This week, the FBI search at Donald Trump's Florida resort, Mar-a-Lago, wasn't the former President's first rodeo with the feds. Federal investigators reportedly served an earlier grand jury subpoena and took away sensitive national security documents from his property during a June meeting, CNN reports.
The subpoena issued before the June meeting, during which investigators were shown where documents were held in a basement room at the Trump residence and private club, shows how the investigation has escalated and suggests the discussions had become confrontational long before Monday's search.
The criminal investigation started with concerns about missing documents raised by the National Archives, which made a criminal referral to the Justice Department. That led to FBI interviews with aides to grand jury subpoenas to this week's court-authorized search and seizure of documents.
Surveillance video:
In addition to the grand jury subpoena for documents, CNN previously reported that federal investigators separately served a subpoena for surveillance video at Mar-a-Lago, seeking to gather information about who had access to areas where documents were stored, according to people briefed on the matter. The subpoena served to the Trump Organization, the former President's company that operates the Palm Beach property, came after the June meeting.
As much as Trump and his Republican allies would like to make the recent search warrant a surprise, the one who shouldn't be surprised is the former President, who has been subpoenaed before by the feds. It's funny how he hasn't mentioned that. It sure will be interesting when we find out what classified documents the one-term President stole because he certainly doesn't want us to know.
