FBI Authorized Use of Deadly Force During Mar-a-Lago Raid

Newly unsealed documents in Special Counsel Jack Smith's espionage case against Donald Trump demonstrate the FBI's plans to use deadly force--even if the former president arrived at the scene.

An exhibit filed today by Donald Trump in a motion to suppress evidence seized during the FBI’s August 2022 raid of Mar-a-Lago revealed shocking new details about the bureau’s plans to use deadly force and even engage the former president and his security detail that day if necessary. The document is just one of many court filings recently ordered unsealed by Judge Aileen Cannon, who is presiding over the matter in southern Florida.

In an August 3, 2022 operations order for “Plasmic Echo,” the FBI’s code name for the government’s investigation into Trump’s alleged mishandling of national defense material, FBI officials furnished instructions on to proceed with the unprecedented raid. “FBI [Washington Field Office] and FBI [Miami] agents and [Evidence Response Team] will effect a search of designated locations within Mar-a-Lago (MAL) to locate and seize classified information, NDI, and US Government records as described in captioned search warrant,” the document read.

The raid involved 25 Miami FBI agents, four Washington FBI agents, one unidentified individual from FBI Headquarters, one DOJ attorney, and the assistant U.S. Attorney from the Southern District of Florida.

But according to the operations order, law enforcement was not preparing a routine search for presidential papers. One section of the plan described how agents should handle the potential for use of deadly force:

The FBI also considered various scenarios should the former president unexpectedly arrive at his residence during the raid. Agents were also prepared to go door-to-door to terrorize Mar-a-Lago guests if staff refused to turn over room keys:

In addition to lock-picking equipment, FBI agents were armed with “Standard Issue Weapon, Ammo, [and] Handcuffs” as well as “medium and large sized bolt cutters.”

Perhaps most shockingly, the FBI team included a medic to tend to anyone “injured” during the raid. The operations order identified a nearby trauma center with directions how to get there:

Additional exhibits in the unsealed motion today also indicate agents ransacked the bedrooms of Melania and Barron Trump

.The head of the Washington FBI Field Office at the time was Steven D’Antuono. In addition to spearheading the criminal investigation into the events of January 6, which included his inability to identify and charge the so-called pipe bomber, D’Antuono led the Detroit FBI Field office in 2020 when the FBI manufactured an entrapment scheme to make it appear that Trump supporters plotted to kidnap and kill Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer in 2020. D’Antuono retired in November 2022.

Attorney General Merrick Garland approved the FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago.