A few weeks after the armed FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago in August 2022, the Department of Justice released a stunning photograph depicting alleged contraband seized from Donald Trump’s Palm Beach estate that day; the image showed colored sheets representing scary classification levels attached to files purportedly discovered in Trump’s private office.
Included as a government exhibit to oppose Trump’s lawsuit requesting a special master to vet the 13,000 items taken from his residence, the crime scene pic immediately went viral—just as Attorney General Merrick Garland, who authorized the unprecedented raid, intended.
However….
New court filings in Special Counsel Jack Smith’s espionage and obstruction case against Trump and two co-defendants conclusively demonstrate that the government used the cover sheets to deceive the public as well as the court. The photo was a stunt, and one that adds more fuel to this dumpster-fire case.
Jay Bratt, who was the lead DOJ prosecutor on the investigation at the time and now is assigned to Smith’s team, described the photo this way in his August 30, 2022 response to Trump’s special master lawsuit:
“[Thirteen] boxes or containers contained documents with classification markings, and in all, over one hundred unique documents with classification markings…were seized. Certain of the documents had colored cover sheets indicating their classification status. (Emphasis added.) See, e.g., Attachment F (redacted FBI photograph of certain documents and classified cover sheets recovered from a container in the ‘45 office’).”
The DOJ’s clever wordsmithing, however, did not accurately describe the origin of the cover sheets. In what must be considered not only an act of doctoring evidence but willfully misleading the American people into believing the former president is a criminal and threat to national security, agents involved in the raid attached the cover sheets to at least seven files to stage the photo.
Classified cover sheets were not “recovered” in the container, contrary to Bratt’s declaration to the court. In fact, after being busted recently by defense attorneys for mishandling evidence in the case, Bratt had to fess up about how the cover sheets actually ended up on the documents.
Here is Bratt’s new version of the story, where he finally admits a critical detail that he failed to disclose in his August 2022 filing:
“[If] the investigative team found a document with classification markings, it removed the document, segregated it, and replaced it with a placeholder sheet. The investigative team used classified cover sheets for that purpose.”
But before the official cover sheets were used as placeholder, agents apparently used them as props. FBI agents took it upon themselves to paperclip the sheets to documents—something evident given the uniform nature of how each cover sheet is clipped to each file in the photo—laid them on the floor, and snapped a picture for political posterity.
That raises many troubling questions, to say the least, about the FBI’s handling of the alleged incriminating documents.
For example, who made the on-site determination as to the classification level appropriate for each document? Did agents have security clearance and expertise related to classification? Did the agents know whether the document had been declassified by Trump while still in office?
The hasty assessment also appears to contradict Bratt’s statements in court about the classification status of the seized documents. Bratt told Judge Aileen Cannon during a hearing last year that the records were undergoing a classification review, presumably conducted by the intelligence community, to determine the correct level of secrecy.
Did the final analysis confirm or dispute the assessments by the field FBI agents who conducted the raid?
Missing Paper Trial and Messy Boxes
But Jack Smith might have bigger problems. During the raid, agents took a box in its entirety if it contained papers with classified markings; the box usually contained other items, which is how the FBI ended up with so many of Trump’s personal belongings.
So, in order to flag the location of the alleged classified record in the box, agents, as Bratt noted, used the cover sheets as placeholders. (The classified records were then placed in a separate secure file.)
But now defense attorneys claim, and the special counsel concedes, that some placeholders do not match the relevant document. “Following defense counsel’s review of the physical boxes…and the documents produced in classified discovery, defense counsel has learned that the cross-reference provided by the Special Counsel’s Office does not contain accurate information,” attorneys representing Trump’s co-defendant Waltine Nauta wrote in a May 1 motion.
The motion forced the special counsel to admit the error. “In many but not all instances, the FBI was able to determine which document with classification markings corresponded to a particular placeholder sheet,” Bratt wrote.
In other words, in their zeal to stage a phony photo using official classified cover sheets, FBI agents might have failed to accurately match the placeholder sheet with the appropriate document. This is a potentially case-blowing mistake, particularly if the document in question is one of the 34 records that represents the basis of espionage charges against Trump.
