The former president’s lawyers and the DoJ are expected to jointly file a list of candidates for the role of special master in the Trump criminal probe sometime Friday.
Prosecutors were barred from continuing their review of the documents seized in the Mar-a-Lago raid as part of their criminal investigation on Monday after a federal judge gave Trump’s attorneys a minor legal victory by approving a request to appoint a special master in the case.
The DoJ appealed the ruling on Thursday, asking to be granted permission to continue their review.
The feds’ investigation hinges on whether Trump or his aides engaged in the criminal removal of classified government documents from the White House, and whether he attempted to obstruct the investigation against him by concealing or removing records that the FBI sought to obtain earlier this year using a grand jury subpoena.
The special master’s role could prove crucial in the case, as the official would have the authority to decide if any of the seized papers should be excluded on the grounds of attorney-client privilege or Executive Privilege.
The deadline for the special master list submissions comes following US media reporting earlier this week alleging that the seized materials include a bombshell document on the military and nuclear capabilities of an unnamed foreign nation.
Feds earlier told the court that the FBI had seized more than 100 classified documents from Mar-a-Lago during the August 8 raid. Before that, the domestic intelligence agency reported the retrieval of over 300 additional documents from the compound between January and June.
Former President Donald Trump has spent the past month attacking the FBI over the raid, and accusing the Biden administration and the “sleazy” Democrats of seeking to take him down and stop him from taking another shot at the White House.
Trump denies illegally storing any classified documents at his Florida estate, and has accused the government of seizing his personal documents, including passports and medical files.
“At least they’ll see that I’m very healthy, an absolutely perfect physical specimen!” Trump quipped in a post on his Truth Social platform Wednesday.
The FBI returned the passports in mid-August.