Disclaimer: This article may contain the personal views and opinions of the author.
Former Republican Rep. Trey Gowdy and current host of Fox News’ “Sunday Night in America” called out Merrick Garland and demanded more transparency.
This comes after the Department of Justice released the redacted affidavit, which was just redactions and no answers.
The affidavit released brings up more questions than answers, and is honestly hilarious the amount of blacked-out lines it contains.
“These questions are not political. They are factual and legal. If you are contemplating indicting a former president, I think we’re entitled to more than 38 pages of black lines and DOJ leaks, clearly, the department is talking to liberal reporters,” Gowdy said.
“If you’re going to tell the story, tell it all and tell everyone, tell the American people.”
Garland didn’t reveal why exactly the raid happened on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-A-Lago estate. The affidavit wasn’t transparent at all, and the Administration hasn’t been transparent about the raid, either.
Fox News reported:
If national security was truly in jeopardy, why did the AG dither for weeks before sending a phalanx of FBI agents to Mar-a-Lago to remedy something so urgent? Indeed, if bureau officials were aware of errant documents in early June or even back in February, why wait for months to retrieve them? If there are answers to those vexing questions in the affidavit, you won’t find them amid pages brimming with black lines.
Nor will you find any reference to how Trump and his legal team cooperated in returning previously requested documents to the National Archives. That kind of exculpatory information might have discouraged the magistrate from signing off on the warrant. Was he deceived by omission, as the FBI has done in the past when obtaining lawless warrants? Did the FBI misrepresent the government’s discussions with Trump’s lawyers? We don’t know because so much is wiped out in black.
The first eight pages are a rote recitation of background information and quotations from statutes that Garland cited to the magistrate to gain his consent for the raid. But the core of the affidavit that contains the attorney general’s probable cause arguments and justification for the raid—pages 9 through 29—are nearly all redacted. The pagination is there, but that’s about it. Then the affidavit ends abruptly with a two-sentence conclusion that reveals nothing meaningful.
There is nothing readable in the affidavit that alleges that Trump harbored criminal intent. The absence of such a claim doesn’t help Garland who is relying on proof that Trump “willfully”, “knowingly” or “deliberately” intended to commit this crime.
It’s reported that even if Trump somehow violated the Presidential Records Act, the proper legal action is a civil enforcement proceeding. Garland could have filed a motion in court to compel the return of the items sought.
Garland, however, didn’t do that. He went above and beyond and pursued a criminal course of action against President Trump.
