The U.S. Department of Justice said Thursday it was appealing an order by a Florida judge to freeze access to thousands of documents, including top-secret files seized from the home of former President Donald Trump.
The department said Federal Court Judge Aileen Cannon’s order Monday to seize all documents for review by an independent “special master” hampered its ability to conduct criminal investigations related to Trump’s possession of the classified documents.
It called on Cannon to unfreeze just over 100 classified documents seized in the Aug. 8 raid on Trump’s Florida home and keep them out of the hands of a special master named to handle the seized examine materials.
The papers are part of an ongoing FBI criminal investigation into unauthorized possession of national defense information covered under the Espionage Act, and Trump has no claim to them, the department said in its filing.
“The secret records are the actual subject of the ongoing government investigation,” it said.
Thousands of government documents, including top secret materials, were seized in last month’s unprecedented FBI raid on Trump’s home in Palm Beach, Fla., Mar-a-Lago.
Much of it was mixed up in dozens of boxes of personal notes from Trump and other things like clothing and media clippings.
Last week, Trump asked Cannon to protect all of this from investigation or use in investigations, citing his executive privileges as a former president, attorney privileges over any personal legal documents in the trove, and also constitutional protections from unlawful searches.
Cannon issued a barricade saying a special master could be appointed to independently review what Trump could actually claim privileges for and what the government could keep.
The administration has asserted that Trump has no right to any of the official government records held in the national archives, and particularly the classified materials.
She has not explained in detail what is in the classified documents, but media reports say some are extremely limited, and the Washington Post reported that one deals with a foreign country’s nuclear program and defenses.
The Justice Department invoked the Defense Materials Preservation Act and the Government Records Destruction Act for the raid.
It also cited obstruction of justice after Trump and his lawyers told the FBI in June that there were no longer any government or classified records at Mar-a-Lago.
In a social media post, Trump accused the FBI and Justice Department of “document fraud” and praised Cannon as “brilliant and courageous.”
