulent or otherwise questionable business dealings. And he sustained all of this through a constant series of lies to his constituents, donors, and staff about his background and experience.”

Guest said he would file a motion to expel Santos on Friday morning, November 17, according to a person familiar with the plans who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. The House can consider the motion upon its return from its holiday break on November 28.

Research contact: @washingtonpost

Above, former President Donald Trump. (Photo source: Sky News)

Mar-a-Lago workers moved boxes of papers before the FBI arrived

May 29, 2023

Two employees at former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club moved boxes of papers around the property a day before FBI agents and a federal prosecutor arrived at the premises in an effort to recover classified documents, reports HuffPost.

The Washington Post first reported that a maintenance employee at the Florida club told federal prosecutors he saw Trump’s valet, Walt Nauta, moving the boxes on June 2, 2022, into a storage area before he offered to help without knowing what the boxes contained. That same day, a lawyer for Trump contacted the Justice Department and said DOJ officials could come to Mar-a-Lago to pick up classified files, people familiar with the investigation told the newspaper.

Jay Bratt, a top prosecutor for the Justice Department, traveled to Mar-a-Lago on June 3 and was handed a batch of classified files and a signed letter attesting that a search had been carried out for any other such material but that none had been found, The New York Times added.

But two months later, on August 8, the FBI executed a search warrant on the property amid concerns that sensitive documents remained at the Trump estate and seized more than 100 other classified files in a storage area and in Trump’s office.

The revelation adds new context to Trump’s behavior surrounding the classified files and potentially broadens the timeline for any potential criminality and obstruction. The Post added that prosecutors have also gathered evidence that Trump’s team had conducted a “dress rehearsal” for moving files he wanted to keep.

The latest reports come at a pivotal time in the investigation. The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday, May 23, that Justice Department Special Counsel Jack Smith is nearly finished collecting testimony and evidence after speaking with top aides to the former president and maids and maintenance staff at the Florida estate, which serves as Trump’s residence and is also a private club.

And the Post reported last month that federal investigators have gathered evidence Trump may have sifted through boxes of documents after receiving a subpoena to return them.

Trump’s lawyers also wrote to Attorney General Merrick Garland this week, requesting a meeting to discuss the probe—claiming it was an “ongoing injustice” centered on baseless claims.

Prosecutors have reportedly homed in on whether Trump attempted to obstruct the government’s efforts to recover the files. The saga went on for months after the National Archives attempted to recover documents missing from his White House tenure, and the Justice Department eventually sent agents to Florida with a subpoena to recover the files. The recovery culminated in the bombastic FBI search on August 8.

Some in Trump’s orbit have reportedly been preparing for an indictment, which could present serious legal peril for the former president. He lambasted the ongoing probe during a CNN town hall-style event earlier this month; but also appeared to claim he was allowed to take anything he wanted when he left the White House in January 2021.

“I took the documents; I’m allowed to,” he said during the live event. He later added that when he left Washington he had “boxes lined up on the sidewalk.”

“Everybody knew we were taking those boxes,” Trump said.

Several other investigations into his behavior after his loss of the 2020 election are ongoing, including his effort to overturn the presidential election results in Georgia.

Research contact: @HuffPost

Above, former Vice President Mike Pence. (Photo source: Reddit)

Pence subpoenaed by special counsel probing Trump’s role in January 6 attack

February13, 2023

Former Vice President Mike Pence has been subpoenaed by the special counsel investigating former President Donald Trump’s effort to stay in office after the 2020 election and his role in the January 6 attack on the Capitol, according to a source familiar with the matter, reports NBC News

.Special Counsel Jack Smith was appointed in November by Attorney General Merrick Garland to lead the Justice Department’s inquiries into Trump’s role in the riot as well as the former president’s handling of classified documents after he left office. The subpoena is related to the January 6 investigation, the source said.

