Former President Donald J. Trump was subpoenaed this spring for documents that federal investigators believed he had failed to turn over earlier this year when he returned boxes of material he improperly took with him when he left the white house three people familiar with the matter said.
The subpoena’s existence helps flesh out the sequence of events that led to Monday’s search of Mr. Trump’s Florida home by FBI agents looking for classified material they believed might still be there , even after the efforts of the National Archives and the Department of Justice. to make sure it had been returned.
The subpoena suggests that the Justice Department tried methods short of a search warrant to account for the material before taking the politically explosive step of sending FBI agents unannounced to Mar-a-Lago, the home of mr trump and members only club.
Two people briefed on the classified documents that investigators believe were left at Mar-a-Lago said they were so sensitive and related to national security that the Justice Department had to act.
The subpoena was first revealed by John Solomon, a conservative journalist who has also been appointed by Mr. Trump as one of his representatives at the National Archives.
The existence of the subpoena is being used by allies of Mr. Trump to charge that the former president and his team were cooperating with the Justice Department to identify and return the documents in question and that the search was not warranted.
The Justice Department declined to comment. Christina Bobb, an attorney who works for Trump, did not respond to messages. It is unclear what precise materials the subpoena sought or what documents the former president might have provided in response.
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland confirmed Thursday that he personally signed a search warrant that was executed Monday. He did not address a subpoena, but said that “if possible, it is standard practice to seek less intrusive means,” indicating that other measures were tried before a search was made.
The subpoena took into account a visit Jay Bratt, the Justice Department’s top counterintelligence official, made with a small group of other federal officials to Mar-a-Lago weeks later in early June. say one of the people.
Officials met with Mr. Trump, Evan Corcoran. Mr. Trump, who likes to play host and has a long history of trying to charm officials who ask about his practices, also made an appearance. During the visit, officials examined a basement storage area where the former president had kept material that had come with him from the White House.
More coverage of the FBI Search of Trump’s Home
A few days after the visit, Mr. Bratt emailed Mr. Corcoran and told him to further secure the remaining documents, which were kept in the storage area with a stronger padlock, one of the people said. The email was previously reported by The Wall Street Journal.
They then subpoenaed surveillance footage from the club, which may have given officials a glimpse of who was entering and exiting the storage area, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. They received images specifically of areas of the club where they believed the documents had been stored, the person said.
During the same period, investigators were in contact with several aides of Mr. Trump who had some visibility into how he stored and moved documents at the White House and still worked for him, three people with knowledge of the matter said.
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Among those contacted by investigators was Molly Michael, Mr. Trump in the outer Oval Office who also went to work for him at Mar-a-Lago, three people familiar with the disclosure said.
Investigators have also contacted Derek Lyons, the former White House staff secretary whose last day was Dec. 18, 2020, and who no longer works for Mr. Trump, with questions about the document management process, according to a person familiar with the matter. the disclosure
Federal officials came to believe that Mr. Trump had not given up all the material that left the White House with him at the end of his term, according to three people familiar with the investigation.
Less than two months later, about two dozen FBI agents, purposely not wearing the blue aprons emblazoned with the agency’s logo that are routinely worn during searches, showed up at Mar-a-Lago with a court order
The club was closed; Mr. Trump was in the New York area; the FBI surprised a crew fixing a large fountain, a maid dusting, and a handful of Secret Service agents guarding the compound.
The search warrant was broad and allowed officers to investigate all areas of the club where classified materials may have been stored. They went through the basement, Mr Trump’s office and at least part of his residence at the club.
After hours of searching, they left with several boxes that weren’t packed to the brim and, in some cases, simply contained sealed envelopes of material that officers took that were otherwise empty, he said. a person familiar with the search.
The person said the FBI left behind a two-page manifest of what was taken. The FBI doesn’t need to list the substance of every item it removed from Mar-a-Lago, and it’s unclear what the inventory will reveal if a Florida judge unseals it. If the manifesto is made public, it will likely be redacted to protect any classified material.
But the inventory provided to the team of Mr. Trump refers to a range of sensitive material, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. For example, it alludes to several confidential documents, as well as some labeled “top secret.”
Trump’s team has declined to disclose the contents of the search warrant. Several organizations, including The New York Times, are seeking in federal court to seal it.
Some senior Republicans have been warned by allies of Mr. Trump to not continue to be aggressive in criticizing the Justice Department and the FBI on the matter because more damaging information related to the investigation may become public.
As Mr Trump left the White House after refusing to admit he had lost the 2020 election and frantically trying to hang on to power, a series of boxes of supplies made their way from the West Wing to Florida .
The boxes contained a mix of papers, along with items such as a raincoat and golf balls, according to people briefed on the contents. The National Archives tried for months after Mr. Trump was left in charge of retrieving the material, holding long talks with his representatives to acquire what the archives should have properly stored under the Presidential Records Act.
When archivists recovered 15 boxes this year, they discovered several pages of classified material and referred the matter to the Justice Department. But officials later believed additional classified material remained at Mar-a-Lago.
Some of Trump’s advisers have maintained that they have tried to cooperate with federal officials and have kept a line of communication open.
But other people familiar with federal officials’ efforts to recover the documents said Mr. Trump was reluctant to return property that belonged to the government, even though he was told he needed to.
Some of the informal advisers of Mr. Trump outside of his direct employees have insisted that he can claim that the documents are personal items and keep them.