let's go to evan perez. he is there at the department of justice. , get us up to speed on what we should expect. >> reporter: victor, i think, you know, the attorney general has been under a lot of pressure, really, including from inside the department, to say something, especially because, you know, the last couple of days, we have seen attacks against the fbi, people questioning whether the fbi would plant evidence, and i think that's one of the things he wants to respond to. he wants to respond to the idea that this was done in some kind of rogue fashion. we also know that, obviously, there's been some reporting out there about whether he was even aware of this. we know that's not true. so, we expect that we're going to hear a lot more about how -- why this was done. we're not going to hear, obviously, very much detail about the investigation that's ongoing, but the attorney general, you can expect, is going to stand behind the law enforcement people who work under him and who are really the ones who are doing this investigation. they're doing it

cnn's evan perez and katelyn polantz are here. the details of this "wall street journal" report, what are you learning? >> right, victor, so we are looking through the "wall street journal" reporting here that where they are saying they're reviewing documents that are included in this court filing or in this search warrant, and that search warrant would lay out what was seized out of mar-a-lago. it would have the receipts of what was taken. that receipt would have been given to the president's legal team, and what the journal says is that it is 11 boxes or sets or classified documents including the highest classification level. some marked at top secret sci, so that's sensitive compartmented information, so that is really among the highest levels of classification in that system for national security, and we also know that that is one set of the documents, there are also three sets of confidential documents, three sets of secret documents and four sets of top secret documents. those are the three different levels of classification

we're going to go to evan perez and katelyn polantz. evan, i know the justice department has met their noon deadline to produce this document. what are we waiting for at this moment? >> we're waiting for the creeky system of the court document system to actually give us the document that the justice department filed. you know, jokingly last night i said, you know, knowing these lawyers at the justice department and especially the ones at the national security division handling this, i jokingly said that they were going to wait until 11:59:59. that is appears what has happened here. so now we're waiting to see. look, one of the things that i just listened to your conversation. in reading the order from the judge ordering that this be released, you know, he said that he viewed what the government had submitted as meeting its burden by showing the propose had redacted are showing the government's legitimate interest. i think we're going to see a document that is narrowly tailored in the view of this judge and the justice department. so we'l

evan perez, attorney mr. george conway, and legal analyst elliott williams. good evening sir's, one and all. evan, i'm going to start with you, because the doj, just minutes away from that midnight deadline, literally, they've got an hour, right, to respond to trump's special master. >> yeah, i keep refreshing my screen, trying to see if, you know, it's like waiting, waiting, waiting. >> are you looking for, what do you expect? >> well, we're waiting to see the filing come in. and don, the fact that they are asking for double the number of pages that they usually have in the southern district of florida tell us the justice department believes they need to talk, they need to say some more about what the former president was alleging in his lawsuit against the government asking for the special master. there are a lot of things that the former president said in that filing, obviously a lot of it are his grievances about how the fbi in the justice department are biased against him. but some of it was about how cooperative he has been with this effort to get these

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evan perez and sara murray have our reporting here. evan, first, what more can you tell us about the number of documents found and where? >> ana, we know according to the court filing, the fbi says they found more than 100 documents with classification markings in 13 boxes, some found in that storage room that had been the focus and the fbi as well as documents found in ma rar-a-lag. i'll read what the prosecutors said. they said the fbi in a matter of hours recovered twice as many documents with classification markings as the quote unquote diligent search that the former president's counsel and a representatives had weeks to perform and calls into question the representations made in the june 3rd certification and casts doubt on the extent of cooperation in this matter. what they're referring to, ana, this meeting in june where the former president's legal team said that, you know, they gave them some classified documents and said there were no more documents to be found there. they signed a certification saying that there was nothing

let's get to cnn senior justice department correspondent evan perez. evan, we'll talk specifically about the witness in just a moment. first, these new details about what happened on june 8th are really important. fill us in. >> absolutely, ana. one of the things we've heard from the trump side, the lawyers and from trump himself is that this has been very cooperative from their side and they were shocked when the fbi showed up on monday to do the search. what we're learning is there was a subpoena that was actually served earlier, back before this meeting in june, and this subpoena essentially prompted this meeting where we know that the trump lawyers gave a little tour to some of the prosecutors and investigators doing this investigation, showed them where these documents were being held, and at the end of that meeting they left with classified documents, documents that were national security information. that's the reason why that meeting occurred. what it tells us is that these conversations, these discussions that were on going between trump lawyer