Spokespersons for Smith and Pence declined to comment on the matter. ABC News first reported that Pence has been subpoenaed.

In December, NBC News reported that Smith had subpoenaed local officials in key presidential swing states for any and all communications involving Trump, his campaign, and a series of aides and allies who assisted in his effort to overturn the 2020 election.

The move was an indication that Smith is probing into a scheme involving fake electors, a slate of individuals who signed documents purporting they were their states’ rightful electors and falsely asserting that Trump was the victor in those states.

The House special committee formed to investigate the attack on the Capitol gathered evidence that the fake electors submitted false certifications of Trump victories to the National Archives in hopes of having Pence substitute them for the actual electoral votes that made Joe Biden president.

The January 6 committee devoted an entire hearing to Pence’s role on that day—and the intense public and private pressure Trump applied to Pence to get his vice president to interfere with the electoral count.

Pence, as then-president of the Senate, presided over Congress’ certification of the 2020 election results—but that role was strictly ceremonial, with no power to intervene in the counting of electoral votes.

Still, Trump sought to apply pressure on his vice president even after Pence’s aides, as well as Trump’s, said it would be illegal for the then-vice president to interfere in the count, according to testimony before the January 6 committee.

In a Wall Street Journal opinion article, Pence described telling that to Trump, himself, during an Oval Office meeting with lawyer John Eastman, one of the architects of a memo that outlined a scenarioin which Pence could refuse to certify the electoral college count.

After Eastman described his plan as mere theory, Pence wrote that he turned to Trump and said, “Mr. President, did you hear that? Even your lawyer doesn’t think I have the authority to return electoral votes.”

Pence, who ultimately performed his ceremonial duty in the aftermath of the violence, has said he’s “proud” of what he did on January 6 and has declared there’s “almost no idea more un-American than the notion that any one person could choose the American president.”

When asked on NBC News’ “Meet the Press” in November if he believes Trump had committed a crime, Pence said, “Well, I don’t know if it is criminal to listen to bad advice from lawyers.”

“The truth is, what the president was repeating is what he was hearing from that gaggle of attorneys around him,” Pence said. “Presidents, just like all of us that have served in public life, you have to rely on your team, you have to rely on the credibility of the people around you. And so, as time goes on, I hope we can move beyond this, beyond that prospect. And this is really a time when our country ought to be healing.”

The former vice president, who has hinted that he is considering a run for president in 2024, also has criticized Trump for his actions on that day. As a mob of the then-president’s supporters descended on the U.S. Capitol, Trump tweeted that Pence “didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution—prompting chants of “hang Mike Pence” as rioters sought out the vice president who had to be rushed to a secure location.

In November, Pence called Trump’s January 6 tweet about him “reckless” and said the remark “angered” him.

“I mean, the president’s words were reckless and his actions were reckless,” Pence said in an interview with ABC News’ David Muir. He added, “The president’s words that day at the rally endangered me and my family and everyone at the Capitol building.”

Research contact: @NBCNews

Representative Carolyn Maloney, chairperson of the House Oversight Committee, requested the assessment from the National Archives. (Photo source: Haiyun Jiang for The New York Times)

Records from Trump White House still missing, National Archives says

October 4, 2022

The National Archives informed Congress’s House Oversight Committee on Friday, September 30, that members of the Trump White House still had not turned over all presidential records—and signaled there could be legal consequences for those who do not comply, reports The New York Times.

In a letter, Debra Steidel Wall, the acting U.S. archivist, said the archives was working to retrieve electronic messages from certain unnamed White House officials who had used personal email and messaging accounts to conduct official business.

Wall wrote that the Archives would consult the Justice Department about whether to “initiate an action for the recovery of records unlawfully removed.”

“While there is no easy way to establish absolute accountability, we do know that we do not have custody of everything we should,” Wall wrote to Representative Carolyn B. Maloney, Democrat of New York and the chairwoman of the Oversight Committee.

