Aug. 13, 2022 - Epoch Times
12:13
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| Time | Text |
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| This right here is Mar-a-Lago, President Trump's Florida home. | |
| And unless you've been living under a rock for the past two or so days now, then you already know that the FBI conducted a massive raid of President Trump's home on Monday morning. | |
| The first public indication that this was actually happening came from a statement from President Trump that he sent out via Truth Social. | |
| Here's what he wrote, quote... | |
| These are dark times for our nation, as my beautiful home, Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, is currently under siege, raided and occupied by a large group of FBI agents. | |
| Now, such a thing was obviously unprecedented, and it led many Trump supporters within that local area to gather outside of Mar-a-Lago as a show of support. | |
| However, in terms of how this raid actually played itself out, well, that was a bit of a black box. | |
| And so, in order to shed light on what really happened that day, I got a chance to speak with one of President Trump's lawyers, Ms. | |
| Christina Bob. | |
| She was actually there on site at Mar-a-Lago for almost the entire time that the FBI was turning the place over. | |
| Here's how she described what happened. | |
| I got a call around 10 o'clock, maybe a little bit before that, saying I needed to get down to Mar-a-Lago, because the FBI was there, and I got there maybe around 10.30, and the FBI was already there, and they were already in the process of conducting the search, so I don't know the exact time that they got there, but I'm guessing it was probably an hour to an hour and a half before I made it there, and then they concluded, I want to say maybe 6.30, 7 o'clock, so it was about 10 hours, I'm guessing, of searching that they did yesterday. | |
| And so how many agents actually came on this raid? | |
| Approximately how many? | |
| I don't know the exact number, but I would guess... | |
| I've guessed about two dozen, maybe. | |
| I think I heard someone say that there were 30, and that was probably about right. | |
| So early in the morning, Mar-a-Lago, which of course has Secret Service protection, they just have these black vans come, FBI agents knocking, and do they show a warrant or an affidavit to the people there? | |
| Well, I assume they showed something to the Secret Service to actually get onto the premises. | |
| When I first got there, I was the first attorney to arrive on behalf of President Trump, and I asked to see the warrant, and initially they wouldn't show it to me, and I said, what do you mean you're not going to show me the warrant? | |
| So after some discussion, they agreed to show it to me so I could see it, and then they gave me the copy once everything had concluded. | |
| But yeah, I mean, there's not really a whole lot you can do in that situation. | |
| They're there, they have a warrant, they're doing what they want, and you kind of just watch. | |
| But it was, I've said before, similar to like a movie scene where you see the FBI come in and they've got all their Their boxes and their gear and their investigating things. | |
| They wouldn't allow me to actually go with them where they were doing the search, so I didn't actually get to oversee the search. | |
| They wouldn't let anybody see what they were doing, so I can't confirm what process they did or any of that, but I know approximately where they went. | |
| Now notice something there. | |
| In her statement, Christina mentioned that the FBI agents did not allow either her or anyone else from Trump's team who was there on property to observe the FBI conducting the search. | |
| And the reason that's so relevant is because just earlier today, President Trump suggested that the FBI may have actually planted evidence during this raid. | |
| Here's specifically what he wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social, again, just earlier today. | |
| Quote, Quote, Everyone was asked to leave the premises, They wanted to be left alone without any witnesses to see what they were doing, taking, or hopefully not, planting. | |
| Why did they strongly insist on having nobody watching them? | |
| Everybody out. | |
| Now it is worth mentioning that President Trump's statement there is only insinuating that this might have happened. | |
| However, obviously it's relevant to this part of our discussion and therefore I mentioned it to you. | |
| Furthermore, there is something else that I believe is really worth highlighting in terms of the actual affidavit and the actual search warrant that was presented by the FBI. Because you see, in order for the FBI to actually secure a warrant like this, they must prove that there is both probable cause of a crime and that it is likely that they will turn up evidence of the crime in their search. | |
| However, here's the kicker. | |
| In terms of the actual search warrant, Ms. | |
| Christina Bobb, who's again President Trump's lawyer, she told us that not only was the affidavit sealed, but also you might be a little surprised at which judge actually signed off on it. | |
| Take a listen. | |
| And as far as the probable cause goes, they wouldn't give that to us, and they've requested that that be sealed with the court. | |
| So we don't know what the probable cause is. | |
| An affidavit will accompany the The request for the warrant, and we haven't been able to see that. | |
| I don't know if we'll ever get a copy of it. | |
| But yeah, so we don't know what the probable cause is. | |
| I don't think there is a good cause to do such a drastic thing, but they did. | |
| And it was a local magistrate judge here in Florida that signed the warrant. | |
| I think it's Reinhardt is his last name? | |
| Really? | |
| Bruce Reinhardt. | |
| So it was Bruce Reinhardt. | |
| A lot of people were speculating that it was him. | |
| Yeah, it was Bruce Reinhardt, yeah. | |
| Now the reason that this particular judge is so significant is because prior to becoming a federal magistrate, Bruce Reinhardt actually worked as an attorney for several of Jeffrey Epstein's employees. | |
| You heard that right. | |
| Back in the year 2008, Bruce Reinhardt was actually working as a senior prosecutor in the Southern District of Florida at the exact same time that that district was negotiating a non-prosecution agreement with Jeffrey Epstein. | |
| However, in the middle of these negotiations, Bruce Reinhardt, he suddenly left his position as a senior prosecutor within the district. | |
| He set up his own criminal defense legal firm, and within days, he was representing Jeffrey Epstein's accomplices. | |
| Specifically, Ms. | |
| Sarah Callen, who worked for Jeffrey Epstein as a scheduler for many years, as well as Ms. | |
| Claudia Marcinova, who worked as one of the pilots for Jeffrey Epstein's infamous airplane. | |
| However, since then, since 2008, well, Bruce Reinhardt has returned to public service. | |
| He became the U.S. magistrate judge for the Southern District of Florida. | |
