Special Counsel Jack Smith Obtains Search Warrant for Donald Trump’s Twitter Account in Jan 6 Probe

Donald Trump's controversial Twitter account @realDonaldTrump is going to be part of the investigation against him. The special counsel investigating Trump obtained a search order to search his Twitter for evidence about the search of the Capitol Riots, newly unsealed court filings reveal.

Twitter was initially prohibited from informing Trump that a search warrant had been acquired for his account because the investigation was so top-secret, and the firm was fined $350,000 because it took so long to produce the material requested by the prosecutors, per CNN. The “data and records related” to Trump's account were the subject of the search warrant special counsel Jack Smith acquired; and finally, the platform was permitted to disclose some information about the search warrant to the former president.

The warrant was requested in January 2023 by the special counsel's office, which is now working on the criminal case against Trump in DC District Court relating to his attempts to rig the 2020 presidential election. According to the filing, which is now available to the public in the US Circuit Court of Appeals, Twitter eventually delivered the documents.

The issue of whether Trump should be informed about the search warrant was contested for months by Twitter and the office of special counsel Jack Smith.

On Wednesday, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals released a decision affirming the district court's handling of the case, bringing the controversy to light.

The district court “found that there were reasonable grounds” to believe that revealing the fact his Twitter is being searched ‘would seriously jeopardize the ongoing investigation’ by giving him "an opportunity to destroy evidence, change patterns of behavior, [or] notify confederates,” according to the DC Circuit's opinion.

The district court also concluded that the non-disclosure order was required because it “found reason to believe that the former President would ‘flee from prosecution,’” according to a footnote. “The government later acknowledged, however, that it had ‘errantly included flight from prosecution as a predicate’ in its application,” the footnote said. “The district court did not rely on the risk of flight in its ultimate analysis.”

The court ruling does not indicate what particular material was turned over. A subpoena may include draft tweets, direct messages, and account access information, including who handles it. A grand jury indictment handed against Trump earlier this month cited 18 of his tweets, per the Washington Post. Seven of these were published on January 6th.

In these tweets, Trump spread false charges of election fraud, attacked authorities working to correct the record, pushed supporters to rally in Washington on January 6th, and pressed Pence to assist in reversing the election results.

Although we don't know which specific tweets Smith and his team have targeted - the grand jury indictment gives an idea. The indictment document, obtained by Washington Post, mentions these posts. These tweets later incited supporters of Trump who stormed the Capitol and rioted against the peaceful transfer of power.

References:

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/08/09/politics/special-counsel-trump-twitter-search-warrant/index.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/08/09/twitter-fine-jan-6-trump/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/documents/8a7503af-fde7-4061-818c-7d7e0ee06036.pdf?itid=lk_inline_manual_5&itid=lk_inline_manual_18