The federal criminal investigation into former President Donald Trumpâs potential mishandling of classified documents escalated in stunning fashion this week with Trumpâs indictment.The indictment hasnât been unsealed yet, so details of the charges arenât publicly available. But the investigation â led by Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith â revolves around sensitive government papers that Trump held onto after his White House term ended in January 2021. The special counsel has also examined whether Trump or his aides obstructed the investigation.Federal authorities have recovered more than 325 classified documents from Trump. He has voluntarily given back some materials, his lawyers turned over additional files after a subpoena, and the FBI found dozens of classified records during a court-approved search of his Mar-a-Lago home last summer.Trump has denied all wrongdoing and claims the investigation is a politically motivated sham, intended to derail his ongoing campaign to win the Republican 2024 nomination and return to the White House.Hereâs a timeline of the important developments in the blockbuster investigation.May 2021An official from the National Archives and Records Administration contacts Trumpâs team after realizing that several important documents werenât handed over before Trump left the White House. In hopes of locating the missing items, NARA lawyer Gary Stern reaches out to someone who served in the White House counselâs office under Trump, who was the point of contact for recordkeeping matters. The missing documents include some of Trumpâs correspondence with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, as well as the map of Hurricane Dorian that Trump infamously altered with a sharpie pen.July 2021In a taped conversation, Trump acknowledges that he still has a classified Pentagon document about a possible attack against Iran, according to CNN reporting. The recording, which was made at Trumpâs golf club in New Jersey, indicates that Trump understood that he retained classified material after leaving the White House. The special counsel later obtained this audiotape, a key piece of evidence in his inquiry.Fall 2021NARA grows frustrated with the slow pace of document turnover after several months of conversations with the Trump team. Stern reaches out to another Trump attorney to intervene. The archivist asks about several boxes of records that were apparently taken to Mar-a-Lago during Trumpâs relocation to Florida. NARA still doesnât receive the White House documents they are searching for.Jan. 18, 2022After months of discussions with Trumpâs team, NARA retrieves 15 boxes of Trump White House records from Mar-a-Lago. The boxes contained some materials that were part of âspecial access programs,â known as SAP, which is a classification that includes protocols to significantly limit who would have access to the information. NARA says in a statement that some of the records it received at the end of Trumpâs administration were âtorn up by former President Trump,â and that White House officials had to tape them back together. Not all the torn-up documents were reconstructed, NARA says.Feb. 9, 2022NARA asks the Justice Department to investigate Trumpâs handling of White House records and whether he violated the Presidential Records Act and other laws related to classified information. The Presidential Records Act requires all records created by a sitting president to be turned over to the National Archives at the end of their administration.Feb. 18, 2022NARA informs the Justice Department that some of the documents retrieved from Mar-a-Lago included classified material. NARA also tells the department that, despite being warned it was illegal, Trump occasionally tore up government documents while he was president.April and May 2022On April 7, NARA publicly acknowledges for the first time that the Justice Department is involved, and news outlets report that prosecutors have launched a criminal probe into Trumpâs mishandling of classified documents. Around this time, FBI agents quietly interview Trump aides at Mar-a-Lago about the handling of presidential records as part of their widening investigation.April 11, 2022The FBI asks NARA for access to the 15 boxes it retrieved from Mar-a-Lago in January. The request was formally transmitted to NARA by President Joe Bidenâs White House Counselâs office, because the incumbent president controls presidential documents in NARA custody.April 29, 2022The Justice Department sends a letter to Trumpâs lawyers as part of its effort to access the 15 boxes, notifying them that more than 100 classified documents, totaling more than 700 pages, were found in the boxes. The letter says the FBI and U.S. intelligence agencies need âimmediate accessâ to these materials because of âimportant national security interests.â Also on this day, Trump lawyers ask NARA to delay its plans to give the FBI access to these materials. Trumpâs lawyers say they want time to examine the materials to see if anything is privileged, and that they are making a âprotective assertion of executive privilegeâ over all the documents.Video below: Supporters gather outside Mar-a-Lago following news of Trump's indictmentMay 1, 2022Trumpâs lawyers write again to NARA, and ask again that NARA postpone its plans to give the FBI access to the materials retrieved from Mar-a-Lago.May 10, 2022Debra Steidel Wall, the acting archivist of the United States, who runs NARA, informs Trumpâs lawyers that she is rejecting their claims of âprotectiveâ executive privilege over all the materials taken from Mar-a-Lago and will therefore turn over the materials to the FBI and U.S. intelligence agencies, in a four-page letter.May 11, 2022The Justice Department subpoenas Trump, demanding all