The aftermath of the FBI raid on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate has stretched into its second week as the drama continued Monday. A Truth Social post from Trump announced that three of his passports were taken by the FBI agents and techs that conducted the search.
Naturally, the mainstream media leaped at the opportunity to cry foul and claim the prominent Republican was lying. But there is a saying about leaping; something along the lines of looking first.
“Wow! In the raid by the FBI of Mar-a-Lago, they stole my three Passports (one expired), along with everything else. This is an assault on a political opponent at a level never seen before in our Country. Third World!” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Five hours later, anchor and managing editor of the CBS Evening News Norah O’Donnell did the inevitable and proclaimed officiously via Twitter that “According to a DOJ official, the FBI is NOT in possession of former President Trump’s passports.”
NEW: According to a DOJ official, the FBI is NOT in possession of former President Trump’s passports. Trump had accused the FBI of stealing his three passports during the search of his Mar-a-Lago home.
— Norah O’Donnell ?? (@NorahODonnell) August 15, 2022
The takedown that followed 29 minutes later from Trump’s director of communications, Taylor Budowich, was as brutal as it was direct.
This is how Fake News works, folks. Biden admin actively feeds half truths & lies that the media willingly amplifies—advancing a partisan narrative to attack Trump.@NorahODonnell, did your “source” read you this email? Did you bother asking if they indeed seized the passports? https://t.co/DlzkagN0ie pic.twitter.com/VwCU7DPCvg
— Taylor Budowich (@TayFromCA) August 15, 2022
Budowich called out O’Donnell directly by name and presented a damning email that showed not only had the FBI admitted to taking the passports, but they had done so over four hours prior to her post.
Do you have any faith in the mainstream media at all?
The email from Jay Bratt, Chief of the Counterintelligence and Export Control Section of the Department of Justice National Security Division, posted in a partly redacted screenshot, confirmed the removal of three passports belonging to Trump from Mar-a-Lago.
Bratt wrote, “We have learned that the filter agents seized three passports belonging to President Trump, two expired and one being his active diplomatic passport. We are returning them, and they will be ready for pickup at WFO at 2 pm today.” Bratt added that he was traveling and seemed to refer Trump’s team to coordinate further with a colleague whose name was redacted.
“In executing search warrants, the FBI follows search and seizure procedures ordered by courts, then returns items that do not need to be retained for law enforcement purposes,” the FBI said in a statement reported by The New York Post.
O’Donnell appeared to soften her statement somewhat about 15 minutes before Budowich’s rhetorical bombardment from orbit struck, but it simply wasn’t enough to dampen the blow.
We are also learning tonight that if any items not contained in the warrant were retrieved during the FBI search at Mar-a-Lago, they will be returned.
— Norah O’Donnell ?? (@NorahODonnell) August 15, 2022
Trump’s attorney Christina Bobb, speaking with Fox’s “The Ingraham Angle” said, “this goes to show the level of audacity that [the FBI] have.”
Bobb added, “it goes to show how aggressive they were, how overreaching they were, that they were willing to go past the four corners of the warrant and take whatever they felt was appropriate, or they felt that they could take and then go back through and look through everything.”
The incident exposes one of the most glaring weaknesses of the establishment media and lays bare the intent of their work: the delegitimization of their political opponents at any cost. But when a situation like this lapses into farce, we are shown the collective damage dealt to the media’s credibility may be utterly irreversible.
The most frightening part of this is that they don’t seem to care.
