Federal Judge Orders DOJ to Release Redacted Affidavit

Bob Litt was a guest on CNN’s Erin Burnett OutFront, discussing a federal judge ordering the Department of Justice to release the redacted version of the affidavit used to obtain a warrant for former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence.

“I think it’s significant that Trump did not call for release of the affidavit until after the Department of Justice indicated that it was going to oppose the release of the affidavit,” Bob said. “I think that he probably doesn’t want the entire affidavit released, and would be much happier with the ability to point to blacked-out spaces and say, ‘Look what they’re hiding from you.’ At the end of the day, this is probably a net plus for the government. It’s very atypical – almost unprecedented – to have a search warrant affidavit released at this stage in the proceedings, but the government has the ability and has exercised that, and the judge has found that they have excised all information that would compromise sources and methods that the Justice Department would be concerned about. We don’t know yet how much is going to be left for us to see, but I think that on balance, this is probably better for the government.”

Watch the full interview.