documents with classification markings that are still at Mar-a-Lago. At some point after receiving the subpoena, Trump asks his lawyer Evan Corcoran if there was any way to fight the subpoena, but Corcoran tells him he has to comply, according to notes Cochran took and later gave to investigators. Also after getting the subpoena, Trump aides are captured on surveillance footage moving document boxes into and out of a basement storage room â which has become a major element of the obstruction investigation.May 12, 2022News outlets report that investigators subpoenaed NARA for access to the classified documents they retrieved from Mar-a-Lago. The subpoena is the first public indication of the Justice Department using a grand jury in its investigation.June 2, 2022As part of the effort to comply with the subpoena, Corcoran searches a Mar-a-Lago storage room and finds 38 classified documents. According to a lawsuit that the former president later filed, Trump invites FBI officials to come to Mar-a-Lago to retrieve the subpoenaed materials.June 3, 2022Federal investigators, including a top Justice Department counterintelligence official, visit Mar-a-Lago to deal with the subpoena for remaining classified documents. The investigators meet with Trumpâs attorneys, including Corcoran, and look around the basement storage room where the documents were stored. Trump briefly stops by the meeting to say hello to the officials, but he does not answer any questions. Corcoran hands over the 38 classified documents that he found. Trump lawyer Christina Bobb signs a sworn affidavit inaccurately asserting that there arenât any more classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.June 8, 2022Trumpâs attorneys receive a letter from federal investigators, asking them to further secure the room where documents are being stored. In response, Trump aides add a padlock to the room in the basement of Mar-a-Lago.Video below: Explaining Trump's classified document indictmentJune 24, 2022Federal investigators serve a subpoena to the Trump Organization, demanding surveillance video from Mar-a-Lago. Trumpâs company complies with the subpoena and turns over the footage. CNN has reported that this was part of an effort to gather information about who had access to areas at the club where government documents were stored.Aug. 8, 2022The FBI executes a court-approved search warrant at Mar-a-Lago â a major escalation of the investigation. The search focused on the area of the club where Trumpâs offices and personal quarters are located. Federal agents found more than 100 additional classified documents at the property. The search was the first time in American history that a former presidentâs home was searched as part of a criminal investigation.Aug. 11, 2022Trump sends a message through one his lawyers to Attorney General Merrick Garland, saying he has âbeen hearing from people all over the country about the raidâ who are âangry,â and that âwhatever I can do to take the heat down, to bring the pressure down, just let us know,â according to a lawsuit he later filed. Hours later, after three days of silence, Garland makes a brief public statement about the investigation. He reveals that he personally approved the decision to seek a search warrant, and that the Justice Department will continue to apply the law âwithout fear or favor.â Garland also pushes back against what he called âunfounded attacks on the professionalism of the FBI and Justice Department.âAug. 12, 2022Federal Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart approves the unsealing of the Mar-a-Lago search warrant and its property receipt, at the Justice Departmentâs request and after Trumpâs lawyers agree to the release. The warrant reveals the Justice Department is looking into possible violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction of justice and criminal handling of government records, as part of its investigation.Aug. 22, 2022Trump files a federal lawsuit seeking the appointment of a third-party attorney known as a âspecial masterâ to independently review the materials that the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago. In the lawsuit, Trumpâs lawyers argue that the Justice Department canât be trusted to do its own review for potentially privileged materials that should be siloed off from the criminal probe.Sept. 5, 2022In a major ruling in Trumpâs favor, Federal District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, grants Trumpâs request for a special master to review the seized materials from Mar-a-Lago. She says the special master will have the power to look for documents covered under attorney-client privilege and executive privilege.Sept. 8, 2022The Justice Department appeals Cannonâs decision in the special master case.Sept. 15, 2022Cannon appoints senior Judge Raymond Dearie to serve as the special master and sets a November 30 deadline for the Brooklyn-based federal judge to finish his review of the seized materials.October 2022A maintenance worker drains the swimming pool at Mar-a-Lago, which ends up flooding a room where there are computer severs that contain surveillance video logs, according to CNN reporting. Itâs unclear if the flood was accidental or on purpose, and itâs possible that the IT equipment wasnât damaged, but federal prosecutors found the incident to be suspicious.Nov. 4, 2022Former Trump administration official Kash Patel testifies before the federal grand jury in the classified documents investigation. A Trump loyalist, Patel had publicly claimed that Trump declassified all the materials that ended up at Mar-a-Lago, even though there is no evidence to back up those assertions.Nov. 18, 2022Garland announces that he is appointing special counsel Jack Smith to take over the investigation.Dec. 1, 