| And then just a few days ago, he signed off as well as sealed up the FBI search warrant against President Trump. | |
| Now, in terms of why this raid actually took place at all, well, sources within the U.S. government say that it has to do with an ongoing investigation regarding White House documents that President Trump allegedly took to Florida. | |
| Documents that President Trump claims were his to take and that he was already working with the relevant agencies to sort the whole matter out. | |
| Here's specifically what President Trump wrote on this matter in a statement. | |
| Quote, And indeed, according to Ms. Greenfield, Christina Bob, who was again at Mar-a-Lago when this was happening, the FBI took several boxes of paper products. | |
| Here's what she said. | |
| So, I haven't seen exactly, you know, what the documents are. | |
| They did give an inventory, which had, you know, they took a handful of boxes of documents, but it's unclear at this point. | |
| I don't think that there was anything incriminating. | |
| Like, I don't think there was anything of substance, so I'm sure that they will say otherwise, but we'll have to wait and see what they come up with. | |
| But it was all paper. | |
| You know, I hear the conspiracy theories and the rumors that There were other artifacts or something taken. | |
| It was all paper. | |
| However, stepping back for a moment, there is a deeper question to ask, which is why really did this raid take place? | |
| And many people are speculating that this FBI raid might actually be used to prevent President Trump from running for office again. | |
| Because you see, according to federal law, specifically Title 18, Section 2071, quote, Meaning that if President Trump were to be Meaning that if President Trump were to be actually found guilty | |
| of violating this particular statute, The state might actually attempt to bar him from holding office again. | |
| However, given the fact that the qualifications for who can actually become president is set forth in the U.S. Constitution, well it's dubious whether this federal law, which is of course below the U.S. Constitution, could actually stop President Trump from running again. | |
| But if he is found guilty, his team would have to very likely go all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court in order for them to determine whether he can run again or not. | |
| And in fact, I asked President Trump's lawyer about this exact scenario, and she responded by saying that they are not really worried about it. | |
| Take a listen. | |
| I'm not worried about any of it. | |
| Donald Trump didn't commit a crime. | |
| Now, whether Mark Elias and his buddies at the Department of Justice want to try to indict President Trump, they can try. | |
| They're not going to be able to show that Donald Trump actually knew what was down there or that he had anything to do with the boxes. | |
| They would have to lay the foundation that Donald Trump actually packed up his own office and Donald Trump was actually the custodian of these records and that he actually moved them. | |
| They have no information to indicate that he actually knew these boxes were in the storage unit. | |
| So there's no reason to believe that Donald Trump committed any crime or that any crime was committed by anybody. | |
| Is that going to stop the Department of Justice? | |
| Probably not. | |
| You know, the law has never, you know, why would you let the law get in the way of good facts that you can make up? | |
| So they might try to indict or, you know, try to make something up. | |
| I'm not worried about it. | |
| I don't think it would get very far, even if they manage to convince the jury, you know, to convict or something. | |
| I just don't think it will hold up. | |
| It's not going to hold up because they don't have the facts to support any criminal activity on the part of Donald Trump. | |
| So I just wanted you to highlight that a little bit for the audience, maybe explain it to them a bit deeper. | |
| In order for President Trump to be found guilty of anything, there's a very high standard that needs to be met. | |
| Can you explain that high standard? | |
| Yeah, so for the Code Section 18 U.S.C. 2071 that Mark Elias quoted in his tweet, It says that you have to willfully or knowingly remove or destroy the whole list of items. | |
| Willfully and knowingly means you have to do it intentionally, which means any person who does that, that would by default mean that if they want to prosecute Donald Trump for doing that, they would have to prove That Donald Trump personally knew that information was being removed from the White House, that he personally either dictated it or had it removed, or that he himself did it. | |
| He knew it was there and that he had some malicious intent with it, which there's nothing to indicate that that's true. | |
| And to be clear, I don't actually think that there's anything incriminating. | |
| You know, they can say that they found classified documents. | |
| We let them in there before, and other attorneys on the team have gone through that, combed through it to make sure there wasn't something that people weren't aware of. | |
| You know, I'm not convinced that there's actually anything damning in there, but we'll see. | |
| We'll have to see what they come up with. | |
| But I also think it's convenient for them that they're shrouding this in a national security blanket because they don't want to disclose what they're doing because what they're doing is wrong. | |
| And so they want to hide it behind the premise that this is, oh, it's a matter of national security and classified documents, so we can't disclose to you what we're doing or why we're doing it, but just trust us. | |
| We're not lying to you. | |
| Now, regardless of the legal ramifications, it appears that in terms of public support, this FBI raid has actually galvanized people supporting Trump. | |
| That's because in a statement that was written by Eric Trump just a few hours ago, quote, DonaldJTrump.com is shattering all fundraising records and I'm told has raised more money in the past 24 hours than ever before in recent history. | |
| The American people are pissed. | |
| Now, Eric Trump did not offer any actual numbers or any actual evidence to support his claim of such a huge windfall of money, but a wave of financial support would seem to be in line with the wave of public support that President Trump has received since Monday. | |
| That's because not only are prominent Republicans like Governor Ron DeSantis, Mike Pompeo, and pretty much everybody else in the caucus coming out and supporting Trump, but also the electorate seems to be doing the same as well. | |
| That's because the day after the raid, on Tuesday, candidates that were endorsed by President Trump swept through both federal as well as state elections. | |
| Now obviously this is a developing story with many twists and turns, and I will keep you updated on all the events as they transpire. | |
| And then until next time, I'm your host Roman from the Epoch Times. |
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