The Department of Justice asked the Supreme Court to reject former President Donald Trump’s bid to again empower an independent arbiter to vet classified records seized from his Florida estate as part of his legal battle against investigators probing his handling of sensitive government records.
Last week Trump filed an emergency request that asked the justices to lift a decision made by the federal appeals court to prevent the arbiter from vetting the documents seized from his beloved Florida home Mar-a-Lago.
The arbiter, known as a special master, is meant to vet more than 100 documents marked as classified that were among the roughly 11,000 records seized by FBI agents at Mar-a-Lago in August.
In a filing on Tuesday, the Justice Department urged the Supreme Court to reject Trump’s request because he has not pointed to any “clear error” in the lower court’s decision or shown how he is harmed by it.
The Supreme Court’s 6-3 conservative majority includes three justices appointed by Trump.
Soon after Trump’s home was raided, the former president went to court on Aug. 22 in an attempt to restrict the Justice Department’s access to the documents as it pursues a criminal investigation of him for holding onto government records after he left the White House.
When he left the White House, Trump took some 11,000 records with him, including some marked as highly classified including some top secret.
Trump at the time asked a judge to appoint a special master, as the judge later did, to vet the seized documents and review whether any could be deemed privileged and potentially withheld from investigators.
In September, the Atlanta-based 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals put on hold a decision by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, who is presiding over Trump’s lawsuit.
Cannon, who was appointed by Trump, had temporarily barred the Justice Department from reviewing the seized documents until the special master she appointed identified any that could be considered privileged.
The special master, Judge Raymond Dearie, was asked by Cannon to review all of the seized records, including classified ones, to locate anything subject to attorney-client confidentiality or executive privilege.
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