Now Pence backs Trump over Mar-a-Lago raid

Former Vice President Mike Pence said Tuesday that he was concerned about the FBI’s raid of former President Donald Trump’s home Mar-a-Lago – despite their 20-month estrangement.

‘I share the deep concern of millions of Americans over the unprecedented search of the personal residence of President Trump,’ Pence tweeted Tuesday afternoon. ‘No former President of the United States has ever been subject to a raid of their personal residence in American history.’

On Monday, Trump confirmed that FBI agents had raided Mar-a-Lago, after media reports said agents were spotted leaving the ex-president’s Florida home and private club. 

Trump raged against the move, saying it represented ‘dark times for our Nation,’ pushing that the Biden administration was going after him as a political target. 

‘After years where FBI agents were found to be acting on political motivation during our administration, the appearance of continued partisanship by the Justice Department must be addressed,’ Pence also said. 

‘Yesterday’s action undermines public confidence in our system of justice and Attorney General Garland must give a full accounting to the American people as to why this action was taken and he must do so immediately,’ the former vice president added. 

So far Attorney General Merrick Garland hasn’t spoken publicly about the raid. 

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre has referred questions about the FBI’s actions to the Justice Department, which hasn’t commented. 

A number of media outlets reported that the raid stemmed from an investigation into Trump removing classified documents from the White House and not the DOJ’s current probe into January 6, which is also looking into Trump’s actions.  

Both Democrats and Republicans have blasted the FBI whenever the agency’s investigations have gotten close to political figures in their respective parties. 

Democrats were enraged by the actions of former FBI Director James Comey, who spoke about the agency’s decision not to charge Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton with mishandling classified information by using a private email server, though saying publicly she was ‘extremely careless.’ 

Comey called a press conference in July 2016 to make the comments – just four months before the presidential election.  

‘This wasn’t your ordinary bureaucrat who just mishandles one document. This was something more than that. But not something that anybody would prosecute,’ Comey explained in a 2018 interview about his decision to characterize Clinton’s behavior that way. 

Comey also informed members of Congress that he had reopened the Clinton email investigation about two weeks before the 2016 election because more emails had been found on a laptop the FBI confiscated from Anthony Weiner, who was then married to top Clinton aide Huma Abedin. 

Despite Comey telling lawmakers that nothing new was found prior to election day – the email investigation resurfacing during the final stretch likely helped Trump narrowly win the 2016 election. 

Then two months into Trump’s tenure, Comey confirmed that the FBI was investigating whether members of Trump’s 2016 campaign team had colluded with Russia, which had meddled in the election.

Democrats were again aghast that Comey kept the Trump-Russia probe under wraps in the run-up to the 2016 election, while speaking publicly about the FBI’s Clinton dealings. 

Comey later said he believed Clinton would win the election, which played a role in why he treated the probes differently.  

A 2018 DOJ inspector general’s report  said that Comey had twice violated the bureau’s policy of discretion: with the July 2016 press conference on Clinton and again when he informed Congress the Clinton email investigation had been reopened.  

Pence’s complaints of partisanship were likely referring to the ‘FBI lovers’ scandal, involving anti-Trump text messages sent between Peter Strzok and attorney Lisa Page, who were both working on special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe and having an affair. 

Mueller took over the Russia investigation after Trump fired Comey. 

Strzok was removed from the probe when critical text messages about Trump and his supporters were discovered. 

While texts critical of Trump only amounted to a small fraction of the 7,000 uncovered, Trump repeatedly used Strzok and Page as punching bags when telling supporters the ‘deep state’ was coming after him. 

In a campaign-style video Trump released Tuesday, he continued to push that any investigation to him was tainted by politics. 

‘We are a nation that has weaponized its law enforcement against the opposing political party, like never before,’ the ex-president said. 

Later Tuesday on Truth Social, Trump called it a ‘horrible thing that took place yesterday at Mar-a-Lago.’

‘We are no better than a third world country, a banana republic,’ he said. ‘It is a continuation of Russia, Russia, Russia, Impeachment Hoax #1, Impeachment Hoax # 2, the no collusion Mueller Report, and more.’ 

‘To make matters worse it is all, in my opinion, a coordinated attack with Radical Left Democrat state & local D.A.’s & A.G.’s,’ Trump also said. 

Trump also faces legal problems in Georgia as Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis investigates a scheme to overturn the state’s 2020 presidential election results. 

And in New York, where Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, is looking into whether Trump’s companies misrepresented the value of properties for loan and tax purposes. 

Additionally in New York, Letitia James, the New York state attorney general, is conducting a civil investigation into whether Trump’s company inflated real estate values. 

Trump and Pence had a falling out after Pence was unwilling to overturn the results of the 2020 election while chairing a joint session of Congress on January 6, 2021. 

That session was interrupted by the Capitol attack, in which some Trump supporters called on Pence to be hanged. 

Trump is also tied up in investigations into the attack by both the House select committee on January 6 and the Department of Justice.