: The FBI did not believe it had probable cause to raid President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home in 2022, but moved forward amid pressure from the Biden Justice Department, with an official saying he didn’t ‘give a damn about the optics’ of the search, newly declassified documents reviewed by Fox News Digital reveal.

Fox News Digital reviewed emails between FBI and Justice Department officials in the months leading up to the August 2022 raid of Mar-a-Lago, with FBI officials expressing concerns about a lack of probable cause to execute the search warrant on the then-former president’s residence in Palm Beach, Florida. 

‘Very little has been developed related to who might be culpable for mishandling the documents,’ an FBI official serving as an assistant special agent in charge, wrote to another FBI official, Anthony Riedlinger. ‘From the interviews, WFO has gathered information suggesting that there may be additional boxes (presumably of the same type as were sent back to NARA in January) at Mar-a-Lago.’

‘WFO has been drafting a search warrant affidavit related to these potential boxes, but has some concerns that the information is single source, has not been corroborated, and may be dated,’ the official continues. ‘DOJ CES opines, however, that the SW’s meet the probable cause standard.’

‘Even as we continue down the path towards a search warrant, WFO believes that a reasonable conversation with the former president’s attorney, (stating that the FBI and DOJ are readying a search warrant, and have developed information that there are more documents at Mar a Lago), ought not to be discounted,’ the official wrote.

‘At a minimum, even if the former president’s attorney is correct and the documents were all declassified (or believed to be declassified), it can be reasonably argued that the documents remain sensitive and should be properly secured until the matter of classification is sorted out,’ the official continued. ‘This conversation could easily be accomplished at the same time that WFO presses forward with the investigation and continues building out the search warrant.’ 

Weeks later, an FBI agent writes an email stating: ‘We haven’t generated any new facts, but keep being given draft after draft after draft.’

‘Absent a witness coming forward with recent information about classified on site, at what point is it fair to table this?’ the agent writes. ‘It is time consuming for the team, and not productive if there are no new facts supporting PC (probable cause)?’

Another email revealed that the FBI’s Washington Field Office did ‘not believe (and has articulated to DOJ CES), that we have established probable cause for the search warrant for classified records at Mar a Lago.’

‘DOJ has opined that they do have probable cause, requesting a wide scope including residence, office, storage space,’ an agent wrote.

The FBI believed that a raid would be ‘counterproductive,’ and suggested ‘alternative, less intrusive and likelier quicker options for resolution’ to reclaim any potential classified records.

The process moved forward, regardless of concerns.

Another email on Aug. 4, 2022, revealed the plan for the execution of the warrant.

‘The FBI intends for the execution of the warrant to be handled in a professional, low key manner, and to be mindful of the optics of the search,’ an agent writes.

The agent quotes then-Deputy Assistant Attorney General George Toscas in a meeting.

‘Since we heard Mr. Toscas say yesterday in the call that he ‘frankly doesn’t give a damn about the optics’ and Mr. Bratt has already built an antagonistic relationship with (Trump) attorneys…I think it is more than fair to say that the DOJ contact with (Trump attorney) just prior to the execution of the warrant will not go well. DOJ said as much yesterday,’ the agent writes. ‘I also think that it is fair to say that if FBI calls, having in mind officer safety, to the optics of the search, and the desire to conduct this search in a professional and low key manner, there is a far better chance that the execution will go more smoothly and we may actually gain some measure of cooperation, which could go some way to resolving the mishandling of classified records investigation that is being conducted.’

The agent added: ‘I understand that this request may not go well at DOJ, however, it is the FBI serving and executing the search and it will be our personnel who will have to deal with the reaction to that first contact.’

The FBI, in August 2022, raided Trump’s Mar-a-Lago, executing the search warrant as part of an investigation into his alleged improper retention of classified records after leaving the White House.

