Washington (AFP) - Donald Trump's legal team argued in court for the first time Thursday about the search of his Florida residence for government secrets removed from the White House -- asking for an independent watchdog to review the documents seized last month by FBI agents.
It was the latest development in multiple criminal, civil and congressional probes into the former president's role in last year's US Capitol attack and plot to overturn the 2020 US election, as well as his family firm's business practices.
Here are some of the key investigations weighing on the one-term president as he eyes a third run for the White House in 2024.
Capitol assault
A series of explosive hearings by the House of Representatives panel probing the attack on the US Capitol by Trump supporters on January 6, 2021 offered a roadmap for potentially charging the ex-president with a crime.
The lawmakers leading the hearings presented their case that Trump knew he lost the 2020 presidential election to Joe Biden, yet pressed his claims of fraud and ultimately brought his supporters to Washington for a rally that ended with a violent assault on Congress.
The House select committee has also uncovered dramatic evidence of Trump's alleged misconduct leading up to the insurrection, including his attempt to co-opt government departments into his bid to overturn the election.
The lawmakers' work is separate from the criminal probe that the Justice Department has launched into the unrest and the events leading up to it.
Former White House counsel Pat Cipollone -- a key witness to Trump's behavior during his last days in office, is expected to appear Friday before a grand jury in Washington.
Besides the legal ramifications, an unprecedented prosecution of a former chief executive would likely cause a political earthquake in a country already starkly divided along partisan Democratic and Republican lines.
'Find' the votes
Trump is being investigated for pressuring officials in the southern swing state of Georgia to overturn Joe Biden's 2020 victory -- including a now-infamous taped phone call in which he asked them "find" enough votes to reverse the result.
Fulton County's top prosecutor Fani Willis has assembled a special grand jury as part of a potentially year-long process that could end in Trump facing a raft of solicitation and conspiracy charges connected to election fraud and interference.
Willis has already amassed significant testimony from Trump's inner circle, including his former personal lawyer, ex-New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, who has been informed he is the target of criminal investigators.
The former president's Senate ally Lindsey Graham, who denies accusations that he improperly suggested Georgia toss out lawful mail-in ballots, has failed in a legal bid to avoid testifying.
The Trump Organization
Authorities in New York state have been looking into the business practices of the Trump Organization, including whether the firm misled lenders and tax authorities on the value of the company's real estate holdings.
However, in March the prosecutor leading a probe into the former president's finances quit over the decision by new Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg not to move ahead with prosecution of the Republican billionaire.
The investigation had probed whether Trump fraudulently overvalued multiple assets to secure loans and then undervalued them to minimize taxes.
It was launched by Bragg's predecessor Cyrus Vance, with Bragg taking over the case when he took office in January.
The prosecutor Mark Pomerantz alleged Trump is "guilty of numerous felony violations," according to his resignation letter published by the New York Times.
New York state Attorney General Letitia James is also pushing ahead with a civil probe of the Trump family firm's practices on property valuations and tax reporting.
'Raid' on Florida residence
An FBI search of Trump's Florida home in August turned up top secret documents improperly taken to Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate when he left office in January 2021.
Government officials said in a filing Tuesday they had evidence of efforts to hide classified documents despite a grand jury demand in May that Trump produce records removed from the White House.
The filing also stated that FBI agents located classified documents in Trump's desk drawers with his passports.
The August 8 raid was triggered by a review of "highly classified" records that Trump finally surrendered to authorities in January this year -- after months of back and forth with the National Archives.
The Justice Department began investigating after the 15 boxes were found to contain national defense information, including 184 documents marked as confidential, secret or top secret, a government affidavit showed.
The former president has taken legal action to seek the appointment of an independent party, or "special master," to screen the seized files for materials protected by law from being investigated.
A judge in southern Florida said Thursday she would consider the request "in due course" after the federal government opposed the move.