let's get to it, let's get started with evan perez. he is live in washington. on that tip that led investigators to get the search warrant to head to mar-a-lago, what are you learning? >> reporter: well, kate, we know that there was at least one witness who told the fbi in the last few months that there were additional documents that were being stored at -- classified documents being stored at mar-a-lago, this is in addition to the 15 boxes that had been retrieved earlier this year. so it is clear somebody had knowledge, knew where they were and told the fbi this during an interview. now, the issue is, you know, there is a number of people obviously who were interviewed in the spring who had knowledge about where these documents were stored and the circumstances under which they came to be stored at the mar-a-lago. listen to mick mulvaney talking about what he knew when he was chief of staff to the former president. >> i didn't even know there was a safe at mar-a-lago and i was chief of staff for 15 months. so this would be someone who was handling things day t

now, we're also hearing more from my colleague, evan perez, that part of this had to do with examining where the documents were kept and trying to determine if anything was left behind. we heard kaitlan collins explaining earlier we've previously reported that trump took 15 boxes of documents with him, and the national archives arranged for much of those to be transported back. but the fact that this search continued is an indication obviously there is more they were looking for. >> all right. sara murray, thank you very much for that. for more on the implications, especially in the middle of a primary season, we're joined now by cnn chief political analyst dana bash and former obama senior adviser david axelrod and former special assistant to george w. bush scott jennings. dana, you've got some new reporting. obviously we learned about this from a statement from the former president himself. what have you heard? >> that that was intentional. i mean, it may seem obvious, but it's important to point out why the former president did what he did, the lengthy statement. this could have bee

evan perez, cnn, washington. >>> and we're getting a better sense of the time line leading up to the search of mar-a-lago. it started in january when the national archives team removed documents from trump's florida home. by late april, trump's team used legal moves to stall efforts to hand over more classified materials. this ultimately led to the fbi search on august 8 which trump's lawyers now want a neutral third party to review. but as we've reported, that legal tactic is getting pushback from a federal judge. here is cnn's legal analyst norm i i izen. >> how many do-overs that you get, when you look at everything that has become public, you get to what the government has written about in some of these papers and that is the willful withholding national defense information and the pattern of concealment. and that gets prosecutors and judges and jurors pretty exercised. so i think it is that pattern that creates criminal peril for donald trump. >> the highly classified documents in mar-a-lago raising all kinds of alarms about potential security threats to the u.s. and its allies.

let's turn right away to cnn's senior justice correspondent evan perez. evan, so nice to see you this evening. you know, tell us a little bit more about this reporting from "the wall street journal." an informant of some kind tipped off investigators about more documents at mar-a-lago? what do you know about that? >> reporter: well, the extent of the journal's report is that there was someone who was familiar with the information that the fbi was looking for, the national archives obviously was looking for -- informed the fbi that there was more than likely these additional documents being stored there in mar-a-lago. we don't know who this person was. we don't know how they would have had that knowledge. but it is something that, 2 it appears, helped drive the fbi's decision, the justice department's decision to conduct this search on monday. keep in mind, laura, that they had been having conversations with the trump team for months, and there clearly was some, you know, decisions at some point that they were not getting the full story from the trump team,

let's go now to cnn senior justice correspondent evan perez for more on this. , break this all down for us. hi there, evan. >> reporter: hey, amara and boris. good morning. look, i think the former president is trying to make his best defense, which is why are you coming, breaking into my house? which they didn't do, by the way. why are you coming to my house to get information that i had declassified? and what's interesting about what the -- what we find from this document that was released by the federal court yesterday is that -- we know now that they're investigating these three crimes, including the espionage act statute, which by the way, does not make a reference to classified information. it refers to national defense information, which is the same thing. but it sort of gives prosecutors the way to get around what donald trump's defense is likely to be, which is this is information that i had the right as president to declassify and i did that. trump is coming up with an even more exotic version of this, saying that just by sending documents from the mai

but with me is senior senior law enforcement analyst andrew mccabe former director of the fbi and evan perez. andy, one thing elle laid without well what we know in the documents, if you add what we learned in these unsealed documents with the subsequent reporting of kind of the timing here, how national archives sought all of these documents, how some documents were returned from mar-a-lago and then kind of they attested to there were no more documents in mar-a-lago and go and pick up 1 1 additional sets of classified information. what do you see in that? does that surprise you? >> it really does. i think you're right to focus on the facts of the timeline as we know it. if you're an investigator looking into this case, you are constantly thinking about intent, intent is typically the hardest piece of a criminal case to prove. as you're looking at this evidence, you're trying to understand was this just a matter of mistake or incompetence or poor planning that this material ended up in mar-a-lago and the thing that works against that in this case from my proserspective is that there was that