2022A federal appeals court shuts down the special master review of the documents that the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago. The appeals panel rebuked Cannonâs earlier decisions, writing that she essentially tried to âinterfereâ with the criminal probe and had created a âspecial exceptionâ in the law to help Trump.Video below: Boston presidential historian on Trump indictment: 'Just a bad, bad look'Dec. 23, 2022Trump attorney Timothy Parlatore testifies before the special counselâs grand jury, where he described how Trumpâs lawyers scoured his properties for classified materials. He later left Trumpâs legal team.Late 2022 and early 2023Trumpâs legal team searches four of his properties in Florida, New York and New Jersey for additional classified material. They find two more classified files in a Florida storage unit, and give them to the FBI. Around this time, Trumpâs team also finds additional papers with classification markings at Mar-a-Lago, and they give those materials to the Justice Department. They also turn over a laptop belonging to a Trump aide who had copied those documents onto the computer, not realizing they were classified.Spring 2023A string of key witnesses testify before the special counselâs grand jury in Washington, D.C. This includes Trump administration officials Robert OâBrien and Ric Grenell, who handled national security and intelligence matters; Margo Martin, a communications aide who continued working for Trump after he left the White House; and Matthew Calamari Sr. and his son, Matthew Calamari Jr., longtime Trump employees who oversee security for the Trump Organization.Mid-March 2023In response to a new subpoena from the special counsel, Trumpâs lawyers turn over some material related to a classified Pentagon document that he discussed at a recorded meeting in 2021. However, Trumpâs team wasnât able to find the specific document â about a potential U.S. attack on Iran â that prosecutors were looking for.March 25, 2023Corcoran, the lead Trump attorney, testifies before the grand jury in Washington, D.C. This occurred after a federal judge ordered him to answer prosecutorsâ questions, ruling that attorney-client privilege did not shield his discussion with Trump because Trump might been trying to commit a crime through his attorneys. Corcoran later recused himself from handling the Mar-a-Lago matter.June 2023The first public indications emerge that the special counsel is using a second grand jury in Miami to gather evidence. Multiple witnesses testify in front of the Miami-based panel, CNN reported.June 5, 2023Trump lawyers meet with senior Justice Department officials â including special counsel Smith â to discuss the Mar-a-Lago investigation. The sitdown lasted about 90 minutes, and Trumpâs team raised concerns about the probe, which they have called an âunlawfulâ and âoutrageousâ abuse of the legal system.June 7, 2023News outlets report that the Justice Department recently sent a âtarget letterâ to Trump, formally notifying him that heâs a target of the investigation into potential mishandling of classified documents.June 8, 2023News outlets report that Trump has been indicted in connection with the classified documents investigation. Trump also says in a social media post that the Justice Department informed his attorneys that he was indicted â and called the case a âhoax.â
The federal criminal investigation into former President Donald Trumpâs potential mishandling of classified documents escalated in stunning fashion this week with .
The indictment hasnât been unsealed yet, so details of the charges arenât publicly available. But the investigation â led by Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith â revolves around sensitive government papers that Trump held onto after his White House term ended in January 2021. The special counsel has also examined whether Trump or his aides obstructed the investigation.
Federal authorities have recovered from Trump. He has voluntarily given back some materials, his lawyers turned over additional files after a subpoena, and the FBI found dozens of classified records during a court-approved search of his Mar-a-Lago home last summer.
Trump has denied all wrongdoing and claims the investigation is a politically motivated sham, intended to derail his ongoing campaign to win the Republican 2024 nomination and return to the White House.
Hereâs a timeline of the important developments in the blockbuster investigation.
May 2021
An official from the National Archives and Records Administration after realizing that several important documents werenât handed over before Trump left the White House. In hopes of locating the missing items, NARA lawyer Gary Stern reaches out to someone who served in the White House counselâs office under Trump, who was the point of contact for recordkeeping matters. The missing documents include some of Trumpâs with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, as well as the map of Hurricane Dorian that Trump with a sharpie pen.
July 2021
In a , Trump acknowledges that he still has a classified Pentagon document about a possible attack against Iran, according to CNN reporting. The recording, which was made at Trumpâs golf club in New Jersey, indicates that Trump understood that he retained classified material after leaving the White House. The special counsel later obtained this audiotape, a in his inquiry.
Fall 2021
NARA with the slow pace of document turnover after several months of conversations with the Trump team. Stern reaches out to another Trump attorney to intervene. The archivist asks about several boxes of records that were apparently taken to Mar-a-Lago during Trumpâs relocation to Florida. NARA still doesnât receive the White House documents they are searching for.