Fox News Digital reported in 2024 that the Biden administration authorized the use of deadly force during the FBI’s raid on Mar-a-Lago. That language was also used during the search of then-President Joe Biden’s residence for potential classified documents in 2023. 

An ‘Operations Order’ produced in discovery as part of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into Trump’s alleged improper retention of classified records revealed that the ‘FBI believed its objective for the Mar-a-Lago raid was to seize ‘classified information, NDI, and US Government records,’’ as described in the search warrant.

The order, according to a court filing, contained a ‘Policy Statement’ regarding ‘Use of Deadly Force,’ which stated, for example, ‘Law Enforcement officers of the Department of Justice may use deadly force when necessary.’

According to the filing, the DOJ and FBI agents ‘planned to bring ‘Standard Issue Weapons,’ ‘Ammo,’ ‘Handcuffs,’ and ‘medium and large sized bolt cutters,’ but they were instructed to wear ‘unmarked polo or collared shirts’ and to keep ‘law enforcement equipment concealed.” 

Fox News Digital first reported that during the raid, FBI agents seized boxes of documents containing records and materials potentially protected by attorney-client and executive privilege, leading to legal disputes over the handling of those documents by a taint team.

Trump attorneys, at the time, told Fox News Digital they were not permitted into the rooms as FBI agents conducted the search, raising major concerns about the procedures surrounding the raid. Attorneys said that the FBI agents executing the search were in no position to decide unilaterally where to search and what were Trump’s personal records and what were not.

Trump was charged out of former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into his retention of classified materials. Trump pleaded not guilty to all 37 felony charges from Smith’s probe, including willful retention of national defense information, conspiracy to obstruct justice, and false statements.

Trump also was charged with an additional three counts as part of a superseding indictment out of the investigation: an additional count of willful retention of national defense information and two additional obstruction counts.

Trump pleaded not guilty. The charges were dropped by Smith after Trump won the 2024 presidential election.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates. 

A moderate House Republican is raging against his own party after negotiations over a vote on extending COVID-19-era Obamacare subsidies fell apart.

Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., told reporters Tuesday morning that it was ‘idiotic’ and ‘political malpractice’ to not hold an ‘up-or-down vote’ on the subsidies, which are set to expire at the end of this year.

He also turned his ire on House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., who he accused of rejecting moderate Republicans’ compromise solutions in order to keep the issue alive as a political cudgel.

‘You have two leaders that are not serious about solving this,’ Lawler said in reference to Jeffries and Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La. ‘I am pissed for the American people. This is absolute bulls—.’

House Republicans have introduced their own healthcare bill aimed at lowering prices via cost-sharing reductions, drug cost transparency measures, and association healthcare plans, which allow small employers and self-employed Americans to work in small groups to purchase coverage.

And while a majority of GOP lawmakers are against any sort of extension of the subsidies, Democrats and a group of moderate House Republicans have warned that a failure to act will result in millions of Americans seeing significant price hikes for their premiums.

House GOP leadership aides told reporters late last week that they expected some sort of amendment vote on the expiring subsidies, but a source familiar told Fox News Digital on Tuesday that those talks fell apart due to disagreements over how to cover the cost of an extension.

The growing pressure has spawned three separate efforts to force a vote on extending the subsidies via discharge petitions, mechanisms to override the will of House GOP leadership on a piece of legislation, provided it has support from the majority of chamber lawmakers.

Two petitions are bipartisan and include limited extensions with reforms to the healthcare system, while a third led by Jeffries includes a straightforward extension for three years.

But moderate Republicans have shown a mixed reaction so far to Jeffries’ proposal, while Jeffries has dismissed the GOP’s.

Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., told NBC News he would not sign Jeffries’ petition, and a source close to Rep. Jen Kiggans, R-Va., told Fox News Digital the same.

Lawler, however, said, ‘Everything is on the table,’ when asked by reporters about his own plans.

He blasted Jeffries for the decision and urged all his colleagues to sign onto one of the GOP’s petitions during an impassioned speech on the House floor.