evan perez reports now from washington. >> reporter: someone came forward in recent weeks to tell the fbi that there were likely more classified documents being stored at former president trump's palm beach club according to the "wall street journal." the "journal" says that is what prompted the search this week at mar-a-lago. cnn has not confirmed the journal's report, but we've previously reported that there were months of discussions between the trump lawyers and justice department prosecutors and that in june, justice and fbi officials paid a visit to mar-a-lago to discuss possible classified documents that were still being stored there despite the government's view that they belong at the national archives. meanwhile inside the justice department, there is frustration that the department has so far said nothing about the search. trump and his allies have portrayed it as a siege and suggested without providing any proof that the fbi may have planted evidence. attorney general merrick garland has said that the department doesn't comment ongoing investigations, in part to protect th

evan perez, cnn, washington. >>> prospect of nuclear weapons documents at trump's home raises serious questions about the country's safety. we asked former director of national intelligence about his level of concern. >> potentially this is quite dangerous. if for example there are deficiencies, maintenance issues, logistics issues, training issues, both with our minuteman ground based intercontinental ballistic missile force or with a submarine launched missile force. and, you know, that is very, very dangerous to national security just to have that kind of material just kind of laying around. now, the mind runs weidlild her. for me, what on earth was the motivation for wanting this kind of data from the white house into a completely unsecured area like mar-a-lago. and that, you know, again, the imagination can run wild here as to what the motivation might have been. >> an hours' long standoff with a government this ohio has ended with the suspect dead. the man tried unsuccessfully to enter an fbi office in cincinnati on thursday morning. and then fled in his vehicle. he eventually s

victor and alisyn. >> evan perez with the reporting for us. thank you, evan. let's bring in donald trump's former press secretary, stephanie grisham and constitutional law attorney page pate. let me start with you, 700 pages of classified information, including some of the most sensitive, top secret compartmented information as well. how does that change the landscape of this saga of these documents at mar-a-lago, now that we have the number? >> victor, one thing i don't understand at all is how anyone could think this could help trump's argument or his defense. what it shows is it's clear there wasn't some random box somebody picked up by mistake. these were documents that trump or people working with him or on his behalf intentionally took and put in a place where they should not have been kept and then refused multiple requests to return those documents or even identify those documents, and then fought to keep them secret from the department of justice during the investigation, so i think what we see here is another situation where trump and his allies are

let's go to our senior justice correspondent evan perez, evan, a bold move by the justice department today and we could know a lot more by this time tomorrow. >> that's right, wolf. the judge who is overseeing this case has now given a deadline of 3:00 p.m. -- giving a deadline until 3:00 p.m. for the justice department and the trump lawyers to decide whether to unseal these documents. the documents that the attorney general said he wants now to be -- to be unsealed would be the search warrant as well as a document that says exactly what was taken from the trump property during the fbi search on monday. what we are not going to see in this release, wolf, is what's behind this investigation. we are not going to know a lot of the details of what is going on in this investigation, but the attorney general really addressed the unusual nature of this. it was essentially because donald trump went out and told the world that the fbi had done this search of his property in palm beach on monday. listen to him address exactly why he did this today. >> since i became attorney general i have mad

evan perez joining us. this goes back to the mueller report and whether or not president trump was obstructing justice. what have we learned? >> this is a 2019 memo that the courts finally ordered the justice department to release. they said that this memo that went to bill barr, this came from other top officials at the justice department, explaining which the justice department should not charge the former president with obstruction of justice. according to the judges who looked at this, they said bill barr had already made a decision not to charge trump and this memo really, what they called it was an academic exercise and a thought experiment. you'll see why. in this nine pages you see they go through -- the basic point that they make is that because trump was not charged with collusion with the russians, therefore, he cannot be charged with obstruction. i'll read you just a part of what they write. the special counsel's obstruction theory would not only be novel, but based on his own analysis, it would

cnn senior justice correspondent evan perez has been following all of this. evan, it has been just over 36 hours since the news broke about this fbi search. what more are we learning? >> reporter: well, alex, we know there have been months of discussions that went on between the justice department and between the fbi. and the trump team over the scope of these documents that the national archives has long said were in the possession of the president, the former president, despite the fact that the law says he was supposed to turn it over at the end of his presidency. the decision to go in and retrieve that material is simply because the prosecutors had determined that there were -- there were documents that trump had not turned over, that were supposed to have been turned over and that after these months and months of discussions obviously there was no progress. there is also a belief they were not essentially being told the truth about exactly how these documents ended up where they did in a fairly unsecured location at mar-a-lago. so obviously the fact that

