Whatever is in those documents, it is serious enough for the DOJ to subpoena the video footage from outside the storage room, video footage that is already concerning to the FBI, and prompting immediate action from Congress, which wants an immediate damage assessment completed. According to the New York Times [1]:
The Justice Department also subpoenaed surveillance footage from Mar-a-Lago, including views from outside the storage room. According to a person briefed on the matter, the footage prompted concern among investigators about the handling of the material. It is not clear what time period that footage was from…
… Expressing alarm about the documents that were retrieved from Mar-a-Lago, the leaders of two House committees on Saturday called on Avril D. Haines, the director of national intelligence, to conduct an “immediate review and damage assessment” and provide a classified briefing to Congress about the potential harm done to national security.
“Even as the Justice Department’s investigation proceeds, ensuring that we take all necessary steps to protect classified information and mitigate the damage to national security done by its compromise is critically important,” the committee leaders, Representatives Carolyn B. Maloney, Democrat of New York and the chairwoman of the Oversight Committee, and Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California and the chairman of the Intelligence Committee, wrote to Ms. Haines.
The boxes contain enough information such that an entire review of “potential harm to national security” be performed immediately, and they are already on the record stating that the material HAS damaged national security (“mitigate the damage”). This is an extraordinary story and, if read carefully – please read the entire story – reveals just how seriously Trump’s actions with the materials are to national security. Additionally, there has to be some reason officials are sure that our national security has been damaged. It almost necessarily means that the material did not just sit in boxes collecting dust.
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[email protected], @JasonMiciak, with Nicole Hickman