Fox anchor Bret Baier on Trump search affidavit: “Where does the negotiation stop, why is there not another subpoena?”
Published
Citation From the August 26, 2022, edition of Fox News' America Reports
JOHN ROBERTS (CO-ANCHOR): So they had an idea what might still be at Mar-a-Lago if the president hadn't turned over everything, but as Sandra and David were just talking about, negotiations over the return of these records had been proceeding for the better part of 18 months. And we're wondering what is it in the redacted sections of this affidavit that had the DOJ say, “FBI, you've got to go in, you've got to seize this stuff now.”
BRET BAIER (FOX NEWS ANCHOR): Exactly, and that's what we don't see and probably what's in the redacted section. I mean this is the point. What is the purpose, what is the goal of the DOJ? If they know in January from the 15 boxes, 14 of them contain all of these classified materials in various stages of classification, then why not initiate the raid right then? Where does the negotiation stop, why is there not another subpoena? That's what we don't see in these documents. There is this part where it says there is probable cause to believe that additional documents that contain classified NDI, national defense intelligence, or that are presidential records subject to record retention requirements currently remain at the premises, but it goes on to say there is also probable cause to believe that evidence of obstruction will be found at the premises. Obstruction. So, did they find evidence of obstruction that the president was purposely trying to obstruct either their efforts or some other effort? We don't see that in these documents, and there are – page 24 to 27 are essentially all black. And I assume there is some of that in there. They say they are protecting witnesses of the grand jury and methods for intelligence services but there is, on the outskirts of this concern about where the documents are held in the basement of Mar-a-Lago, in the pine room, and that there were foreign nationals at Mar-a-Lago that had access to that area or near that area, and that suggests – that's on the outskirts of the blacked out portion.
SANDRA SMITH (CO-ANCHOR): And, yeah, on page 26 of the 38 pages, section 70, probable cause to believe that documents containing classified NDI and presidential records remain at the premises. That's when full redactions begin after that, it leaves a lot of room – for speculation there. Bret, to your point though about could there have been and was there room here for another subpoena to happen before the raid of a former president's home and to that, that's the question you've had since the release of this redacted affidavit.
BAIER: Yeah, it's the timing. This affidavit doesn't – because of the redactions, doesn't show us, doesn't tell us why that all fell apart. Did they believe that there was a reason that the former president was somehow holding them off? There was a reason in their justification that they had to move now? Why didn't they, when they find the documents in the 15 boxes in January, move quicker to, you know, go after these highly, highly sensitive documents they believe were still on the premises after looking at the 15 boxes that they retrieved in January. Why does it take until June to get a subpoena and then why does it take till August 8 to then launch this raid. That is not laid out in these documents, at least in the part that we can read. It may be in the part that we can't read.