‘If everybody who says they care about extending this signs the discharge, it could be solved today. And we could say to the leadership on both sides, ‘A pox on both your houses, both of you are failing this country, both of you are failing this institution,’ and move the bill forward,’ Lawler said. ‘So the challenge I have for every one of my colleagues is, put the party crap aside and sign the damn discharge today.’

He directed a comment at Jeffries specifically, ‘Come down to this floor, sign the discharge, and show real leadership. Because sadly, my conference has failed to do that.’

Johnson called Lawler ‘a very dear friend’ and pointed out he campaigned in Lawler’s district recently when asked about the criticism during his weekly press conference.

‘Mike Lawler fights hard for New York, as every Republican in this conference does for their districts. The districts are different. They have different priorities and ideas,’ Johnson said. ‘And many of them didn’t want to vote on this Obamacare or, you know, COVID-era, something that the Democrats created. We looked for a way to try to allow for that … and it just was not to be.’

One Senate Republican is making the case that lawmakers aren’t using all the tools at their disposal to tackle affordability in the United States.

Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., wants Republicans to take another crack at budget reconciliation, the grueling, monthslong process used earlier this year to pass President Donald Trump’s crowning legislative achievement of 2025, and one that tested the unity of congressional Republicans.

Kennedy wants to see the process used to eat into the cost of living in the country, which has proven a thorny issue for the GOP after Trump’s promises on the campaign trail to hack away at skyrocketing inflation that proved politically fatal, among other issues like immigration, for Democrats in last year’s election.

But it’s a Pandora’s box that lawmakers have been hesitant to reopen after narrowly advancing the colossal tax package over the summer.

‘I have been preaching as persuasively as I can for months now that we need to do another reconciliation, and in that bill, we need to address things like rules and regulations, which add about $2 trillion to the cost of goods and services,’ Kennedy said.

He acknowledged that the process could be tricky, given that it is governed by the Byrd Rule, which nixes any provisions that don’t have a budgetary impact, but noted that lawmakers have at least two more attempts to take advantage of the process while Republicans still control both chambers of Congress.

‘And I am at a loss to understand why our leadership will not agree to another reconciliation,’ he said. ‘If you went to Senator [Chuck] Schumer right now and said, ‘Schumer, Senator Schumer, you have the chance to pass anything you want to pass today within the parameters of Byrd, without having to depend on a single Republican vote,’ what do you think Chuck would do? He’d take a dozen, and I just don’t understand why we are not doing that.’

Affordability and the cost of living have become a central focus for many on the Hill, particularly after dueling partisan proposals to tackle the impending hike to healthcare premiums and expiring Obamacare subsidies went down in flames last week.

Lawmakers are still searching for a path forward on that front, with a bipartisan group led by Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, meeting on Monday night to build a consensus between the parties.

Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., one of the architects of Senate Republicans’ healthcare proposal that failed last week, told reporters, ‘The calendar precludes getting something done this week,’ but was still optimistic about finding a way to deal with rising costs on the healthcare front.

‘But, still, a commitment to work together is a lot of progress,’ he said.

Still, Kennedy was ardent that lawmakers had spent little time since passing Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill,’ taking advantage of their majority in Congress.

‘Yes, we passed the ‘one big, beautiful bill,’ that was July 1, five months ago, now, almost six months ago,’ he said. ‘We need to act. And I’m hoping that after the holidays, my friend, Senator [John] Thune, and he is a friend, and I think he’s doing a great job, but I think Senator, I hope Senator Thune will relent and agree to another reconciliation bill that addresses the cost-of-living issue.’

Erika Kirk has announced that she is to meet privately with commentator Candace Owens marking the first direct conversation between the two after a period of public discussion and differing perspectives that emerged after her late husband’s death.

Kirk shared the update in a brief statement on X on Sunday, saying both women had agreed to pause all public commentary until after the meeting.

