The raid on Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate was reportedly sparked by an ongoing probe into the box loads of materials the ex-president took with him to Florida when he left the White House — including notes from North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and even a cocktail napkin.
A showdown over the materials first erupted back in January when the National Archives said it had retrieved 15 boxes of White House records — including classified information — from Mar-a-Lago that Trump should have turned over when he left office. The feds took another 12 boxes of material on Monday.
Some of the items recovered in January included correspondence from Kim Jong Un and a letter former President Barack Obama had written his successor, sources told the Wall Street Journal.
A list of the unclassified items found in the boxes was about 100 pages long — and included the cocktail napkin and a birthday dinner menu, according to a Washington Post source.
Other items included schedules, a phone list, letters, memos, talking points, slide decks and schedules.
An inventory list of classified materials was roughly three pages long, but there were no immediate details on what the information entailed.
The revelation from the National Archives — which is in charge of collecting presidential material — set off a months-long Justice Department probe into whether Trump was illegally storing classified information at his private club and estate.
Investigators reportedly visited Mar-a-Lago in early June to meet with Trump’s attorneys about turning over more potentially classified information, sources told CNN.
Trump stopped by briefly to say hello to the feds during that meeting before the investigators were taken to a basement room where the documents were stored, the sources said.
Five days later, Trump’s attorneys were asked by the FBI to secure the room where the documents were.
The FBI then sought a search warrant for Monday’s raid after sources told Fox News that investigators felt they were not getting the same level of cooperation from Trump’s side as before.
Investigators believe additional classified information could still be at Trump’s estate.
It is unclear what the feds seized when they executed the latest search warrant, which unfolded while Trump was at his Manhattan residence. The Washington Post said the FBI took about a dozen boxes from a locked basement storage area Monday.
The Justice Department hasn’t commented on the raid.
Trump — who said he had been cooperating with the agencies — slammed the raid as “not necessary.” Despite this, the former president still hasn’t publicly disclosed details of the warrant.
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