evan perez, cnn, washington. >>> democrats and republicans are clamoring for more information about the mar-a-lago search, but a legal analyst says keeping the affidavit private is at least in part to protect trump's rights. >> one of the reasons why doj does not reveal these affidavits is because you are protecting the rights of the innocent, the presumption of innocence, the rights of people who have not even yet been accused. and just so people understand, we have not seen this document, but it would layout in detail the probable cause that doj used to get in that search warrant, it would layout probable cause that crimes were committed. i don't know that donald trump and his supporters would want that to be out there in the public. >> of course we still don't know exactly what the documents seized by the fbi are about, but a former counter espionage official had this assessment. >> at the end of the day, i'm willing to bet these weren't just inadvertent documents laying around the cheeseburger wrappers in the residence that gsa threw in a box. i think that the fbi and doj will find

let's bring in cnn's evan perez, he's been following the story closely for us. evan, bring us up to speed on the latest. >> reporter: the latest is, you see the shifting explanations, the shifting defenses of what happened here and why these documents, and you guys just described, which is things that are among the most closely-guarded secrets of the u.s. government, how they ended up in a basement room at the former president's estate in palm beach. the latest one we've heard is that not only were these things declassified previously but the former president's allies are now saying that whenever things were moved from the white house, the main part of the white house to the residence, they just by that act, they were declassified. of course that is not the way things usually work. so we'll have to see how that works, if this ever gets to court. but interestingly, boris and amara, the three statutes, the three crimes that the prosecutors listed on the search warrant application that, you know, was the reason why the fbi went to mar-a-lago, the three statutes don'

department toed a eat least ass the public that what they did was authorized by a court. >> all right, evan perez on top of this story, we know you'll stay on it. thank you very much. >>> joining us to discuss this is former federal prosecutor rato miriati. i want to start with where evan left off. where do you fall in this debate in terms of doj, merrick garland, chris wray of the fbi, doing something, maybe going to capitol hill to talk to the loud voices who have been condemning this search at mar-a-lago? >> well, usually as evan pointed out a moment ago the policy at the justice department is to say very little about ongoing criminal investigations. there is a lot of good reasons for that. not only to protect the rights of the people who are under investigation, but also to ensure that their investigations are not interfered with in any way. i have to say that the justice department in the past has veered from that from time to time, both notably when james comey was talking to the public about an ongoing investigation of hillary clinton. i don't think that turned out very well. and i think t

cnn's evan perez is live in washington. evan, what will we see today?ell, i think one of the first things in that filing last night, what they said they wanted to go from 20 pages to 40 pages is they said that they needed all that space in order to address the legal and factual issues. and i think that we can read into the fact that the justice department believes that what trump -- the trump legal team filed in court were filled with inaccuracies, including the fact that they were claiming that the former president and his legal team were being very cooperative with their investigation, with this effort to get these boxes of classified boxes out of mar-a-lago. we're expecting to see some of t that. we know they're going to describe to this judge in florida, we have had a filter team, of separate fbi agents, lawyers, who have been looking through these documents, making sure they set aside things that could have some privilege issues, and we have a whole system set up for that. there's no need for you to appoint a third party especially master, which is

let's get to cnn senior justice department correspondent evan perez.what happened on june 8th are really important. fill us in. >> absolutely, ana. one of the things we've heard from the trump side, the lawyers and from trump himself is that this has been very cooperative from their side and they were shocked when the fbi showed up on monday to do the search. what we're learning is there was a subpoena that was actually

evan perez is out front live in washington tonight. evan, so many of these investigations now moving forward. it appears more and more quickly. what more are you learning about cipollone and philbin being interviewed about the mar-a-lago documents? >> reporter: erin, both pat cipollone and patrick philbin were senior lawyers inside the white house and were designated as people for the national archives to get in touch with when it came to records that were missing, that the national archives wanted to try to retrieve. it is within that context that the fbi reached out earlier this year as they tried to interview a number of people around the former president to get a sense of how these documents should never have left the custody of the federal government and ended up in palm beach at his private estate of mar-a-lago. what we know is that philbin and cipollone, of course, would know a lot of answers to some of the questions that you and i were asking over the last few days, the questions of what trump has said that he did a mass declass