Wall cited an August filing by the Justice Department to recover official email records from the personal account of Peter Navarro, a former Trump adviser. Navarro is facing charges of contempt of Congress after he refused to comply with a subpoena from the House committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

In her letter, Wall declined to say whether former President Donald Trump had surrendered all presidential records in his possession.

“With respect to the second issue concerning whether former President Trump has surrendered all presidential records, we respectfully refer you to the Department of Justice in light of its ongoing investigation,” she wrote.

“The National Archives has confirmed to the Oversight Committee that they still have not received all presidential records from the Trump White House,” Maloney said in a statement. “Presidential records are the property of the American people, and it is outrageous that these records remain unaccounted for 20 months after former President Trump left office.”

Maloney had requested a formal assessment from the Archives of what presidential records remained unaccounted for and whether the archives believed any were potentially still in Trump’s possession.

Maloney also requested that the Archives “seek a personal certification from Donald Trump that he has surrendered all presidential records that he illegally removed from the White House after leaving office.”

The federal government tried and failed for more than a year and a half to retrieve classified and sensitive documents from Trump before resorting on August 8 to a search of his Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, according to government documents and statements by his lawyers.

Two months before the search, Trump’s lawyer certified that all documents bearing classified markings had been returned and that no “copy, written notation or reproduction of any kind was retained.”

Yet the FBI search revealed that the former president still had more than 11,000 government records—including more than 100 with classified markings and documents with the highest classification markings, some related to human intelligence sources. There were additional classified documents in Trump’s office desk drawer.

The search also turned up 48 folders with classified markings that were empty. Although it was unclear why they were empty, the committee said, the apparent separation of classified material and presidential records from their designated folders raised questions about how the materials were stored and whether sensitive material might have been lost or obtained by third parties.

Research contact: @nytimes

Above, Judge Aileen Cannon, former President Donald Trump, and (inset) Mar-a-Lago.(Photo source: blogforarizona.net)

Judge rules Trump can ignore Special Master’s order to prove claim FBI ‘planted’ docs

October 3, 2022

U.S. District Judge for the Southern District of Florida Aileen Cannon—who was nominated to the court by former President Donald Trump in April 2020—ruled on Thursday, September 29, that Trump does not have to comply with an order by the Special Master to put up or shut up about his claims that the FBI “planted” information among documents that agents seized from Mar-a-Lago, reports HuffPost.

Special Master Raymond Dearie—a federal judge who was recommended by Trump’s own legal team—had given the former president’s lawyers until Friday to confirm or refute an inventory list of items taken by the FBI agents that was provided by the Justice Department.

Dearie’s order, in essence, demanded proof of Trump’s claims that some White House files agents confiscated at Mar-a-Lago had been “planted.” It was a claim pointedly not ever made by his attorneys.

“This submission shall be Plaintiff’s final opportunity to raise any factual dispute as to the completeness and accuracy of the Detailed Property Inventory,” Dearie, a former federal prosecutor and a U.S. district judge in Brooklyn, New York, said when he issued the order.

Trump said that he and family members watched agents search sections of his Mar-a-Lago home and resort on surveillance cameras—raising the question of how the FBI could have secretly planted evidence at the same time.

Two lawyers for Trump were also at Mar-a-Lago during the search, and one signed off on a list of boxes and “miscellaneous top secret documents” that were removed.

In a letter written on Sunday, September 25, and made public late Wednesday, Trump’s team attempted to duck Dearie’s demand.

“Because the Special Master’s case management plan exceeds the grant of authority from the District Court on this issue, plaintiff must object,” Trump’s attorneys wrote.

Cannon agreed in her order Thursday, saying Trump’s attorneys would not be required to affirm the accuracy of the FBI’s inventory from Mar-a-Lago before getting a chance to review the records themselves.

“There shall be no separate requirement on Plaintiff at this stage, prior to the review of any of the seized materials. … The Court’s Appointment Order did not contemplate that obligation,” Cannon wrote.

