Special counsel gets search warrant for Donald Trump’s Twitter records
- The social media platform, now known as X, was given a US$350,000 fine for a delay in complying, court documents show
- The warrant was kept secret, after a US court found that disclosing it would give Trump ‘an opportunity to destroy evidence, change patterns of behaviour’
Special Counsel Jack Smith’s team obtained a search warrant in January for records related to former US president Donald Trump’s Twitter account, and a judge levied a US$350,000 fine on the company for a delay in complying, according to court documents released Wednesday.
The details were included in a decision from the federal appeal court in Washington rejecting Twitter’s claim that it should not have been held in contempt or sanctioned.
X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, sent an automated reply to a request for comment, saying it would respond soon.
The filing says prosecutors got the search warrant directing Twitter to produce information on Trump’s account after a court “found probable cause to search the Twitter account for evidence of criminal offences”. The government also obtained a nondisclosure agreement prohibiting Twitter from disclosing the search warrant, the filing says.
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The court found that disclosing the warrant could risk that Trump would “would seriously jeopardise the ongoing investigation” by giving him “an opportunity to destroy evidence, change patterns of behaviour”, the filing says.