‘Candace Owens and I are meeting for a private, in-person discussion on Monday, December 15,’ Erika said.

‘@RealCandaceO and I have agreed that public discussions, livestreams, and tweets are on hold until after this meeting. I look forward to a productive conversation. Thank you,’ Erika added.

The planned discussion between Erika and the former Turning Point USA employee reflects an effort by the women to address weeks of mounting tensions over conspiracy theories online in a more thoughtful and personal setting.

At a recent CBS town hall Erika expressed the emotional toll of widespread online speculation surrounding her husband’s passing, ‘Stop. That’s it. That’s all I have to say. Stop.’ when asked what she had to say to people making unfounded claims.

‘When you go after my family, my Turning Point USA family, my Charlie Kirk Show family, when you go after the people that I love, and you’re making hundreds and thousands of dollars every single episode going after the people that I love because somehow they’re in on this, no,’ Erika also said on ‘Outnumbered’ Dec. 10.

The relationship between the two women has deteriorated sharply in recent months, despite their earlier history of collaboration and personal friendship.

The recent events have placed them on different sides of a sensitive moment and their decision to meet privately shows signs of a mutual desire to speak directly while reducing misunderstandings and avoiding further speculation.

Kirk, who now leads TPUSA, has been focused publicly on preserving her husband Charlie Kirk’s legacy since his tragic death in September.

After more than eight years of Democrat lawfare against President Trump, his aides and his allies, the Justice Department under Attorney General Pam Bondi is bringing much-needed accountability — which is what American voters demanded in our last presidential election. But Democrat activist judges are doing what they do best: weaponization and sabotage.

In South Carolina, Clinton-appointed Judge Cameron Currie — handpicked by a Biden-appointed judge — wrongly disqualified Eastern District of Virginia U.S. Attorney Lindsey Halligan, the bold and fearless prosecutor who had secured an indictment against former FBI Director James Comey for lying and obstruction of a Senate investigation into his politicization, weaponization, and corruption of the intel agencies and law enforcement to go after political enemies and protect political allies. The government is appealing that decision to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.  Now, another Clinton-appointed judge in the District of Columbia, Colleen Kollarr-Kotelly, has interfered even more egregiously with the government’s case. This ruling threatens the separation of powers essential to the Republic, and either the D.C. Circuit or Supreme Court must intervene immediately.

Comey was indicted on two charges: making false statements to Congress and obstruction of Congress. The indictment stemmed from the events surrounding Operation Crossfire Hurricane, more colloquially known as the Russiagate hoax. Comey used his longtime friend, Columbia Law Professor Daniel Richman, as a conduit to leak material unfavorable to President Trump to media outlets. In addition to being a law professor, Richman was a government contractor. He and Comey communicated frequently via email on government and private accounts. Communications on a government email account enjoy no reasonable expectation of privacy — the standard under the Fourth Amendment as a result of Justice Harlan’s concurrence in Katz v. United States (1967) — because the government can monitor its own email servers.

Six years ago, even Obama-appointed Judge James Boasberg, a judicial disgrace about whom we often have written, signed a warrant authorizing the search and seizure of emails on Richman’s computer and iCloud account and his account at Columbia. Richman was able to review all emails and withhold the information he deemed privileged from all but one account. Now, Richman — who was the recipient of many emails from Comey and the sender of many emails to him — has sought to reclaim those emails pursuant to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 41(g). This rule allows an individual to ask a court to reclaim his property obtained pursuant to an unlawful search and/or seizure in violation of the Fourth Amendment.

Shockingly, Kollar-Kotelly granted the motion and has ordered the FBI to destroy the emails by 4 p.m. on Monday.  Kollar-Kotelly’s ruling ordered the destruction of emails obtained pursuant to a warrant signed by another (Obama) judge six years ago.  She claims that the seized information relates to a new investigation; however, she is basing this assertion on a decision by Eastern District of Virginia U.S. Magistrate Judge William Fitzpatrick. Fitzpatrick issued a suppression-like decision even though suppression was not briefed by the parties — yet another example of blatant and unlawful judicial sabotage by partisans in robes.

