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Ohio Republican Rep. Mike Turner delivered a message to Attorney General Merrick Garland. No one is above the law, not even him.
He appeared on the CNN show “State of the Union” on Sunday and said that Garland himself has to be careful.
“Well, we have a number of concerns. One is whether or not the raid was justified. We have this list from the FBI, but we don’t have conclusive as to whether or not this is actually classified material and whether or not it rises to the level of the highest classified material. On a bipartisan basis, Congress is saying, show us the goods,” he said, Breitbart News reported.
“We want to know, one, what did the Department of Justice and the FBI tell the judge that they were going to find, and what did they find? There’s nothing in those boxes that members of the intelligence committee and the committee itself don’t have the ability to see. If it rises to the level of an immediate national security threat, which is what it would take to actually raid the president’s home. They had a number of options available to them, including just going to court and asking for the court to enforce the subpoena that they had,” the representative said.
“Now, clearly, no one is above the law. Donald Trump is not above the law, and Attorney General Garland is not above the law either. Congress that the powers of oversight. He needs to comply. We’ve seen material like this before. We’ve seen materials that have been submitted to courts for warrants. This is not unprecedented. His actions are unprecedented in history and he has a lot of questions to answer,” he said.
The FBI grabbed documents that were protected by attorney-client privilege, and possibly executive privilege, during its raid on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence.
The Department of Justice opposed the request of the former president’s attorneys to appoint a special master to review the records, a source said to Fox News exclusively.
Sources familiar with the investigation told Fox News Saturday that the former president’s team was informed that boxes labeled A-14, A-26, A-43, A-13, A-33, and a set of documents—all seen on the final page of the FBI’s property receipt —contained information covered by attorney-client privilege.
The FBI seized classified records from Trump’s Palm Beach home during its unprecedented Monday morning raid, including some marked as top secret. But the former president is disputing the classification, saying the records have been declassified.
“Sources told Fox News that some records could be covered by executive privilege, which gives the president of the United States and other officials within the executive branch the authority to withhold certain sensitive forms of advice and consultation between the president and senior advisors,” Fox News said.
The former president responded to the news on his truth Social account on Sunday, saying “Oh great! It has just been learned that the FBI, in its now famous raid of Mar-a-Lago, took boxes of privileged “attorney-client” material, and also “executive” privileged material, which they knowingly should not have taken. By copy of this TRUTH, I respectfully request that these documents be immediately returned to the location from which they were taken. Thank you!”
Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart unsealed the warrant on Friday after a request from both the Department of Justice and the former president.
The warrant said that the search be done “on or before August 19, 2022,” and “in the daytime 6:00 am. to 10:00 p.m.”
“The locations to be searched include the ‘45 Office,’ all storage rooms, and all other rooms or areas within the premises used or available to be used by FPOTUS and his staff and in which boxes or documents could be stored, including all structures or buildings on the estate,” it said.
The warrant gave the FBI the authority to seize “all physical documents and records constituting evidence, contraband, fruits of crime, or other items illegally possessed” in violation of U.S. Code.
According to reports, agents recovered 11 sets of documents that were marked as classified, including some that were labeled “Top Secret.”
