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Former US President Donald Trump.Sergio Flores/AFP via Getty Images
  • The Mar-a-Lago documents contain his handwritten notes.

  • The DOJ was prevented from reviewing the records from the home.

  • An initial hearing was held on Tuesday.

The Justice Department's appeal for access to classified materials seized from former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago home did not go down well with the public. Government and the public would suffer irreparable harm without the ability to review those records.

On Tuesday, Trump's lawyers suggested that the former president may not be able to overcome the power of his pen.

Trump's lawyers said in a new filing with the US Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit that the fact that the documents contain classification markings doesn't mean they aren't protected. According to court documents, some of the classified records seized from Mar-a-Lago contained what appeared to be President Trump's handwritten notes.

The need for an independent, third-party review of the documents is supported by the notes.

More than 100 documents that were marked classified were among the 11,000 documents seized from Mar-a-Lago.

Cannon refused to stay her ruling and appointed Raymond Dearie, a former chief judge of the federal court in Brooklyn, to serve as special master.

The government's efforts to protect the nation's security were undermined by the Justice Department's appeal. Lawyers for the former president said handwritten notes were more important.

There is no evidence that Trump had a standing order to declassify the records. More than a dozen of his former aides told CNN they didn't know about the order.

Trump's lawyers have not echoed his declassification claims, but they have said that a current president has the authority to do so. The government has not proven that the records with classified markings are still classified.

Dearie held an initial hearing Tuesday to discuss how his review process will unfold over the next two months. Trump's lawyers objected to Dearie's request for more information about the seized documents.

The possible indictment on charges related to the removal of records from the White House was noted by the response.

Trump would have to reveal a defense in the event of a "subsequent indictment" if he was given information about records' classification status.

The FBI searched Mar-a-Lago as part of an inquiry into possible violations of the Espionage Act and other laws. The Espionage Act makes it a crime to retain government records that are related to the national defense.

The concealment, removal, and destruction of government records are also being looked at by the Justice Department.

Business Insider has an article on it.