Her order also extended the timeline to review the documents Trump took from the White House to stash at Mar-a-Lago from November 30 until December 16. The records, which belong to the public, are supposed to be held by the National Archives.

Dearie is supposed to be reviewing the several boxes of documents to determine if any may be protected by lawyer-client or executive privilege.

While Dearie appeared to be speeding up the process, Cannon is slowing it down— which will delay revealing any damning information until after the midterm elections.

In a blow to Trump, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit ruled last week that the Justice Department can resume reviewing the seized classified records—blocking a portion of a stay issued earlier by Cannon. The appeals court also prohibited Dearie from vetting the documents marked classified.

After the ruling, Cannon—whose decision in Trump’s favor protecting the records seized at Mar-a-Lago has been criticized by several legal expert— amended her own order. It now states that material subject to a special master review no longer includes the “approximately one-hundred documents bearing classification markings.”

Research contact: @HuffPost

Above, former Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows.l (Photo source: GQ)

Meadows was central to hundreds of texts about overturning 2020 election, book says

September 28, 2022

The texts included previously unreported messages—including a group chat with Trump administration cabinet officials and plans to object to Joe Biden’s election certification on January 6 by Republican members of Congress and one former US attorney, as well as other Trump allies.

The book, “The Breach” by former Congressman Denver Riggleman, was obtained by The Guardian in advance of its scheduled publication on Tuesday, September 27.  The 288-page tome, published by Henry Holt and Co., already has become controversial after being condemned by the panel as “unauthorized.”

Although most of the texts sent to and from Meadows that Riggleman includes in the book have been public for months, his text offers new insight into and fills some gaps about how all three branches of government were seemingly involved in strategizing ways to obstruct the congressional certification on January 6, 2021.

Less than an hour after the election was called for Biden, for instance, Rick Perry, Trump’s former energy secretary, texted a group chat that included Meadows; then-housing secretary, Ben Carson; and former agriculture secretary, Sonny Perdue, all concluding that Trump should dispute the call.

“POTUS line should be: Biden says hes [sic] president. America will see what big data says,” Perry wrote. “This sets the stage for what we’re about to prove.” While Carson was more cautious, Perdue appeared unconcerned about seeing concrete proof of election fraud. “No quit!” he wrote.

The former president’s final White House chief of staff also fielded a text from the Republican Senator Kevin Cramer, who forwarded a note from North Dakota’s then-U.S. attorney, Drew Wrigley, who offered his own advice for overturning the results because “Trump’s legal team has made a joke of this whole thing.”

“Demand statewide recount of absentee/mail-in ballots in line with pre-existing state law with regard to signature comparisons,” Wrigley wrote. “If state officials refuse that recount, the legislature would then act under the Constitution, selecting the slate of electors.”

The suggestion from Wrigley echoed what the Trump legal team would ultimately pursue in having fake electors sent to Congress on January 6 to have the then vice-president, Mike Pence, refuse to certify Biden’s win—a scheme now part of a criminal investigation by the US attorney in Washington, D.C.

The text from Wrigley is significant since the Justice Department is supposed to remain above the political fray. Wrigley’s note appears to mark an instance of a federal prosecutor endorsing a legally dubious scheme when there was no fraud sufficient to alter the outcome of the 2020 election.

A DOJ spokesperson could not immediately be reached for comment. Wrigley, now the North Dakota state attorney general, also could not be immediately reached for comment.

Texts to Meadows also show Republican lawmakers started to finalize objections to the certification of the 2020 election only hours after Trump sent a tweet about a “big protest” that the House January 6 committee has said mobilized far-right groups to make preparations to storm the Capitol.

The former president sent the pivotal tweet in the early hours of December 19, 2020. The panel previously described it as the catalyst that triggered the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers groups, as well as “Stop the Steal” activists, to target obstructing the certification.

