Friday 12 August 2022 05:01 PM Republicans demand DOJ reveal reason for Mar-a-Lago search if it was 'nuclear ... trends now

House Republicans demanded the Department of Justice now release not just the warrant used to raid Mar-a-Lago but the highly detailed accompanying affidavit. 

Attorney General Merrick Garland announced Thursday he would ask a judge to unseal the warrant, barring former President Trump's objection. Trump released a statement Friday calling for the warrant to be released immediately. 

But the government has not yet taken steps to release the affidavit used in support of the warrant, which would reveal in further detail the broad investigation into Trump. It would describe the probable cause prosecutors had to believe there was evidence of a crime hiding out in Trump's Florida golf course property. 

'It should be released to us,' House Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Mike Turner, R-Ohio, said in a news conference Friday of the affidavit. 

'We believe that after the [warrant] release today that these questions will still remain unanswered,' he added. He requested that the Democrats who lead the committee support their call for the affidavit and back a subpoena if DOJ fails to provide one. 

'We want to know what was this imminent national security threat upon which this was based?' Turner said. 

'There were a number of options that were available to the Attorney General and the director of the FBI besides raiding Mar-a-Largo, the foreign president's home, and spending nine hours there,' Turner said. 

The Washington Post reported that classified nuclear weapons documents may have been among the boxes the FBI retrieved. Trump called the claim a 'hoax.' 

Asked if the raid would be justified if it was to take back nuclear weapons information, Turner said: 'It depends on what the nuclear information is. You can say nuclear weapons, but there are things that are highly highly classified. There are things that are not extremely classified.' 

Utah Rep. Chris Stewart joked that 'maybe it was aliens' but no one could say without the affidavit. 

'Was it nuclear? Was it, hey heck, maybe it was aliens - that's the point. We don't know. We're asking them to tell us.' 

Other members of the caucus sowed distrust in the FBI and claimed the Department of Justice was launching a political attack. 

'What makes you think we should trust the FBI?' Rep. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., said. 'Where have they earned out trust?' 

Stewart compared the raid to attacks on political opponents under the Soviet Union. 

'People around the world want to live under an American FBI and their leadership, not an American KGB or some of the nefarious innuendos that would come with living under an organization or a government that treat people differently,' he said.

'The perception is now.... the Department of Justice and the FBI has chosen a team and that they're working for that team now against the interest of other Americans.' 

Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, Pa., the only former FBI agent in Congress, questioned why the FBI chose the 'most extreme' method of retrieving documents. 

'There is a continuum of options available to any agency that's enforcing the law from non invasive methods like the passive service of a subpoena ... all the way up to the most extreme, which would be the execution of a search warrant.'

'The Bureau and the Attorney General and the DOJ obviously made the decision that this extreme measure was necessary. We will await their rationale as to why that extreme measure was justified and not some lesser intrusive means.' 

Mullin and Rep. Trent Kelly, Miss., placed Garland squarely in their crosshairs.  

'No one is above the law. I heard that yesterday. No one is above the law and that includes the Attorney General and the seventh floor of the FBI,' Kelly said. 

'Attorney Garland goes out and says that no one is above the law. I agree with that statement. No one is that includes you, Attorney General Garland,' Mullin added. 'That includes you, [FBI Director Chris Wray], and I'm here to tell you that the Democrats don't hold you accountable for your actions, the Republican Party will.'