let's bring in cnn's evan perez now. what do you know about this report that investigators were seeking documents related to nuclear weapons? >> well, it really does explain why the justice department has been pushing donald trump to return these documents that should never have left the possession of the federal government, and certainly do not belong in a basement at his house in palm beach. "the post" says that at least some of the documents in question relate to nuclear weapons programs of the united states. now, we also previously reported that at least some of the documents that have been in dispute were related to special access programs. now, nuclear weapons issues, documents would actually be among those things that are among the most closely guarded secrets in the federal government. they are not supposed to be obviously out of the hands of any federal authorities. and certainly not being housed in a basement with lax security. what we know, though, is that the fbi has been over the process of 18 months has bee

i want to go to evan perez. the hearing tomorrow about the affidavit is another crucial piece of this, because, you know, when we got the warrant, okay, that was important. we got the receipt of what they took. that was important. but the affidavit is the real deal, right? so many questions would be answered. are we going to get it? >> well, the justice department is opposed to releasing the entire thing. a judge could have them go through the document and find a way to release at least some aspects of it. again, the justice department itself, when they asked to release the search warrant, said that they understood that there was a public interest in releasing some information about this search. and given the fact the unprecedented nature of this, you could see where this could go. one of the things we would be looking for is, you know, often when lawyers for the justice department show up in court, sometimes they have a way of saying additional things that they wouldn't say necessarily in the court filings and

let's turn now to cnn's senior justice correspondent evan perez. michael moore is a former federal prosecutor and now a partner at the moore hall law firm. and joshua school is -- he served as the fbi executive assistant director for intention. he's now a president of bow wave llc. first, trump's lawyers have about five more hours to respond to the justice department's latest assertions, that deadline actually close to six, 8:00 p.m. they have a lot of work to do. >> they really do, and look, you guys laid it out so well. this is exactly what prosecutors, if they get to this point, this is exactly the time line that they're going to present to show that there was months and months and frankly, more than a year of effort to recover some of these documents and that at every point the former president and his team were not cooperative, despite the efforts that they've made to claim and to show and to at least in some of their court filings to present that they've been very, very cooperative. and i'll read you just a part of the filing because it's so

evan perez, thank you for th reporting. olivia andr. ambassador stay with us, much more on th afdat ahead, including what kis of information the doj redacted. we have the categories of what th protected. >> and later, a record number o in new york city today. theye sent by texas's governor, greg abbott, we're going to speak to the manhtan borough president about at the city thinks about this, how they're handnghe sudden flux. only t thing are fover: love and libertmutual you only pay r whatoe if anye objes to ts marrge... you only pay r whatoe (emu squawks) vi no! notoday. er. ♪ you only pay r whatoe (emu squawks) [ marcia ] my dental health was not good. i had periodontal disease, ani just didn't feel well. [ forde ] replacing marcia's teeth with dental implants at carchoice was going afforher that permanent solution. [ marc ] clechoiceental implan gave me the ability to take on t. i feelo much better,nd i think at that is the key. ♪ subway draftg 12 nesubs for the all-new suay series menu thnew monster has juicy steak ancrispyacon. bu

cnn's evan perez is live in washington with this side of this. justice department hasn't said anything at all so far which is not surprising. what are you hearing? >> right. that's a great thing to remind the public, right? that the justice department and the fbi haven't actually acknowledged that this search occurred and they went out with a public statement right around the agents were wrapping up the search at mar-a-lago. kate, they went in there without their signature fbi jackets. they went there very quietly. they did not make a lot of noise, and so that's one of the things that we know that the justice department was intending to do was to make as little fuss as possible. offer the former president a lot of courtesy in handling what really was the most polite way for the fbi to do a search. here's what we know, though, we know that behind the scenes there is a lot of friction among some officials who believe that the justice department should say something, that the attorney general should come out and at least explain some of these action

cnn's evan perez is live for us with details on this. evan, what more are you learning about what was seized by the fbi? >> reporter: good morning, fredericka. you're highlighting the most important part of this and what the fbi found when they went into mar-a-lago to retrieve these 20 boxes. the top item, obviously, are these documents that were labeled as ts/sci. this is among the most tightly guarded secrets of the u.s. government. these are things that in order to view them you have to go to special rooms that are designed to evade surveillance, not the kind of thing that you keep in a box in a basement at your beach house in palm beach. that's not the way these types of things are stored. and according to the government, these are the documents that of course they found in the search on monday, which of course came as a culmination of almost 18 months of back and forth between various agencies in the u.s. government, beginning with the national archives which was trying to retrieve the documents, and then you have fast forward to jun

