Donald Trump has been accused of business fraud (Andrew Milligan/PA)
(Picture: PA Archive)A former employee of Donald Trump told FBI agents admitted moving boxes of records from a Florida storage unit after receiving a government demand for their return, according to reports.
The testimony of the key witness, coupled with surveillance footage represents some of the strongest known evidence to date of possible obstruction of justice by the former Republican president.
The New York Times separately reported on Wednesday that Trump aide Walt Nauta was captured on security camera footage from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach moving boxes out of a storage area at the centre of the investigation.
It was unclear whether the employee cited in Wednesday’s Washington Post report was Nauta or a different staff member, according to the Times, which cited three unnamed people familiar with the matter.
The FBI allegedly has surveillance footage showing an employee moving boxes out of the storage room, a source told CNN.
It was reported by the broadcaster, the unnamed Trump employee initially denied handling sensitive documents at Mar-a-Lago.
But the FBI found evidence that prompted investigators to go back to the witness, who then admitted that Trump had given an order.
Trump spokesperson Taylor Budowich, in a statement on Thursday, reiterated Trump’s accusation that the August search was “unwarranted and unconstitutional” and accused the Justice Department of leaking to the media in an “act of intimidation and tampering.”
In a post on his social media platform late Wednesday, Trump again denied any wrongdoing, posting: “There is no ‘crime’ having to do with the storage of documents at Mar-a-Lago.”
The FBI conducted a court-approved search on August 8 at Mar-a-Lago, seizing more than 11,000 documents, including about 100 marked as classified.
