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A federal judge has ordered Donald Trump's lawyers to reveal the names of the private investigators who were hired to search four of the former president's properties for classified materials, according to reports.
Chief Judge Beryl Howell, of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, ruled on Wednesday that Trump's legal team must identify to the government the names of the private investigators hired late last year to carry out searches for any potential remaining documents removed from the White House, according to The New York Times.
The names of the private investigators were handed over Wednesday night, reported CNN.
Prosecutors may now decide to interview the investigators as part of the criminal probe, as they have done with other members of Trump's inner circle.
The decision from Howell is the latest twist in the ongoing attempts by the federal government to get Trump and his team to return all sensitive materials which were seemingly removed from the White House when Trump left office in January 2021.
The FBI recovered more than 100 documents, including those marked top secret, from Trump's Mar-a-Lago home in Florida in August after the former president was originally subpoenaed to return the classified materials in May.
Months after the criminal investigation into allegations Trump mishandled the classified materials found at his Florida home, a federal attempt to retrieve them was launched and two more documents with classified markings were found at a storage facility in West Palm Beach, Florida, just before Thanksgiving.
The documents were found by two private investigators hired by Trump's legal team, who also searched Trump Tower in New York, Trump's Bedminster golf club in New Jersey, and an office in Florida.
Trump's lawyers then handed over documents recovered from the storage unit to the FBI and assured investigators they believe that all classified materials have been returned, a claim they also made in June when federal agents visited Mar-a-Lago prior to the August raid.
However, prosecutors were frustrated with Trump and his legal team's co-operation in the criminal investigation and asked Judge Howell to hold the former president's office in contempt of court for failing to comply with the subpoena requesting all White House documents be returned.
Howell declined to hold Trump's office in contempt in December.
Prosecutors have already questioned Walt Nauta, a valet driver at Mar-a-Lago, who is alleged to have been ordered by Trump to move boxes of documents into a Mar-a-Lago storage room after the former president received a government subpoena to return the classified materials.
Kash Patel, a close adviser of Trump, was also offered immunity to testify to a federal grand jury in Washington, D.C. about Trump's handling of the classified materials.
Trump and his team have been contacted for comment.
About the writer
Ewan Palmer is a Newsweek News Reporter based in London, U.K. His focus is reporting on US politics, and Florida ... Read more