Jan. 18, 2022
After months of discussions with Trumpâs team, of Trump White House records from Mar-a-Lago. The boxes that were part of âspecial access programs,â known as SAP, which is a classification that includes protocols to significantly limit who would have access to the information. NARA says in a statement that some of the records it received at the end of Trumpâs administration were âtorn up by former President Trump,â and that White House officials had to tape them back together. Not all the torn-up documents were reconstructed, NARA says.
Feb. 9, 2022
NARA Trumpâs handling of White House records and whether he violated the Presidential Records Act and other laws related to classified information. requires all records created by a sitting president to be turned over to the National Archives at the end of their administration.
Feb. 18, 2022
NARA that some of the documents retrieved from Mar-a-Lago included classified material. NARA also tells the department that, despite being warned it was illegal, Trump occasionally tore up government documents while he was president.
April and May 2022
On April 7, for the first time that the Justice Department is involved, and news outlets report that prosecutors have launched a criminal probe into Trumpâs mishandling of classified documents. Around this time, FBI agents quietly at Mar-a-Lago about the handling of presidential records as part of their widening investigation.
April 11, 2022
The FBI to the 15 boxes it retrieved from Mar-a-Lago in January. The request was formally transmitted to NARA by President Joe Bidenâs White House Counselâs office, because the incumbent president controls presidential documents in NARA custody.
April 29, 2022
The Justice Department as part of its effort to access the 15 boxes, notifying them that more than 100 classified documents, totaling more than 700 pages, were found in the boxes. The letter says the FBI and U.S. intelligence agencies need âimmediate accessâ to these materials because of âimportant national security interests.â Also on this day, Trump lawyers its plans to give the FBI access to these materials. Trumpâs lawyers say they want time to examine the materials to see if anything is privileged, and that they are making a âprotective assertion of executive privilegeâ over all the documents.
Video below: Supporters gather outside Mar-a-Lago following news of Trump's indictment
May 1, 2022
Trumpâs lawyers , and ask again that NARA postpone its plans to give the FBI access to the materials retrieved from Mar-a-Lago.
May 10, 2022
Debra Steidel Wall, the acting archivist of the United States, who runs NARA, that she is rejecting their claims of âprotectiveâ executive privilege over all the materials taken from Mar-a-Lago and will therefore turn over the materials to the FBI and U.S. intelligence agencies, .
May 11, 2022
The Justice Department subpoenas Trump, demanding all documents with classification markings that are still at Mar-a-Lago. At some point after receiving the subpoena, Trump asks his lawyer Evan Corcoran if there was any way to fight the subpoena, but Corcoran tells him he has to comply, Cochran took and later gave to investigators. Also after getting the subpoena, Trump aides are on surveillance footage document boxes into and out of a basement storage room â which has become a major element of the obstruction investigation.
May 12, 2022
News outlets report that for access to the classified documents they retrieved from Mar-a-Lago. The subpoena is the first public indication of the Justice Department using a grand jury in its investigation.
June 2, 2022
As part of the effort to comply with the subpoena, Corcoran a Mar-a-Lago storage room and finds 38 classified documents. According to that the former president later filed, Trump invites FBI officials to come to Mar-a-Lago to retrieve the subpoenaed materials.
June 3, 2022
Federal investigators, including a top Justice Department counterintelligence official, to deal with the subpoena for remaining classified documents. The investigators meet with Trumpâs attorneys, including Corcoran, and look around the basement storage room where the documents were stored. Trump briefly stops by the meeting to say hello to the officials, but he does not answer any questions. Corcoran hands over the 38 classified documents that he found. Trump lawyer Christina Bobb inaccurately asserting that there arenât any more classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.
June 8, 2022
Trumpâs attorneys from federal investigators, asking them to further secure the room where documents are being stored. In response, Trump aides add a padlock to the room in the basement of Mar-a-Lago.
Video below: Explaining Trump's classified document indictment
June 24, 2022
Federal investigators serve a subpoena to the Trump Organization, demanding surveillance video from Mar-a-Lago. Trumpâs company complies with the subpoena and turns over the footage. that this was part of an effort to gather information about who had access to areas at the club where government documents were stored.
Aug. 8, 2022
The FBI at Mar-a-Lago â a major escalation of the investigation. The search focused on the area of the club where Trumpâs offices and personal quarters are located. Federal agents found more than 100 additional classified documents at the property. The search was the first time in American history that a former presidentâs home was searched as part of a criminal investigation.
