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Donald Trump is set to sue the US Department of Justice for $100m in damages over the 2022 raid on his Mar-a-Lago estate less than a month after his classified documents case was overturned, according to a memo from his lawyers.
The FBI’s search of his Palm Beach, Florida, resort on August 8, 2022, resulted in hundreds of pages of classified documents retained from when he was president being removed from the property.
Special Counsel Jack Smith indicted the former president on 37 felony counts in June last year. Trump pleaded not guilty on all charges.
Now, Trump’s lawyers have argued that the DOJ’s raid was conducted with “clear intent to engage in political persecution,” according to memo first obtained by Fox News.
The filing condemns the alleged “tortious conduct by the United States against President Trump,” citing intrusion upon seclusion, malicious prosecution, and abuse of process from the raid.
Trump’s lawsuit accuses both US Attorney General Merrick Garland, who assigned Smith in 2022 to oversee two federal investigations and the eventual indictment, and FBI Director Christopher Wray for running a “malicious prosecution” against him.
President Joe Biden, whom Garland reports to directly, has been accused by Trump numerous times of orchestrating an alleged political “witch-hunt”. The White House and DOJ have denied any accusations that the raid was politically motivated.
“Garland and Wray should have never approved a raid and subsequent indictment of President Trump because the well-established protocol with former U.S. presidents is to use non-enforcement means to obtain records of the United States,” Trump attorney Daniel Epstein, who filed the memo, wrote.
He added that Garland and Wray should have “sought consent” from Trump and notified his legal team at the very minimum.
Epstein filed the notice on Monday, giving the DOJ six months to respond. The case will move to federal court in the Southern District of Florida if no resolution is made.
“What President Trump is doing here is not just standing up for himself – he is standing up for all Americans who believe in the rule of law and believe that you should hold the government accountable when it wrongs you,” Epstein told Fox Business.
It comes after US District Judge Aileen Cannon’s unprecedented decision to grant Trump’s notion to dismiss Smith’s federal case on July 15.
She ruled that Smith was unlawfully appointed and funded, pointing to the Appointments Clause in the Constitution – in turn leading to the entire classified documents case being thrown out.
Smith’s office filed a notice of appeal on July 17 to revive the case and reverse Cannon’s ruling.
“The Court is convinced that Special Counsel’s Smith’s prosecution of this action breaches two structural cornerstones of our constitutional scheme – the role of Congress in the appointment of constitutional officers, and the role of Congress in authorizing expenditures by law,” Cannon concluded in her 93-page order.
A furious Garland slammed Cannon’s ruling late last month in an NBC News interview, suggesting she does not understand the law.
The Supreme Court ruled last month the presidents have absolute immunity for actions undertaken in office if they fall under the president’s core responsibility.
Citing the high court’s ruling and Cannon’s decision, Epstein’s argued that there was “no constitutional basis for the search or the subsequent indictment,” he wrote in the memo.
In May, prosecutors presented compelling evidence that Trump had knowingly stashed national security documents in his home and then tried to conceal them when the DOJ tried to retrieve them.
“Notably, no excuse is provided as to how the former president could miss the classified-marked documents found in his own bedroom at Mar-a-Lago,” Judge Howell wrote in her 87-page opinion.
After the opinion’s release, Trump claimed that FBI agents had been authorized to use “deadly force” during the “unconstitutional” raid of his Florida property. The FBI said that its agents had followed “standard procedure” during the raid.
The Independent has reached out to the DOJ for comment.
