'Big mystery': FBI search of Trump's Mar-a-Lago property sparks political, legal debates

Aug. 20—The ongoing investigation into former President Donald Trump, which included the search of his Mar-a-Lago residence by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, has created legal uncertainty and political unpredictability.

The agency released a list of seized items, some identified as "secret," "top secret" and "classified," without providing much specific information about the contents.

Speculation abounds.

But there has been no official announcement concerning the alleged crimes, although the search warrant did cite the Espionage Act, along with laws pertaining to the removal or destruction of records and obstruction of justice.

Federal Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart, who signed the search warrant for the Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, said there are "portions of it (the affidavit) that can be unsealed," adding that he would "give the government a full and fair opportunity" to make redactions.

"One of the problems here is you don't know a lot," Penn State Dickinson Law Distinguished Fellow in Law and Government Stanley Brand said. "You only have the inventory and the warrant. You don't have the affidavit, which is obviously the most informative document because it lays out the allegations and the Athena's knowledge of what is the basis of the warrant. That's a big mystery to us in the public."

Brand, a former general counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives, said, in his opinion, "it's very early to be speculating about what statutes could wind up being used to charge anyone in this."

There are political unknowns now, too, as the nation heads into this year's midterm elections, according to G. Terry Madonna, senior fellow in residence for political affairs at Millersville University.

"It's just too hard to know where all this goes," Madonna said. "The one thing I think we're learning out of this is making predictions right now is a path to nowhere, a course to nowhere, because we just don't know. That's the same with the economy and inflation."

'Motivating Trump voters'

Madonna senses that the search of Mar-a-Lago on Aug. 8 and overall investigation is "motivating Trump voters."

Some local GOP leaders have questioned — and even condemned — looking for documents in the former president's residence.

"We all need to pay attention to what's happening at Mar-a-Lago — the Democrats are showing what a one-party rule looks like," Cambria County Republican Party Chairwoman Jackie Kulback said. "Their aggressive attempts to punish those who push back against the far left are in full view. The raid on a former U.S. president should be a wake-up call to every American. Their unprecedented expansion of the IRS should scare every taxpayer. This shows how important this midterm election really is."

U.S. Rep. Dr. John Joyce, R-Blair, 13th Congressional District, said that U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland's decision to search the former president's residence was "unprecedented and uncalled for."

"In order to restore the public trust that this was not a politically motivated weaponization of the U.S. Department of Justice, Attorney General Garland must provide absolute and immediate transparency into the circumstances surrounding his decision," Joyce said.

U.S. Rep. Glenn "GT" Thompson, R-Centre, 15th Congressional District, said, "I remain skeptical of the FBI's motives and fear the Bureau has been weaponized for political gain. FBI Director (Christopher) Wray must appear before Congress to explain why a former president has been targeted and detail who is really calling the shots on this operation."

Trump's camp issued a statement that there was "a standing order that documents removed from the Oval Office and taken to the residence were deemed to be declassified the moment he removed them." If such an order existed, it has not been made known publicly or established that such a sweeping declaration would follow proper procedures, even if the president has final approval on declassification.

The Presidential Records Act of 1978 established that a president's documents belong to the public and automatically transfer to the ownership of the National Archives and Records Administration when the president leaves office.

'Our national security'

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey Jr., a Democrat, countered that "recent reports of the former president's conduct are troubling and we must take them seriously."

"I commend Attorney General Garland for requesting to unseal the warrant and for the Department of Justice's commitment to the safety of the American people," Casey said. "Our national security is paramount and no one, including a president, is above the law."

Cambria County Democratic Party Chairwoman Nina Licastro said she was "shocked" to hear about the search and thinks that if Trump possessed top-secret documents "that's a problem."

"And I would say that if it was Barack Obama, or Joe Biden, or Bill Clinton or George Bush," Licastro said.

But, in Licastro's opinion, "conjecture in the media is out of control, though, with this."

"It's obviously an investigation," she said. "We don't really know all the facts yet. Maybe, just calm down, everybody."

Political impact

Trump's name will not appear on any ballot this year.

But his presence is being felt during the election cycle.

In Pennsylvania, he endorsed Dr. Mehmet Oz in the race for the state's open U.S. Senate seat and state Sen. Doug Mastriano for governor. Both won Republican primaries. Oz is running against Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, a Democrat. Mastriano is facing Democrat Josh Shapiro, Pennsylvania's attorney general.

When asked her thoughts about how the investigation of Trump could impact the midterms, Licastro said, "It's hard because the election is 80-some days away and we move in a 24-hour news cycle.

"It's flying without wings with what they think may be facts or what their opinions are. We're not getting enough factual information from what feels like any news report anymore because everybody just wants to interpret and try to predict the future of what's going to happen. We don't know. We don't know."

The Mar-a-Lago search is one occurrence in a series of recent significant events that could affect the elections, including the United States House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack hearings and the Supreme Court of the United States overturning the Roe v. Wade abortion precedent.

"It's all turning out that there's sort of one big event after another," Madonna said. "... It's a yo-yo, up and down, up and down."

The investigation could impact elections in the short term.

But there is a historic context, too.

Federal investigators never previously executed a search warrant on a former president.

Other modern-era presidents have been involved in legal matters, though. Richard Nixon resigned as a result of Watergate. Clinton testified under oath during the Whitewater probe, which led to him being impeached for perjury and obstruction of justice. Trump was impeached twice.

"When a barrier breaks down, as it did in Watergate, it tends to keep going," Brand said. "It tends to gather momentum. It establishes a new beachhead each time. We never seem to go back to a period of time before all that. We expand it.

"There's a breakdown in comity among the branches. There's a breakdown in respect for and confidence in some of the institutions of government. And so one case builds on another. So what would have been unprecedented in 1974, pre-Watergate, becomes precedented and then the frontier moves further out as we go on."

Brand said the "conventional wisdom" is that Trump broke a lot of norms as president and questions exist if laws were violated.

"That's where we are at now," Brand said.

Department of Justice officials have described the current investigation as being in the early stages.

"We're far away from any kind of resolution or charges that are going to come much later after much more thorough investigation and examination of the evidence, whatever that is," Brand said. "The thing that people, I think, miss — even sophisticated people in Washington, including lawyers — there's a huge gap between something that on the surface that looks like a crime and something that can be prosecuted in court as a crime and established beyond a reasonable doubt. There's a huge gulf between those two poles.

"And so, we'll have to see."