But the tweet also coincided with efforts by Republican lawmakers to finalize objections to the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s election win, new texts from some of Trump’s most ardent supporters on Capitol Hill sent to Meadows show.

Hours after Trump sent his tweet, according to texts published in the book, the Republican congressman Jody Hice messaged Meadows to say he would be “leading” his state’s “electoral college objection on Jan 6”—days before Trump is known to have met with Republicans at the White House to discuss it.

The congressman also told Meadows that Trump “spoke” with Marjorie Taylor Greene, a far-right Republican who had been elected to a House seat in Georgia but had yet to be sworn in, and was interested in meeting with the ultra-conservative House Freedom Caucus.

Hice’s messages to Meadows came at a critical juncture: It was the Saturday after a contentious Friday meeting at the White House, where Trump entertained seizing voting machines and installing a conspiracy theorist lawyer, Sidney Powell, as special counsel to investigate election fraud.

The meeting to discuss objecting to Biden’s win on January 6 was originally scheduled for the next Monday, December 21, 2020, but it was rescheduled to take place on the next Tuesday, according to the book, citing additional messages sent by the Republican congressman Brian Babin.

Nine days after the meeting with Trump, the Republican members of Congress seemed to finish their objection plans, and Babin texted Meadows to say the “objectors” would be having an additional strategy session at the Conservative Partnership Institute, which played host to other January 6 efforts.

The timing of the new texts to Meadows raised the prospect that Trump’s tweet moved ahead several plans that worked in concert, with the Republican objections about supposed fraud giving Pence a pretext to throw out Biden votes as rioters obstructed proceedings.

Research contact: @guardian

Above, former Whie House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. (Photo source: CNN)

CNN exclusive: Mark Meadows has complied with DOJ subpoena in January 6 probe

September 16, 2022

Former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows has complied with a subpoena from the Justice Department’s investigation into events surrounding the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, sources familiar with the matter have told CNN—making him the highest-ranking Trump official known to have responded to a subpoena in the federal investigation.

Meadows turned over the same materials he provided to the House select committee investigating the US Capitol attack, one source said, meeting the obligations of the Justice Department subpoena, which has not been previously reported.

Last year, Meadows turned over thousands of text messages and emails to the House committee, before he stopped cooperating. The texts he handed over between Election Day 2020 and Joe Biden’s inauguration, which CNN previously obtained, provided a window into his dealings at the White House, though he withheld hundreds of messages, citing executive privilege.

In addition to Trump’s former chief of staff, one of Meadows’ top deputies in the White House, Ben Williamson, also recently received a grand jury subpoena, another source familiar with the matter has informed CNN.

That subpoena was similar to what others in Trump’s orbit received. It asked for testimony and records relating to January 6 and efforts to overturn the 2020 election. Williamson previously cooperated with the January 6 committee. He declined to comment to CNN.

Meadows’ compliance with the subpoena comes as the Justice Department has ramped up its investigation related to January 6, which now touches nearly every aspect of former President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss—including the fraudulent electors plot, efforts to push baseless election fraud claims and how money flowed to support these various efforts, CNN reported this week.

An attorney for Meadows declined comment. The Justice Department did not respond to CNN requests for comment.

As White House chief of staff, Meadows was in the middle of Trump’s efforts to overturn the election in the two months between Election Day and Biden’s inauguration. Meadows communicated with numerous officials who tried to find election fraud and pushed various schemes to try to overturn the election, according to text messages obtained by CNN that Meadows turned over to the House select committee.

Meadows also shared baseless conspiracy theories with Justice Department leaders, as Trump tried to enlist DOJ’s help in his push to claim the election was stolen from him.

After Meadows stopped cooperating with the House committee, Congress referred him to the Justice Department for contempt of Congress. DOJ declined to prosecute him for contempt earlier this year.

It’s not yet clear whether the Justice Department will seek more materials from Meadows as part of the ongoing criminal investigation, which could lead to a legal fight over executive privilege.