evan perez, thank you. let's bring in harry litman who helped lead the justice department as deputy assist attorney general. he's now a cnn political analyst, and martha talib. let me start with you about approaching this submission to the judge. the redactions have been submitted under seal, but would it be counterprouductive to jus send in this with huge sections blacked out considering that the judge wants more? >> well, the question is counterproductive for whom. so the doj did say last week if we -- if we redact, you could see -- it could be gibberish, and the judge acknowledged that possibility. the judge, remember, is a longtime doj guy, so he's considering all the considerations they're trying to protect. following up on what evan said, to the extent there are redactions and nonredactions that are approved, they almost surely go to this back and forth and extend it and we now know excruciatingly back and forth extended starting before he even left office, when they have to serve the search warrant o

here is our senior justice correspondent evan perez with more on what officials are looking for here. >> this is reporting with jamie gangel, my colleague, and what we learned is that there is a new subpoena that has gone from the justice department, from the grand jury that is investigating some of these issues, to the national archives, asking for additional documents. about three months ago there was an initial subpoena, initial grand jury subpoena asking the national archives to turn over everything they had provided to the january 6th committee. so what this -- this signifies is the investigation which is, by the way, led by a prosecutor and special grand jury that is focusing specifically on the role that the former president and his allies played in trying to impede the transition of power with these fake electors scheme, what this shows us is that this investigation is broadening, it is going beyond what initially they were looking at, which was taking a look at what the january 6th committee already had. >> evan perez, notable, thanks so much. joining us to break it down, eli

evan perez has the story and joins us now. what are you learning, evan?he efforts to overturn the georgia election results in 2020. obviously this is a significant move by the d.a. meadows was very, very central to the former president's efforts to try to organize efforts to remain in power with fake electors, to try to get states to overturn their election results. you know, a part of what she says here is that he is a significant witness to the efforts by donald trump to overturn those election results. she is calling for him to testify on september 27th. you know, obviously meadows was involved, he talked to members of the georgia legislature. he was on the phone when the former president was pressuring the secretary of state there in georgia to find the exact number of votes in order to overturn joe biden's victory in georgia. we know he also was pressuring the justice department, anderson, to say that there was significant fraud in georgia, even though of course the justice department had no evidence of that. we also know according to politico that a

cnn's evan perez is back with us with more details. so evan, we're learning more about this documents. or at least deciphering what is stated. >> reporter: that is right, fredricka. the 20 boxes included the 11 sets of documents of varying levels of classification. of course, the concern is always about national security information and that is really what this is all about. the former president and his legal team have been interacting with different parts of the government since about may of 2021 when they -- national archives asked for the return of documents that should never have left the u.s. government and ended up at mar-a-lago which is his private home and of course his private beach club. and what we know is that these documents included very -- documents that were labelled as top secret, as secret and others but the problem is, you know, the biggest concern are the documents that were labelled as top secret sci and that is always the concern for the government for these documents which should never leave the premises of the se

it's alyssa farah griffin, miles taylor, and evan perez, who helped break this story and many other stories. tom fitton, many people might not know in the influence he is now having. it does strike you as very odd that this is a person with an extensive legal team, donald trump. we've seen different iterations. but this is the person who he wants to brief these lawyers. >> he also really likes the people, the legal minds, that he sees on television, as you know. and so, fitton pretty quickly after this -- after the national archives retrieved these 15 boxes, he goes on fox and he goes on other platforms, on twitter and other places, and starts saying that, you know, should never have given back these boxes because these are actually inherently personal. that by virtue of the president leaving the white house with them, they became personal. >> that's not the standard though, evan. they don't become personal. it's not poliin your pocket all of a sudden. >> right. you see where trump has gotten some of these ideas. and one of the things that he is looking back at is this case from about a dec

cnn's evan perez joins us with that. so what are you learning? >> well, anderson, allen weisselberg who was a top executive with the trump organization, "the new york times" says that he is about to finalize a plea agreement with the district attorney in manhattan. as you remember, he was indicted in the summer and, you know, he's facing these tax charges as part of a tax scheme that the d.a. says also involves the trump organization. what's key about this plea agreement or this anticipated plea agreement that the "new york times" is reporting on is that they say he's not expected to cooperation against the trump organization or anyone else in the trump family. we know that the d.a.'s investigation st is still ongoi though it seems to have lost steam in the last few months. right now it appears he's going to -- you know, he's looking at perhaps a five-month jail sentence at the end of this. but it really gives you a sense, anderson, of all of the different parts of these investigations that touch on the former president. he's got a host of legal

