The grounds of the palatial Mar-a-Lago estate were unusually quiet on Monday morning. The sprawling Palm Beach resort was mostly closed to guests, as it usually is during the hottest summer months. Only staff and close friends of the owner, Donald Trump, were around to see a stream of black cars sweep up the driveway.
Inside those cars were agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, there to execute a search warrant on the former president’s primary residence.
The nature and sensitivity of the investigation that led to the extraordinary search of Mr Trump’s home — reportedly part of a probe into his handling of classified documents — has meant that the Department of Justice has yet to comment on the reasons behind it or what was found.
Most of the details of what transpired come from Mr Trump and people in his orbit. With that caution in mind, here is what we know about how the search on Mar-a-Lago went down.
A librarian scorned
Long before the black cars rolled up the Mar-a-Lago driveway, in the dying days of his presidency, more than a dozen boxes of documents were taken by Mr Trump to his Florida home.
The National Archives and Records Administration (MARA) had been requesting access to those boxes for months when Mr Trump finally relinquished them in January of this year. Mr Trump turned over 15 boxes of documents, letters, memos and gifts that were taken from the White House when he left office.
A few weeks later, the NARA revealed that those boxes contained items that were “marked as classified national security information.” As that material was subject to the Presidential Records Act, which requires that all White House documents be turned over to the archives, national archivist David S. Ferriero referred to the Justice Department.
Mr Trump claimed in a statement at the time that the Archives "did not ‘find’ anything," but confirmed he had agreed to return some records, calling it "an ordinary and routine process."
Both of those claims turned out to be false, and Mr Trump’s clash with a librarian appears to have set into motion a chain of events that led to the unprecedented decision by the Justice Department to search the former president’s home.
In the time between that referral and the search, the FBI began an investigation into Mr Trump and would have had to demonstrate probable cause to a judge to obtain a warrant.
The New York Times reported in May that federal prosecutors launched a grand jury investigation into Mr Trump’s handling of classified documents. On Tuesday, the newspaper reported that a small number of federal agents, including at least one involved in counterintelligence, visited Mar-a-Lago in search of some documents.
Monday’s search appeared to be a continuation of that search. Two people familiar with the matter, speaking on the condition of anonymity to the Associated Press, said the search was related to the records probe. The same sources said the agents were also searching for additional presidential records or any classified documents that they did not know about.
Approval for such a consequential search would have likely required high-level approval, but so far the Justice Department has declined to say if attorney general Merrick B. Garland was involved in the decision.
“Like a Die Hard movie”
FBI agents arrived at Mar-A-Lago sometime on Monday evening. Estimates about how many agents were present at the scene range from 30 (according to Eric Trump) to “at least 100” (according to a source present at Mar-A-Lago cited by the New York Post).
The FBI agents informed the Secret Service, the federal agency responsible for Mr Trump’s security, that they were coming, according to NBC, but did not take part in the search.
The source cited by the Post described what transpired as “like the scene of a ‘Die Hard’ movie,” adding that “the staff were absolutely terrified.”
The former president generally spends summers at his New Jersey golf resort, and was in New York at the time of the search. It was Eric Trump, who was also spotted in New York on Monday, who informed his father of the search.
“I was the guy who got the call this morning and I called my father and let him know it happened, and I was involved all day,” he told Fox News host Sean Hannity on Monday night.
Back in Palm Beach, a number of Mr Trump’s attorneys were present for the search, including Christina Bobb. She told NBC News that federal agents “did conduct an unannounced raid and seized paper.”
A senior government official also told NBC News that the FBI was at Mar-a-Largo “for the majority of the day.” According to Peter Schorsch, the publisher of FloridaPolitics.com and the person who broke the biggest political story of the year, the agents left around 6.30pm.
“They even broke into my safe!”
The FBI and Department of Justice have refused to comment on the search or what, if anything, was found. That has meant that most of the details about what transpired came from Mr Trump himself.
The former president confirmed the news of the search in a 6.52pm statement.
“These are dark times for our Nation, as my beautiful home, Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, is currently under siege, raided, and occupied by a large group of FBI agents,” he wrote.
Mr Trump railed against what he described as “prosecutorial misconduct” and “the weaponization of the Justice System.”
“After working and cooperating with the relevant Government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate,” he said. “They even broke into my safe!”
Further details of the search would emerge throughout the evening from sources in Trumpworld, many of them lavishly embellished. Eric Trump also shared with Mr Hannity during his appearance on Fox News that the agents ransacked closets in Mar-a-Lago.
“To have 30 FBI agents — actually more than that — descend on Mar-a-Lago, give absolutely, you know, no notice, go through the gates, start ransacking an office, ransacking a closet — you know, they broke into a safe. He didn’t even have anything in the safe. I mean, give me a break,” he said.
“Defund the FBI”
Republican condemnation of the search was swift and furious. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said in a tweeted statement that the Department of Justice “has reached an intolerable state of weaponized politicisation” and pledged to investigate Mr Garland and the department.
South Dakota governor Kristi L. Noem called the search an “unprecedented political weaponization of the Justice Department.”
“They’ve been after President Trump as a candidate, as President, and now as a former President. Using the criminal justice system in this manner is un-American,” she added.
Republican congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has expressed support for executing and arresting Democratic opponents in the past, tweeted: “DEFUND THE FBI!”
Paul Manafort, Mr Trump’s former campaign chairman, erroneously called the search a “pre dawn raid” in a tweet.
