Following the Federal Bureau of Investigation's raid at former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago home, many have begun to question the lack of explanation from the Justice Department.
Among those calling for answers is CBS News Chief Washington Correspondent Major Elliot Garrett, who joined News Talk 830 WCCO's Chad Hartman to discuss his thoughts on the raid.
"It's unprecedented," Garrett shared.
Garrett says the raid is unprecedented because of Trump's "never before seen attitude about the requirements of the presidency."
Garrett shared that many of his supporters have praised him for not following prior traditions and being what they would call an "originalist." Still, when it comes to the handling of documents, especially after the Watergate scandal, certain things need to be done by the book.
"President Trump was clearly, not only casual, but sort of manifestly irresponsible around some documents that needed to have presidential protection," Garrett said. "That's what this is about, at least on the surface. There might be other issues that the FBI, empowered by a search warrant, is looking into."
When he first saw the news, Garrett shared that he first thought of the at least 15 boxes of classified documents taken from the White House when Trump left office that shouldn't have been.
Because there was no understanding of what was in the documents and whether or not Trump had declassified the information, Garrett says there was an issue, and the Justice Department seems to have been trying to resolve that issue.
Trump and the Justice Department had been in talks over the last several months about handling the documents, and the former president had reported that the negotiations were cooperative, according to Garrett.
However, Garrett shared that the Justice Department must have thought that what was going on wasn't entirely cooperative and that something illegal was happening. Garrett said from there that the only way to find out if the law was being broken was to execute the search warrant.
"For an operation of this magnitude, it would have to go up all the way to the top of the Justice Department," Garrett said. "If not Merrick Garland, Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco."
When it comes to what troubles Garrett, it's that there has been no communication from the Justice Department on what happened and why because it is leaving the door open for Trump to manipulate the situation.
"You can't just have an operation like this and leave the vacuum open to the former president," Garrett said.
As for the fallout of the raid, Garrett says that the divide on how Trump is viewed, either as someone who is the target of political agendas, or a president who acted inappropriately, will only continue to grow.
"The existential question of what former President Trump represents is the biggest dividing line and most dangerous dividing line in our country in my lifetime. Bigger than Vietnam," Garrett said.
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