Collar-Kotelly has ordered that a copy of the emails be given to Biden-appointed Judge Michael Nachmanoff, who is presiding over the Comey case in Virginia. This salvation of a copy of the emails, however, does not lessen the impact of Kollar-Kotelly’s horrible ruling. The FBI and the prosecution will be unable to review them in their efforts to seek a new indictment if Currie’s dismissal ruling survives on appeal. The statute-of-limitations law allows the government only six months after an indictment’s dismissal, suspended during the appellate process, to seek a new indictment. The inability to view this evidence would substantially increase the time necessary to seek an indictment.  Even if a higher court reverses Currie, the government’s inability to review the emails to use as evidence and prepare for trial would massively hamper its case.

Kollar-Kotelly’s decision is more disturbing because it implicates the separation of powers. Usually, Rule 41(g) comes into play where a defendant has had property wrongly seized, and he moves to reclaim it. Here, Comey is not seeking to reclaim anything; Richman, a then-government contractor with whom Comey communicated extensively about government business, is seeking this evidence. Richman has run to a partisan Democrat judge not even involved in the criminal case — and not even in the same district — to procure the destruction of crucial evidence in that case in an obvious effort to assist his friend Comey. Comey cannot challenge the warrant against Richman because he lacks standing to do so. Incredibly, Kollar-Kotelly suggested that Richman could move to quash this evidence in Virginia.  She’s going way out of her way to help Comey. Judges presiding over cases often have excluded evidence against defendants as having been obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment. It is, however, extraordinary for a different judge — especially in a different district — to interfere in and dramatically hamper the prosecution’s case based on a claim by a third party of a wrongful search and seizure, especially when the evidence the government wishes to use consists of communications between that third party and the defendant — a defendant who was a senior government official.

The government obtained the evidence it wishes to use against Comey pursuant to a lawful warrant, even one signed by a highly partisan Obama-appointed judge. Now, a Clinton-appointed judge who is not presiding over the case — and is not even in the same district — is blatantly trying to aid Comey by preventing the government from using that evidence either to re-indict Comey or try him if the original indictment is reinstated. This ruling contravenes the normal way in which Rule 41(g) applies. The Clinton judge’s staggering timeline — destruction by tomorrow afternoon — also illustrates her agenda. She should have stayed a ruling of such magnitude to allow the appellate process to play out.  Instead, she has put the government in an incredibly precarious position: having to obtain a stay from either the D.C. Circuit or the Supreme Court in just a few hours. Kollar-Kotelly’s order had no legal basis, and a higher court must put a stop to it.

Kollar-Kotelly’s ruling is part of a larger pattern. Leftist judges like Obama-appointed D.C. Judge Tanya Chutkan — who presided over President Trump’s January 6-related case, Boasberg, who signed off on the national disgrace that was Operation Arctic Frost, and many other Democrat judges did nothing to stop and did much to escalate the lawfare waged against President Trump, his aides, and his allies. Now, the Justice Department is seeking legal accountability for lawfare perpetrators like Comey. Currie and Kollar-Kotelly have endeavored to prevent — or, at the very least, drastically decrease the chances of — such legal accountability. Courts do not order the FBI to destroy evidence in pending investigations, except when the evidence is harmful to a lawfare perpetrator like Comey. The inconsistency between the treatment afforded lawfare perpetrators and lawfare targets threatens the very legitimacy of the federal judiciary. If higher courts do not reign in these rogue judges, Congress must do so through oversight, withholding of funds from judicial appropriations, and impeachment.  A system where the judiciary enables lawfare and then shields its perpetrators from legal consequences is unsustainable, and higher courts must put a stop to it.