FBI search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago found document with foreign nuclear secrets: Report

The documents found at former US President Donald Trump’s Florida resort home in the FBI's search last month included information about another country’s military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities, The Washington Post reported on Tuesday.

“Some of the seized documents detail top-secret U.S. operations so closely guarded that many senior national security officials are kept in the dark about them. Only the president, some members of his Cabinet or a near-Cabinet-level official could authorize other government officials to know details of these special-access programs,” the report said, citing people familiar with the matter who declined

It also did not name the country whose defense and nuclear capabilities were cited in the document.

According to the report, such documents require special clearances on a need-to-know basis, not just top-secret clearance.

In early August, Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida was searched by the FBI, prompting him to lash out at what he called an unprecedented "assault” and accuse his political opponents of weaponizing the justice system. Analysts pointed out that a former president taking classified documents with him after leaving the White House is also unprecedented.

According to a court document filed by the Justice Department late Tuesday, over 100 classified records, including some materials marked with the highest level of classification, were recovered from Trump’s residence.

Classified federal documents were likely "concealed and removed" from a storage room at the residence in an effort to "obstruct" the FBI’s ongoing investigation into Trump’s potential mishandling of classified materials, said the department.

Obstruction of justice now appears to be the central thrust of the federal investigation, which was opened to probe Trump's alleged removal of classified government documents from the White House as he left office in January 2021.