- Reports suggest an informant told authorities that Mar-a-Lago held documents the FBI sought.
- Sources told Newsweek and The Wall Street Journal the person also told investigators where to look.
Sources told both Newsweek and The Wall Street Journal that an informant tipped off authorities that classified government documents might've been improperly stored at Mar-a-Lago.
On Monday, the FBI executed a search warrant at former President Donald Trump's home in Palm Beach, Florida, sparking a furious reaction from Trump and his allies.
The FBI and the Department of Justice have stayed quiet on the reason for the raid, but numerous media outlets and the former president's son Eric Trump suggested it was because of material that Trump took from the White House in a possible violation of the Presidential Records Act.
In February, the National Archives took 15 boxes of documents from Mar-a-Lago and also asked the Department of Justice to investigate whether Trump broke the law in the handling of these documents.
Newsweek said it talked to two senior government officials with knowledge of the raid, who said a person told law enforcement that Trump still had certain documents in his possession. The person was also said to have pinpointed exactly where the documents were.
Newsweek's sources also said the raid was timed to take place while Trump was away to try to avoid giving the former president a photo op and to lower the profile of the raid. One Newsweek source, an unnamed senior Justice Department official, described that plan as a "spectacular backfire" because of the backlash the raid got among Trump's supporters.
The report from Newsweek was matched by reporting from the Journal.
The Journal said it talked to anonymous sources familiar with the matter who said a person who knew where the papers were stored had been in touch with investigators. According to the Journal, this person told investigators that Mar-a-Lago contained classified documents beyond the 15 boxes the National Archives retrieved from Trump's residence back in February.
The Department of Justice didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
The possibility that investigators were been tipped off sent Trumpworld into a tailspin, touching on a pre-existing paranoia among many in his cricle.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene raged during a livestream Wednesday about an "FBI informant at Mar-a-Lago."
Axios reported that Trump allies believed someone might've "flipped" and given information on Trump to the FBI.
It reported that people close to Trump were suspicious after the raid.
Rolling Stone also reported, citing anonymous sources close to Trump, that the former president and his advisors were desperately trying to root out this person, with Trump said to be concerned that Republicans and people close to him might be wearing wires.
He asked his close aides if they thought he may be under surveillance by the authorities, the report said.
One source told Rolling Stone: "He has asked me and others, 'Do you think our phones are tapped?'
"Given the sheer volume of investigations going on into the (former) president, I do not think he's assuming anything is outside the realm of possibility."
The raid is just one of a host of legal problems to descend on Trump at once. On Tuesday, a federal court dealt him a blow by ruling that a Congressional panel is allowed to obtain his long-concealed tax records.
And on Wednesday, Trump sat for a deposition in the long-running probe of his business affairs by New York attorney general Letitia James.
Trump said at the time of the hearing that he would refuse to answer questions under his Fifth Amendment rights. Sources told NBC News that he did this more than 440 times, answering only to confirm his name.
In a recent post on his social-media network Truth Social, Trump said he was "being attacked from all sides."