Attorney General Merrick Garland on Thursday admitted he ‘personally approved’ of the FBI’s raid of Donald Trump’s home in Mar-A-Lago after nearly a week of media denials.
“There are however, certain points I want you to know,” Garland said. “First, I personally approve the decision to seek a search warrant. In this matter second, the department does not take such a decision lightly.”
Garland refused to take questions after the press briefing.
"But as I said this all I can say this time."
AG Garland refuses to take questions about the FBI raiding Trump. pic.twitter.com/PXR1orNebr
— Real Mac Report (@RealMacReport) August 11, 2022
Newsweek in an exclusive falsely reported that AG Garland was not asked to approve the raid on Mar-a-Lago.
“The senior Justice Department source says that Garland was regularly briefed on the Records Act investigation, and that he knew about the grand jury and what material federal prosecutors were seeking,’ Newsweek claimed. “He insists, though, that Garland had no prior knowledge of the date and time of the specific raid, nor was he asked to approve it.”
“I know it’s hard for people to believe,” says the official, “but this was a matter for the U.S. Attorney and the FBI.”
This all turned out to be a media lie. The Attorney General not only knew about it, he signed off on the “code Orange.”
Even worse, the New York Times attempted to paint Merrick Garland as a victim, portraying him as unfairly targeted for criticism by the former president.
“The Justice Department would not acknowledge the execution of a search warrant at Mr. Trump’s home on Monday, nor would Mr. Garland’s aides confirm his involvement in the decision or even whether he knew about the search before it was conducted,” the Times reported. “They declined to comment on every fact brought to their attention. Mr. Garland’s schedule this week is devoid of any public events where he could be questioned by reporters.”
The Biden administration had earlier refused to admit that the White House or anyone in the Department of Justice had signed off on the unprecedented raid of a former president and political rival of the current president.
“President Biden, what did Attorney General [Merrick] Garland tell you about the Trump raid?” a reporter shouted at Biden on Tuesday.
“Do you approve of the FBI’s Trump raid, President Biden?” the reporter added.
Biden didn’t respond to the question. Neither did White House Press Secretary Jean-Pierre who batted away questions at a press briefing.
“This is not something I’m going to comment on today from here at all,” she said. “This goes to the Department of Justice and that’s where I refer you to.”
If Merrick Garland is the ‘fall guy’ for the FBI’s raid it would mean that an official who was denied a Supreme Court Justice seat by the incoming Trump presidency has effectively carried out political revenge by abusing the Office of the Attorney General.
It is time for Attorney General Merrick Garland to resign.
Current Founder, CEO and Chief Editor of Becker News. Former Writer & Associate Producer at Fox News for #1 top-rated prime-time cable news show. Former Director of Viral Media and Senior Managing Editor for award-winning startup website IJReview, which grew to a readership of 20-30 million Americans a month. Led editorial and social media team that was #1 ranked news & politics publisher on Facebook for story engagement. Writer whose thousands of digital articles have been read by over 100 million unique users.