Biden says he had 'zero' advance notice of FBI search of Trump's Mar-a-Lago home

President Biden emphatically denied Wednesday that he had any advance notice of the Federal Bureau of Investigation search conducted at the Florida home of former President Donald Trump that turned up hundreds of pages of highly classified documents.

At the conclusion of a White House event detailing Biden's plan to cancel student loan debt for some Americans, a Fox News reporter asked the president, "How much advance notice did you have of the FBI's plan to search Mar-a-Lago?"

"I didn't have any advance notice — none, zero, not one single bit. Thank you," Biden responded.

Since the FBI executed a search warrant at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort and home in Palm Beach, Fla., on Aug. 8, Republicans have accused the Biden administration of "weaponizing" the Justice Department in an effort to further politically damage the former president.

On Tuesday, Trump himself led that chorus.

"The White House stated strongly that they were NOT INVOLVED, and knew absolutely nothing about, the political Witch Hunt going on with me, & that they didn't know anything at all about the Break-In of Mar-a-Lago. This was strongly reiterated again & again. WRONG!" Trump wrote in a statement posted to his social media platform. "Remember, these are the people who spied on my campaign, denied it, & got caught. Through the great reporting of John Solomon (Fake Pulitzer Prize?), documents reveal they knew everything, in fact led the charge - a political NO, NO!"

Contrary to Trump's claim, a federal magistrate judge signed off on the FBI warrant authorizing the search following months of negotiations between the former president and the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) regarding boxes that Trump removed from the White House and was storing at his Florida home.

The FBI warrant for the search suggests the government believes that there may have been violations of the Espionage Act, which covers the mishandling and damaging of sensitive documents, possibly in addition to other laws.

Trump has pointed to a May 10 letter sent by Debra Steidel Wall, acting archivist of the United States, to Trump's legal team about the former president holding on to national security documents and other sensitive material. The letter says Trump took more than 700 pages of classified documents to his Florida home, some of them categorized as the most highly secret in government.

Trump's allies homed in on one passage that they concluded proved that the Biden administration had been tipped off months in advance that a raid of Mar-a-Lago was in the works. In the passage, Steidel Wall writes that she at one point sought guidance from the White House counsel's office.

"On April 11, 2022, the White House Counsel's Office affirming a request from the Department of Justice supported by an FBI letterhead memorandum formally transmitted a request that NARA provide the FBI access to the 15 boxes for its review within seven days," she wrote.

Yet in the very same letter, Steidel Wall makes clear that the White House counsel's office and Biden himself had deferred to her given the politically charged circumstances of the negotiations to retrieve and inspect the documents Trump is accused of improperly taking to Florida.

"The Counsel to the President has informed me that, in light of the particular circumstances presented here, President Biden defers to my determination, in consultation with the Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel, regarding whether or not I should uphold the former President's purported 'protective assertion of executive privilege,'" she wrote.

Since the Aug. 8 search of Trump's home, the White House has staunchly denied prior knowledge of it.

"The president was not briefed, was not aware of it," White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at a briefing on Aug. 9. "No one at the White House was given a heads-up."

At a news conference on Aug. 11, Attorney General Merrick Garland said that he had "personally approved the decision to seek a search warrant in this matter."

"Faithful adherence to the rule of law is the bedrock principle of the Justice Department and of our democracy," Garland said. "Upholding the rule of law means applying the law evenly, without fear or favor. Under my watch, that is precisely what the Justice Department is doing."