the fbi combing through donald trump s resort for classified documents. plus, a bipartisan win for joe biden. the president puts pen to paper on a law that he says will boost american manufacturing and provide more jobs. today, important primaries in four states, plus a dark twist in a georgia senate contest. a new ad surfaces accusations of abuse against the republican nominee, herschel walker. first time he held the gun to my head, he held the gun to my temple and said he s going to blow my brains out. we begin the hour with a monumental moment and what it might mean for the former president of the united states. federal agents serving a warrant and searching donald trump s home. the former president s palatial florida resort. the research started monday afternoon, and then confirmed within the hour by trump himself. the search was both legally executed and unprecedented. it is a stunning escalation in the federal probes into the former president. sources tell cnn the
done to his base. you are really seeing supporters coming out here, riled up by his announcement of this search, the search warrant being executed by the fbi. john. thank you for kicking us off. with me in studio and remotely to share the reporting and their insights, kaitlan collins, the former fbi supervisor peter lucotta, and jennifer rogers. jennifer, let me start with you. this is the former president s residence. this is the former president s office in florida. this is a former president. is there any way this happened without the attorney general of the united states signing off on it and looking at a very detailed probable cause warrant? i don t think so, john. of course, we re in unchartered territory here, but it s so conseq consequential, everybody knew it would be big news and you want to be very careful with this investigation and proceedings. seems to me merrick garland signed off and they were very
this went down yesterday. these fbi agents showed up at mar-a-lago at we re told between 8:00 and 10:00 in the morning. it wasn t until about 7:00 p.m. eastern last night that the president, former president confirmed in a statement that yes, it had happened. that was the first confirmation, him in his own words saying this happened. i think there s part of this where he s using this to his political advantage, but there s the other aspect of this where people in his own orbit are saying they went and executed a search warrant on his residence. they have concerns about whether or not there is something more there because they believe it s so explosive and delicate and sensitive that there must be something if they took that step. whether or not there is remains to be seen. they re attacking the attorney general, but even long serving republicans in this town who know merrick garland well from his days moving up from the federal bench, they don t think he would sign off on this unless
merrick garland, appointed by joe biden. listen here to preet bharara, the former u.s. district in the eastern district of new york saying to make probable cause, they needed some evidence there was a crime being committed. to get that evidence, where did it come from? they must have some close witness who can show the judge in an affidavit that the documents are still there, that there s evidence of misconduct up to and including the former president of the united states. ia don t take this kind of action lightly. if you look at what we have learned from the january 6th hearings it is people very close who had constant eyes on donald trump who have provided the most damning testimony about his conduct from election day through the insurrection. and beyond. preet is suggesting there that to get this warrant, the fbi must have some inside information that it could not trust what was being done with the custody of those documents. and that s the major question here of what document
don t think anyone has experience on anything this sensitive, but are you asking for a search warrant of the former president s residence when you re at the beginning of an investigation or at the very end and you believe you need a final piece of evidence and you believe you know where it is? it s at the very end. it s towards the very end. when you have corroborating information from a close in person source that you re relying on to swear to your affidavit. so this is going towards the end that they knew these documents were there, and they were able to articulate to a magistrate, let alone as you said, their chain of command. director of the fbi, the attorney general of the united states, and all those lawyers in between, that something exists that s a violation or potential violation of federal law and the fbi needs to go seize it. jennifer rogers, it s merrick garland s job, and everyone involved in the investigation s job to try to block out history, if you will. but they ar