The DOJ recently released a photo suggesting former President Donald Trump’s possession of top-secret government documents. The image displayed colored sheets (reportedly representing various levels of classification) on top of files allegedly found in Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence.
However, new disclosures in Special Counsel Jack Smith’s case against Trump indicate that these colored sheets were actually props used by the FBI to stage the infamous photo. The DOJ had previously presented these as evidence to support the case against Trump, but the use of props raises questions about the credibility of the evidence.
The Daily Caller reported on this shocking development, noting that Jay Bratt, the lead DOJ prosecutor now part of Jack Smith’s team, admitted in a recent court filing that FBI agents brought cover sheets reading “top secret” to the Mar-a-Lago raid to use as placeholders when gathering classified documents. The court documents also revealed that the order of the documents after the FBI seizure appeared to be inconsistent, casting doubt on the authenticity of the evidence.
The FBI brought props to its raid of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago for classified documents that were pictured in an infamous photo taken at the alleged crime scene, according to court documents.
Jay Bratt, the lead Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutor now assigned to special counsel Jack Smith’s team, admitted in a recent court filing that FBI agents brought cover sheets reading “top secret” to the raid of Mar-a-Lago to use as placeholders in their gathering of classified documents. The classified documents, however, now appear to be out of order following their seizure, both Trump’s defense attorney and the special counsel have admitted, according to court documents first reported by Declassified with Julie Kelly.
The crime scene photo of classified documents allegedly found at Mar-a-Lago, complete with the bright red “classification” cover sheets, went viral in the weeks after the raid. Corporate media outlets breathlessly reported on the photo and the cover sheets as proof that Trump had been storing classified documents at his Florida property.
“[If] the investigative team found a document with classification markings, it removed the document, segregated it, and replaced it with a placeholder sheet. The investigative team used classified cover sheets for that purpose,” Bratt wrote in a recent filing.
Following the Mar-a-Lago raid, the crime scene photo showing the bright red “classification” cover sheets went viral, leading to widespread speculation about Trump’s storage of classified documents. Corporate media outlets used this photo to suggest that Trump was hiding sensitive information at his Florida property.
However, Bratt’s recent filing indicates that the FBI used the cover sheets as placeholders during their investigation. This new information has raised questions about the integrity of the DOJ’s evidence in the Trump classified documents probe and why the security footage from the raid has not been released.
In response to these revelations, the House Judiciary Committee, led by Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH), has launched an investigation into the FBI’s handling of the Trump classified documents case, focusing on whether the evidence was “altered or manipulated.” Jordan sent a letter to the DOJ’s Office of Professional Responsibility after Jack Smith’s team admitted that some of the seized documents are no longer in their original order and sequence, contradicting earlier claims that the documents were “in their original, intact form as seized.”
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