Former Top FBI Official Questions Mar-a-Lago Raid: 'Just Didn't Smell Right'
A former high-ranking FBI official has expressed concerns that the FBI’s 2022 raid on Mar-a-Lago might have unintended consequences.
In August 2022, the FBI conducted a raid on the home of former President Donald Trump as part of an investigation into whether Trump unlawfully retained classified documents after leaving the White House.
“I was worried about it increasing distrust in us,” said Steve D’Antuono, who led the Washington Field Office of the FBI at the time, according to NBC.
“We all thought this posed a risk to us both professionally and personally. I can’t impress upon you the pressure,” the retired official stated.
D’Antuono revealed that voicing his concerns during a critical meeting about the raid led to him being reprimanded.
“I take it to heart to do the right thing in the right way for the right reasons,” he emphasized. “They put such urgency into getting into Mar-a-Lago; for the circumstances, it just didn’t smell right, it didn’t feel right.”
D’Antuono also expressed concern that Justice Department prosecutor Jay Bratt “was being a little overly aggressive.”
Bratt had made several donations to Democratic candidates between 1993 and 2007.
NBC News, citing information from the book “Where Tyranny Begins: The Justice Department, the FBI, and the War on Democracy” by David Rohde, portrayed D’Antuono and other FBI agents as wanting to retrieve any documents in Trump's possession without confrontation. D’Antuono believed a consensual search could recover the documents and stated he would only proceed with a raid if explicitly ordered.
“I was trying to be a different voice in the room. Why do we have to be aggressive? We have an attorney in this case,” D’Antuono told NBC in his interview. “If it didn’t work with Corcoran, then fine. We would serve the search warrant and go in. No harm, no foul.”
He noted that the FBI was prepared to act if documents were removed.
“In my opinion, there was no harm in doing it that way,” D’Antuono added.
D’Antuono indicated that the charges being prepared, including those that could potentially bar Trump from office for unlawfully possessing classified documents, fueled suspicions.
“The barring from office charge. People saw that charge as ‘Aha, is that DOJ’s effort to get Trump?’” he explained.
During a 2023 appearance before the House Judiciary Committee, D’Antuono suggested in an interview that the raid was managed in a way that left the FBI vulnerable to criticism.
“So it wasn’t completely out of the ordinary, but something like this, the severity of this, you know, we were asking for it,” he said at the time.
He expressed his belief that the FBI wanted to avoid creating a spectacle. “And there was no reason to raid or break down a door or anything like that,” he noted.
He further described the raid as “a reputational risk” for the FBI.
“I do think there was a good likelihood that we could have got consent and then we wouldn’t have had to — I think the Bureau — we left — we were left holding the bag again, right, and we cut ourselves,” he concluded in the 2023 interview.