And there is another issue in connection with the cover sheets. Defense attorneys also noted that in at least one instance, the location of the cover sheet in the physical box didn’t match the FBI’s accounting. “[The] sheet…does not appear for several hundreds of pages later than the FBI Index indicated it would. Defense counsel’s review of these materials calls into question the likelihood that the contents of the physical boxes remains (sic) the same as when they were seized by the FBI on August 8, 2022.”
Which Bratt also admitted is an issue. After the boxes were transported from Florida to the hopelessly corrupt Washington FBI field office (another scandalous aspect of the case since the investigation should have been conducted in southern Florida not in another jurisdiction), a private company took scans of the inside of the boxes. But according to the defense team, the current condition of the boxes does not match the scans taken in August 2022.
Bratt explained that “there are some boxes where the order of items within that box is not the same as in the associated scans.” He then offered a list of excuses including how some “boxes contain items smaller than standard paper such as index cards, books, and stationary, which shift easily when the boxes are carried, especially because many of the boxes are not full.”
It is safe to assume Judge Cannon will not take these new revelations lightly–particularly since Bratt also had to admit in the same filing that he did not tell her the truth when she asked about the condition of the boxes during a hearing last month. On April 12, Cannon directly asked Bratt, “are the boxes in their original, intact form as seized?” Bratt replied yes, but “with one exception, and that is that the classified documents have been removed and placeholders have been put in the documents [place.]”
In other places…
Why was climate change activist Gretta Thunberg at a Palestine protest you ask? Because the issue is never the issue, the issue is always the revolution – and both climate change and Palestine are issues the left uses to build support for their revolution.
NEW: Georgia Election Board dumbfounded after finding out that 3,000 ballots were scanned twice in the 2020 election recount in Fulton County. The board also revealed that 380,761 ballot images from machine count were “not available.” Q: Does Fulton County know why there are not 380,761 ballot images from election day? A: As with the investigators we have not been apprised of this allegation. This is the first I’m hearing about it. General counsel for the secretary of state’s office Charlene McGowan confirmed that Fulton County broke the law in their recount. “Fulton County used improper procedures during the recount of the presidential contest in 2020.” Despite this, the board refused to approve further investigation.
Also in Georgia…new voting reform bill in Georgia, just signed by Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, would require all absentee ballots to be tabulated and the results reported on Election Night.
On Monday, Kemp signed SB 189, which makes several significant changes to Georgia’s election procedures. The bill removed some possible conflicts of interest between the secretary of state, the state Board of Elections, and those involved with counting ballots; compels homeless residents to list their county register’s office as their mailing address; prevents voters from using a P.O. box or private mailbox service as proof of residency; and requires individuals who have voted or registered to vote in another state or district to re-register in their original district before they will be allowed to cast a ballot there, WSBTV.com reported.
In Washington….
House Dems just voted UNANIMOUSLY this week to give illegals representation in Congress AND the Electoral College. House Seats and Electoral College votes WILL BE added to areas with the most illegals (including all Biden illegals) unless Senate passes the bill. Invasion by design.
American citizenship means less and less. It take some folks 7 to 10 years to earn citizenship. Dems don’t hide their true colors anymore. They are importing voters for one-party control. This is not constitutional.
As always, an excellent analysis and summary of the STATE OF SURREAL AND ABSURD UNREALITY that we are now stuck with in what long ago was called the “United” states of America, which itself was never really a true statement, as the DEMOCRATS proved when they seceded from the Union back when and caused a horrible, bloody CIVIL WAR, the likes of which they are trying to revive so they can try and win this time and make us all their chattel and slaves.
I know I should not be speechless, but I am.
1) A Leftist says, “If it saves just one innocent life we should repeal the 2nd amendment and ban guns.”
2) I say, “If it stops just one murder, robbery, rape, etc., we should repeal immigration and ban all illegal aliens.”
A quick history lesson:
North America was settled by Anglo/Celts and has enjoyed prosperity, peace and freedom unparalleled in human history.
Central and South America were settled by Hispanics, and have has revolutions, generalissimos, poverty,disease and strife forever.
Now our betters want to bring that Eden of “diversity” here.
NO.
Asian countries for Asians.
Black countries for Blacks.
but White countries for everybody?
That’s genocide.
Anti-racist is a code-word for Anti-White