. >> cnn justice correspondent evan perez is with us now. two sides, the feds and trump lawyers have been speaking for quite some time. we know they had a meeting with mar-a-lago back in june. president trump insisted in his statement that they are cooperating. how much of a surprise is it, this raid at mar-a-lago? >> it's a strange credulity that these guys were claiming how much of a surprise this was. going back to the time line we know back in may of 2021 is when the archives first approaches the trump team that they believe there were boxes of classified information that should have been returned that were not and they needed to know where it was. and so you can take through the next year or so where you have this discussion again in june where they are told again that they believe there are documents that needed to be returned to the national archives. these are presidential records and classified information and the justice department believed that had not been properly returned and obviously, seven since then there was a subpoena for

evan perez, thank you so much. stay with us. we're also learning at the advice of a prominent conservative activist, tom fitton, trump became convinced he should have full control over records, including the classified ones that he took to mar-a-lago. >> sources also tell our cnn colleagues that the former president and his allies have become increasingly concerned about any potential legal fallout from all of this. so for that let's go to our chief white house correspondent kaitlan collins. what more are you hearing about that inner circle around trump that seems to be increasingly concerned? >> two things, one, what this new reporting from our colleagues shows is maybe an explanation potentially and partially for what was happening in that period of when trump returned. some of the boxes to the national archives, but then didn't return others. it is what led to that fbi search of mar-a-lago that happened in recent weeks. and tom fitton is the head of this legal activist group known as judicial watch. he's often on television,

let's bring in senior justice correspondent evan perez. we had previously seen a redacted version of this memo, and it shows barr broke with mueller when making this decision. >> yeah, that's right, jake. i'll show you just a portion. >> that's the redacted version? >> this is redacted, what it looked like before. they have now released the the tire memo that we can now see what was going on. the courts have been really critical of the justice department and specifically of bill barr, saying that this memo was really an academic exercise, that it was a thought experiment, because he had already decided that he was not going to charge the former president, then the sitting president, with obstruction of justice. now, mueller cataloged a number of instances where he believed that the president could be charged with obstruction of justice, but he left it up to the attorney general to make that final decision. in the end, what you see in this memo is a discussion of various instances, including this one, if you remember the story of don mcgahn

evan perez, thank you so much. doug and -- please stick around. >>> listen, ahead, we've got an extremely violent arrest that was captured on video. and it's sparked a whole lot of conversations now about police, again, crossing the line. we have two guests here who will dig much deeper into this incident, an attorney for the suspect who was beaten by the three officers, and the governor of arkansas, as his own state and the feds are investigating. next. ♪ my name is austin james. as a musician living with diabetes, fingersticks can be a real challenge. that's why i use the freestyle libre system. with painless, one-second scan i know my glucose numbers without fingerstic. now i'm managing my diabetes better and i've lowered my a1c from 8.2 to 6.7. take the mystery out of managing your diabetes and lower your a1c. now you know. try it for free at freestylelibre.us new astepro allergy. now available without a prescription. astepro is the first and only 24-hour steroid free spray. while other allergy sprays take hour

let's get more from cnn's senior justice correspondent evan perez. >> john and brianna, someone cameorward in recent weeks to tell the fbi that there were likely more classified documents being stored at former president donald trump's palm beach club according to the "wall street journal." the journal says that that's what prompted the search this week of mar-a-lago. cnn hasn't confirmed the journal's report, but we previously reported that there were months of discussions between the trump lawyers and justice department prosecutors and that in june justice and fbi officials paid a visit to mar-a-lago to discuss possible classified documents that were still being stored there despite the government's view that they belong at the national archives. meanwhile, inside the justice department there is frustration that the department has so far said nothing about the search. while trump and his allies have portrayed it as a siege and suggested without providing any proof that the fbi may have planted evidence. attorney general merrick garland has said that the department doesn't comment o

let me go to evan perez. and one element that we learned from the ag is his involvement in the application for that warrant that was executed on monday. he says he personally approved it. >> yeah. look, i think this was him trying to make sure people understood that the buck stops with him. and really it was in response to -- there's some very inaccurate reporting out there that seemed to suggest that maybe he was surprised by this, that he was maybe not involved. and we all -- those of white house cover the department knew that that was not true. this was one of the most important investigations that's now ongoing in this building. and there's absolutely no way thatleasea monaco, deputy -- lisa monaco, deputy attorney general, wouldn't have been deeply involved in the weeks and months of lawyering that went into this decision to carry out the search. one of the things that i think he mentions in there, in his comments was the idea that they looked at less intrusive means before taking this step. again, that'

