FBI Raid on Trump's Florida Home Sparks Political Firestorm

The dramatic FBI raid on Donald Trump's palatial Florida residence has supercharged the bitter, polarizing political debate around the slew of judicial investigations facing the former president as he considers another White House run.

Monday's shock action marked a stunning escalation of legal probes into the 45th US president, drawing cheers from his political foes and condemnation from his allies.

He denounced the FBI raid as "prosecutorial misconduct" and "weaponization of the Justice System" by "Radical Left Democrats who desperately don't want me to run for President in 2024."

But multiple US media outlets said federal agents were conducting a court-authorized search related to the potential mishandling of classified documents that had been sent to Mar-a-Lago after Trump left the White House in January 2021.

Since taking his last Air Force One flight from Washington to Florida on January 20 last year, Trump has remained the country's most divisive figure, continuing to sow falsehoods that he actually won the 2020 vote.

"The Department of Justice has reached an intolerable state of weaponized politicization," said Kevin McCarthy, a California lawmaker who is seeking to become the speaker of the House of Representatives if Republicans win back the chamber in November's midterm elections.

"Countless times we have examples of Democrats flouting the law and abusing power with no recourse," McDaniel said. "Democrats continually weaponize the bureaucracy against Republicans."

After denouncing the raid in a lengthy statement Monday evening, Trump's team put out a fund-raising message on Tuesday asking "every single red-blooded American Patriot to step up" and donate to fight what he called "this NEVERENDING WITCH HUNT."

Dan Scavino, Trump's former social media manager, urged him to accelerate an announcement that he would run again.

Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic speaker of the House, was asked about the raid during an appearance on NBC. "No person is above the law," she said, "not even a former president of the United States."

Andrew McCabe, a former deputy director of the FBI, said he believed the bureau may have been looking for "something specific" related to its probe into the alleged mishandling of classified information.

The recovery of the boxes raised questions about Trump's adherence to presidential records laws enacted after the 1970s Watergate scandal that require Oval Office occupants to preserve records.

Trump's former communications director Alyssa Farah Griffin told CNN that the raid could fire up his supporters, a small number of whom rallied outside Mar-a-Lago on Tuesday.

For weeks, Washington has been riveted by hearings in Congress about the January 6 storming of the Capitol by Trump supporters and his attempts to overturn the election won by Democrat Joe Biden.

"No one is above the law," Garland has said, while adding recently that he intends to "hold accountable every person who is criminally responsible for trying to overturn a legitimate election."