Former President Donald Trump plans to sue the Department of Justice (DOJ) for $100 million over its alleged “malicious prosecution” and “abuse of process,” according to Fox News, which obtained a copy of the memo.
The memo, filed by Trump attorney Daniel Epstein, states Trump plans to sue the DOJ over its unprecedented August 8, 2022, raid but gives the DOJ 180 days after receiving the notice to respond and resolve the issue, Fox News reported. Trump will take the case to court should the matter go unresolved, according to the report.
The filing alleges, according to Fox News, the “tortious acts against the president are rooted in intrusion upon seclusion, malicious prosecution, and abuse of process resulting from the August 8, 2022 raid of his and his family’s home at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach Florida.”
The memo further alleges the raid was made with the “clear intent to engage in political persecution — not to advance good law enforcement practices.”
“The FBI’s demonstrated activity was inconsistent with protocols used in routine searches of an investigative target’s premises,” Epstein reportedly wrote in the memo, arguing Trump “had a clear expectation of privacy at Mar-a-Lago.”
“Worse, the FBI’s conduct in the raid — where established protocol was violated — constitutes a severe and unacceptable intrusion that is highly offensive to a reasonable person,” the memo reportedly states.
Epstein also cites the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on presidential immunity and the dismissal of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s case to argue that there was “no constitutional basis for the search or the subsequent indictment,” according to Fox News.
Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed Smith’s lawfare prosecution against Trump in July after finding his appointment to be unconstitutional. Smith indicted Trump less than one year after the raid related to his alleged mishandling of classified documents. Notably, President Joe Biden also retained classified documents following his tenure as vice president, but his own DOJ decided not to charge him over prosecutors’ concerns that Biden would likely “present himself to the jury, as he did during our interview with him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”
Cannon ruled that Attorney General Merrick did not have the authority to appoint Smith and that the appointment should have come from the legislature.
The lawfare prosecution was deeply tainted by misconduct as well. Independent journalist Julie Kelly pointed out in a post on X that DOJ prosecutors admitted some of the documents seized during the raid were not kept in the same order in which they were found. My colleague Tristan Justice also reported that other documents were either possibly misplaced or mislabeled.
