New court ruling has opened the door for the DOJ to get another search warrant for Trump's properties: legal expert
10 December 2022
During an appearance on MSNBC's "The Katie Phang Show," former U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade suggested that a judge's decision on Friday to not hold Donald Trump and his lawyers in contempt of court could compel the Department of Justice to seek another search warrant for the former president's properties.
Late Friday "A federal judge in Washington declined to hold former President Donald Trump or his legal team in contempt of court," ABC reported before adding, "The judge instead urged the Justice Department and Trump's legal team to resolve the dispute themselves, the sources said."
With that in mind, McQuade stated the DOJ has grown increasingly frustrated with the former president and his legal team since they can't get anyone to sign off on a declaration affirming that all government documents have been turned over to the FBI.
According to McQuade, the failure to get a contempt of court ruling could lead the DOJ to ask for a search warrant to check for themselves.
"Why not make Donald Trump himself sign a piece of paper saying they have been returned?" host Phang prompted.
"I don't know that you can ever say they've all been returned because there is the possibility that some scrap of paper went undetected," McQuade replied. "You can ask what is frequently attested to in one of these record custodian documents, which is to say that after a diligent search, to the best of my knowledge, they have all been returned."
"I think that's all they are asking for here -- they will not even sign that," she continued. "What does that say? Yes, I think the judge could force someone to do that, but I think that the failure to do that could be a bit of evidence that prosecutors could use as probable cause to obtain a search warrant."
"I think that contempt order is a really important next step because the refusal to do it could be a piece of evidence which could go into a search warrant affidavit to give the government the authority to go in and actually just search these places themselves," she added.
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