Aug. 11, 2022
Trump through one his lawyers to Attorney General Merrick Garland, saying he has âbeen hearing from people all over the country about the raidâ who are âangry,â and that âwhatever I can do to take the heat down, to bring the pressure down, just let us know,â according to a lawsuit he later filed. Hours later, after three days of silence, Garland about the investigation. He reveals that he personally approved the decision to seek a search warrant, and that the Justice Department will continue to apply the law âwithout fear or favor.â Garland also pushes back against what he called âunfounded attacks on the professionalism of the FBI and Justice Department.â
Aug. 12, 2022
Federal Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart and its property receipt, at the Justice Departmentâs request and after Trumpâs lawyers agree to the release. The reveals the Justice Department is looking into possible violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction of justice and criminal handling of government records, as part of its investigation.
Aug. 22, 2022
Trump seeking the appointment of a third-party attorney known as a to independently review the materials that the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago. In the lawsuit, Trumpâs lawyers argue that the Justice Department canât be trusted to do its own review for potentially privileged materials that should be siloed off from the criminal probe.
Sept. 5, 2022
In a major ruling in Trumpâs favor, Federal District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, grants Trumpâs request for a special master to review the seized materials from Mar-a-Lago. She says the special master will have the power to look for documents covered under attorney-client privilege and executive privilege.
Sept. 8, 2022
The Justice Department in the special master case.
Sept. 15, 2022
Cannon to serve as the special master and sets a November 30 deadline for the Brooklyn-based federal judge to finish his review of the seized materials.
October 2022
A maintenance worker at Mar-a-Lago, which ends up flooding a room where there are computer severs that contain surveillance video logs, according to CNN reporting. Itâs unclear if the flood was accidental or on purpose, and itâs possible that the IT equipment wasnât damaged, but federal prosecutors found the incident to be suspicious.
Nov. 4, 2022
Former Trump administration official Kash Patel before the federal grand jury in the classified documents investigation. A Trump loyalist, Patel had publicly claimed that Trump declassified all the materials that ended up at Mar-a-Lago, even though to back up those assertions.
Nov. 18, 2022
Garland that he is appointing special counsel Jack Smith to take over the investigation.
Dec. 1, 2022
A federal appeals court the special master review of the documents that the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago. The appeals panel rebuked Cannonâs earlier decisions, writing that she essentially tried to âinterfereâ with the criminal probe and had created a âspecial exceptionâ in the law to help Trump.
Video below: Boston presidential historian on Trump indictment: 'Just a bad, bad look'
Dec. 23, 2022
Trump attorney Timothy Parlatore before the special counselâs grand jury, where he described how Trumpâs lawyers scoured his properties for classified materials. He later left Trumpâs legal team.
Late 2022 and early 2023
Trumpâs legal team searches four of his properties in Florida, New York and New Jersey for additional classified material. They in a Florida storage unit, and give them to the FBI. Around this time, Trumpâs team also finds additional papers with classification markings at Mar-a-Lago, and they give those materials to the Justice Department. They also belonging to a Trump aide who had copied those documents onto the computer, not realizing they were classified.
Spring 2023
A string of key witnesses testify before the special counselâs grand jury in Washington, D.C. This includes Trump administration officials and , who handled national security and intelligence matters; , a communications aide who continued working for Trump after he left the White House; and and his son, Matthew Calamari Jr., longtime Trump employees who oversee security for the Trump Organization.
Mid-March 2023
In response to a new subpoena from the special counsel, Trumpâs lawyers related to a classified Pentagon document that he discussed at a recorded meeting in 2021. However, Trumpâs team wasnât able to find the specific document â about a potential U.S. attack on Iran â that prosecutors were looking for.
March 25, 2023
Corcoran, the lead Trump attorney, testifies before the grand jury in Washington, D.C. This occurred after a federal judge him to answer prosecutorsâ questions, ruling that attorney-client privilege did not shield his discussion with Trump because Trump might been trying to commit a crime through his attorneys. Corcoran later from handling the Mar-a-Lago matter.
June 2023
The first public indications emerge that the special counsel is using a in Miami to gather evidence. Multiple witnesses in front of the Miami-based panel, CNN reported.
June 5, 2023
Trump lawyers with senior Justice Department officials â including special counsel Smith â to discuss the Mar-a-Lago investigation. The sitdown lasted about 90 minutes, and Trumpâs team raised concerns about the probe, which they have called an âunlawfulâ and âoutrageousâ abuse of the legal system.
June 7, 2023
News outlets report that the Justice Department recently to Trump, formally notifying him that heâs a target of the investigation into potential mishandling of classified documents.
June 8, 2023
News outlets report that in connection with the classified documents investigation. Trump also says in a social media post that the Justice Department informed his attorneys that he was indicted â and called the case a âhoax.â