The US Department of Justice has asked a judge to issue a search warrant for a search of former President Donald Trump’s home. It is also intended that the receipt with the items taken by the FBI from Trump’s golf resort, Mar-a-Lago, be made public.

Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the request at a press conference Thursday. Garland has personally authorized a judge to seek a search warrant for Trump’s Florida home.

He wants the search warrant and the list of seized items to be made public because it is in “public interest”. A third document detailing the FBI’s firm suspicions will not be made public.

Finally, the minister stressed that his ministry has acted in accordance with the law. He did not want to say anything further. Garland did not respond to reporters’ questions.

The request to make the search warrant and list public could be seen as a reflection of the way Trump talks about the search. The former president has described the raid as an unprovoked one. Garland noted that Trump and his lawyers had both the warrant and the list from the search, which they may have made public themselves. They didn’t.

Trump already received a subpoena in the spring

It was also announced Thursday that Trump had already received a subpoena from the US Justice Department last spring. With the subpoena, the department sought to retrieve documents taken from the White House without a search. reports that The New York Times Based on three initiations.

The newspaper writes that the subpoena may provide additional context on Monday’s raid. The fact that Trump was subpoenaed first demonstrates that the department first sought alternatives to the probe.

Some classified documents had already been seized when ministry officials visited Trump’s home in June. On Monday, the FBI was still searching the golf resort in Florida for more documents. According to The New York Times These are very important documents related to national security.

Such an unannounced raid is politically very sensitive and a tool that is not quickly used. Monday’s raid was the first of a former US president.

Trump decided not to return the documents

Trump moved several boxes of documents from the White House to his Mar-a-Lago golf resort after his election loss in 2020. Over the next few months, the National Archives attempted to recover the material.

The former president wasted months of time and returned only fifteen boxes. The boxes were found to contain secret documents. The archive then informed the Ministry of Justice. The ministry later discovered that the classified material was still missing.

Trump has wanted to return classified documents since leaving the White House, but hasn’t.