evan perez joins us with more. what are those saying is about the search? >> i think you can hear a lot of frustration from officials that because the justice department was not saying anything, it has left at the void to be filled by donald trump and some of its allies, which is what he had done, during the mueller investigation, and he is doing it right now. he has called what happened on monday a siege. as you pointed out today, he has suggested that the fbi may be planting evidence while they were at the monologue of property. again, this was a search done by fbi agents who were playing quoted, did not wear typical rejects. they did this somewhere around 10 am on monday, not in the predawn hours, as you often do the searches. they were trying to make this less of a spectacle. instead, what has happened is the former president has taken this opportunity to make it a political scoring point for him. we hear from folks inside that they understand that the shadow of comey looms large over the department. because the form president has gone out publicly and

cnn's evan perez joins us now with more on both. so what are you hearing from those inside the justice department in regards to the search on the former president's home? >> reporter: well, anderson, look, i think you could hear a lot of frustration from officials that because the justice department is not saying anything, it has left the void to be filled by donald trump and some of his allies, which is what he has done. obviously he did this during the mueller investigation, and he's doing it right now. he has called what happened on monday a siege. he, as you pointed out today, has suggested that the fbi may have been planting evidence while they were at the mar-a-lago property. again, you know, this is a search that was done by fbi agents who wore plainclothes and did not wear any of their typical raid jackets. they did this somewhere around 10:00 a.m. on monday, not in the pre-dawn hours as you often do these searches. they were trying to make this less of a spectacle, and instead what has happened is the former president has t

cnn's evan perez joins us with that. can you walk us through the attorney general's decision, which is rare, to speak up publicly and then to ask the court to unseal the search warrant --? >> it is rare, anderson. let me tell you, a monday, merck garland was unknown on the idea of making a statement at all about the search. obviously, the former president went public with that statement, describing it as a siege. the former president has had the ground to himself. he had the ability to fashion the narrative about exactly what happened during the fbi search on monday. what we have seen in the in suing few days is some of the things that brynn gingras was talking about, threats against fbi agents. we have seen attacks against their credibility, attacks saying that the fbi may have planted some evidence. that is what really helped inform what the attorney general did today. he stood before us and said, essentially, the former president has already spoken publicly about this and, essentially, made it okay for the justice dep

joining me tonight to discuss this big news weekend more, evan perez. and joining me in studio, robert costa, chief corspondent for cbs news. he's also a former moderator of washington week so we are glad to have him back. also, we have philip rucker, the deputy national editor for the washington post. evan, this is a huge week, huge moment for our home, the residence of a former president searched. also using words like nuclear documents and espionage act. what led to this search? why did this search happen? what did federal officials obtain based on your reporting? evan: yeah, it is an extraordinary thing for the fbi to take a step like this. it is important for people to understand despite what the former president is saying and his team has been saying, which is they have been cooperative, the record indicates there has been some very contentious discussions between his lawyers and the justice department that were increasingly getting contentious before we get to this point. and you heard this from the attorney general. he said in his remarks, he sa

let's go to our senior justice correspondent evan perez, evan, a bold move by the justice department is overseeing this case has now given a deadline of 3:00 p.m. -- giving a deadline until 3:00 p.m. for the justice department and the trump lawyers to decide whether to unseal these documents. the documents that the attorney general said he wants now to be -- to be unsealed would be the search warrant as well as a document that says exactly what was taken from the trump property during the fbi search on monday. what we are not going to see in this release, wolf, is what's behind this investigation. we are not going to know a lot of the details of what is going on in this investigation, but the attorney general really addressed the unusua

here now to discuss is cnn senior justice correspondent evan perez. his flows initially from a grand jury that at least i didn't know existed. in other words, it's very hard to keep straight all the different investigations of former president trump, but am i right, that there's some other grand jury operating out there that we didn't know about until just this week? >> reporter: yeah, look, you're not alone. we didn't know until after the search on monday that -- we learned there had been this june meeting at mar-a-lago where jay brant and the investigators from the justice department, the fbi, came to mar-a-lago. it turns out there was a grand jury subpoena that was served that it allowed them to take some documents at the end of that meeting in june. there was a subsequent subpoena, grand jury subpoena, served for access to surveillance video from mar-a-lago. the fbi wanted to know who's got access to this area because of the sensitivity of the documents that we're talking about that were being stored in this basement in the former president's beach