A federal judge declared "preliminary intent to appoint a special master" to examine materials obtained by the FBI during its search of former US President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago property earlier this month.
Donald Trump and his legal team filed a motion Monday evening seeking an independent investigation of the records seized by the FBI during its raid on Mar-a-Lago earlier this month.
Fox News reported that Trump's lawyers claimed that the unusual search in his private residence just months before the 2022 midterm elections was motivated by "political calculations" geared to weaken the "Republican Party's leading voice, President Trump."
On Saturday afternoon, US District Judge Aileen M. Cannon of the Southern District of Florida announced the decision based on a consideration of Trump's filings and "the exceptional circumstances" presented.
Affidavit Raises More Questions Than Answers
In a Saturday filing, Judge Cannon stated: "Pursuant to Rule 53(b) (1) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and the Court's inherent authority, and without prejudice to the parties' objections, the Court hereby provides notice of its preliminary intent to appoint a special master in this case."
US District Judge Aileen Cannon, who was nominated to the bench by Trump in 2020, has requested that the Department of Justice file a public response as well as under seal records detailing what was seized from the search, as well as a notice outlining the status of the review of the seized materials, including the process of filtering out privileged information, as reported by CNN.
Trump's response to the DOJ's response is due on Wednesday. While the hearing is scheduled at 1 p.m. ET on Thursday at the West Palm Beach courthouse.
At the end of the order, Cannon noted that it should not be interpreted as her final verdict on the subject.
On Friday, in response to Cannon's request that he explain his request for the special master, Donald Trump pointed to some more legal discussion of case law that he said supported his request.
Trump's reply came just hours after the Justice Department released a redacted version of the affidavit used to secure the warrant, which revealed additional details about the FBI's investigation and the extremely sensitive nature of classified material recovered from the Palm Beach, Florida, property.
Trump asserted that the recently disclosed redacted affidavit filed by the FBI in court to get the search warrant raised "more questions than answers."
US Intelligence To Review Materials For National Security Concerns
In other updates, the Director of National Intelligence said that the agency will examine documents seized from former President Trump's Florida property for possible threats to national security.
According to an ODNI official, intelligence authorities will assess the extent of harm that could result from revealing documents taken from Trump's Mar-a-Lago property.
The spokesperson said ODNI will "closely coordinate" with the Department of Justice to make sure that the Intelligence Community evaluation procedure will not "unduly interfere with DOJ's ongoing criminal investigation."
NPR reported that a redacted version of the affidavit used by the FBI to search the former president's house was made accessible on Friday, about half of which was unreadable.
The statement states that 184 classified documents were discovered among 15 boxes seized from the resort earlier this year. Twenty-five of the documents had the classification "Top Secret."
Read also: Donald Trump Mar-a-Lago Raid: Unsealed Affidavit Reveals 'Top Secret' Files That Led to FBI Search