Following last month’s FBI search of Trump’s Florida residence and resort, the Ma-a-Lago Club, Meadows handed over texts and emails to the National Archivesv that he had not previously turned over from his time in the administration, CNN previously reported. Last year, Meadows spoke with Trump about the documents he brought to Mar-a-Lago that the National Archives wanted returned.

Trump has been counseled to cut contact with Meadows—and some of Trump’s attorneys believe Meadows could also be in investigators’ crosshairs and are concerned he could become a fact witness if he’s pushed to cooperate, CNN reported last month. Still, Trump and Meadows have spoken a number of times, according to a source familiar with their relationship.

Another source described their relationship as “not the same as it once was” while in the White House, but said they still have maintained a relationship, even as Trump has complained about Meadows to others.

Research contact: @CNN

Above, National Archives workers loading boxes outside the White House five days before former President Donald Trump left office in January 2021. (Photo source: Stefani Reynolds/The New York Times)

Trump’s private residence in Florida is searched by F.B.I.

August 10, 2022

Former President Donald Trump said on Monday, August 8, that the F.B.I. had conducted what he referred to as an “unannounced” search of his Palm Beach, Florida, home on the grounds of the private Mar-a-Lago Club, and had broken open a safe—an account signaling a major escalation in the various investigations into the final stages of his presidency, reports The New York Times.

The search, according to multiple people familiar with the investigation, appeared to be focused on material that the former president had brought with him to Mar-a-Lago, when he left the White House. Those boxes contained many pages of classified documents, according to a person familiar with their contents.

Trump delayed returning 15 boxes of material requested by officials with the National Archives for many months, only doing so when there became a threat of action to retrieve them. The case was referred to the Justice Department by the archives early this year.

According to the Times, “The search marked the latest remarkable turn in the long-running investigations into Trump’s actions before, during and after his presidency—and even as he weighs announcing another candidacy for the White House.”

It came as the Justice Department has stepped up its separate inquiry into Trump’s efforts to remain in office after his defeat at the polls in the 2020 election and as the former president also faces an accelerating criminal inquiry in Georgia and civil actions in New York.

Trump has long cast the F.B.I. as a tool of Democrats who have been out to get him—and the search set off a furious reaction among his supporters in the Republican Party and on the far right of American politics. Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the Republican leader in the House, suggested that he intended to investigate Attorney General Merrick Garland if Republicans took control of the House in November.

The Times notes that the F.B.I. would have needed to convince a judge that it had probable cause that a crime had been committed, and that agents might find evidence at Mar-a-Lago, to get a search warrant. Proceeding with a search on a former president’s home would almost surely have required sign-off from top officials at the bureau and the Justice Department.

The search, however, does not mean prosecutors have determined that Mr. Trump committed a crime.

An F.B.I. representative declined to comment, as did Justice Department officials. The F.B.I. director, Christopher A. Wray, was appointed by Trump.

Trump was in the New York area at the time of the search. “Another day in paradise,” he said Monday night during a telephone rally for Sarah Palin, who is running for a congressional seat in Alaska.

Eric Trump, one of his sons, told Fox News that he was the one who informed his father that the search was taking place, and he said the search warrant was related to presidential documents.

Trump, who campaigned for president in 2016 criticizing Hillary Clinton’s practice of maintaining a private email server for government-related messages while she was secretary of state, was known throughout his term to rip up official material that was intended to be held for presidential archives. One person familiar with his habits said that included classified material that was shredded in his bedroom and elsewhere.

The search was at least in part for whether any records remained at the club, a person familiar with it said. It took place on Monday morning, the person said, although Trump said agents were still there many hours later.

“After working and cooperating with the relevant Government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate,” Trump said, maintaining it was an effort to stop him from running for president in 2024. “Such an assault could only take place in broken, Third-World Countries.”

Research contact: @nytimes