Former President Donald Trump emerged Tuesday with a firmer grip on the Republican Party after the FBI’s raid on his Florida home, which quickly became a clarifying event in the 2024 presidential race.
Republican officeholders rushed to defend the president or, at least, to excoriate the FBI for the operation.
Agents swarmed Mr. Trump’s home when he wasn’t there, reportedly looking for documents that he was supposed to have turned over to the National Archives from his time in office.
One analyst said the raid turned Mr. Trump into a “martyr,” and another said it became an us-versus-them moment, in which the sides were the FBI and the former president. For most Republicans and some independents, the former president wins.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican who is at odds with the former president and is regularly mocked by Mr. Trump, also called on the Justice Department to explain its actions.
“The country deserves a thorough and immediate explanation of what led to the events of Monday,” Mr. McConnell said. “Attorney General Garland and the Department of Justice should already have provided answers to the American people and must do so immediately.”
SEE ALSO: Republicans call for defunding the FBI, cleaning house at DOJ after Trump raid
Mr. Trump seized the moment by issuing a fundraising plea to supporters. He told them to “rush a donation” to show they “stand with me against this never-ending witch hunt.”
“Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States before, and it’s important that you know that it wasn’t just my home that was violated - it was the home of every patriotic American who I have been fighting for since that iconic moment I came down the Golden Escalators in 2015,” Mr. Trump wrote in the email.
Political oddsmakers saw the raid as bad news for the former president’s chances of winning the Republican nomination and the White House in 2024. The big winner was Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, another Republican. President Biden’s odds of winning another term also improved.
Still, political pros said that was a misreading of the zeitgeist and of Mr. Trump’s chances.
Michael McKenna, a senior official in the Trump White House, said the raid probably will accelerate Mr. Trump’s official entry into the race and may even chase off some potential opponents.
“It’s going to create a situation where the Republican Party is going to have to coalesce around him because here are your choices: You can be with Trump or you can be with the FBI,” said Mr. McKenna, a columnist for The Washington Times. “No self-respecting Republican can be with the FBI.”
SEE ALSO: Republicans call on FBI Director Wray to appear before Congress to explain Trump raid
Republican lawmakers said they will investigate the FBI and Justice Department if they win control of the House in the November midterm elections.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, California Republican, instructed Attorney General Merrick Garland to “preserve your documents” in preparation for the investigation.
Questions swirled Tuesday about the FBI’s activities, including who signed off on the operation, what the actual target was and whether the White House had warning.
The Miami Herald reported that a magistrate judge in West Palm Beach signed off on a warrant to collect boxes of documents, including what authorities said was classified material, that Mr. Trump took when he left the White House.
The Herald, which said the raid was not connected to investigations into events surrounding the 2020 election, reported that the probable cause for the FBI’s search stemmed from documents that Mr. Trump already turned over to the Archives. The FBI figured the former president was unlawfully holding on to other documents.
Republicans said the search was all the more strange given that Mr. Trump’s attorneys were negotiating with the Archives about the documents.
Even some Democrats were surprised, given what seemed like relatively small stakes of a violation of the Presidential Records Act.
“DOJ must immediately explain the reason for its raid & It must be more than a search for inconsequential archives or it will be viewed as a political tactic to undermine any future credible investigation & legitimacy of January 6 investigations,” former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said in a message on Twitter.
Others drew comparisons with Mr. Trump’s 2016 opponent, Hillary Clinton, who was found to have sent classified information on her secret personal email server during her time as secretary of state.
“Where was the raid on Hillary’s server? The Clinton Foundation?” Sen. Bill Hagerty, Tennessee Republican, said on Twitter. “No wonder the American people are deeply disturbed & outraged by what appears to be a two-track justice system in our country, and they deserve an explanation from their government.”
No such explanation was forthcoming from the FBI or Justice Department, though House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat, told MSNBC that there had to be a good justification for the raid.
“And that says that no one is above the law — not even a president or a former president of the United States,” she said. She added that she didn’t know anything beyond what was publicly reported.
The lack of information didn’t stop the politicking, with Democrats jumping on the fundraising train.
“We’re finally on the cusp of locking up Trump for scheming to overturn the 2020 election,” the Save Democracy political action committee said in its fundraising email to supporters.
Rep. Jim Jordan, Ohio Republican, issued an email asking supporters to show their outrage over the raid by donating to his campaign.
Mr. Jordan is in line to become chairman of the House Judiciary Committee should Republicans win control of the House in November and would be at the fore of any effort to scrutinize the FBI’s actions.
“If we fail to take back the House majority, we will never get the answers we deserve about why the FBI raided President Trump’s home, or anything else for that matter,” Mr. Jordan wrote.
Mr. McKenna said the timing of the FBI’s move was particularly bad for Democrats, who appeared to have regained some political footing by pushing through a massive tax-and-spending plan to enact their energy and climate policies, stiffen IRS enforcement and control prices that the government pays for prescription drugs.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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