Newly declassified FBI records show investigators in the classified-documents probe tracked phone metadata involving Susie Wiles and at least 21 Trump-associated lawyers, campaign advisers and journalists, while separate records reveal Washington Field Office agents questioned whether probable cause existed for the 2022 Mar-a-Lago search.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom.
WASHINGTON — Newly declassified FBI records show federal investigators tracked telephone contacts between President Donald Trump’s campaign chief Susie Wiles and dozens of lawyers, political advisers and journalists during the investigation into classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, providing new details about the scope of an inquiry later overseen by special counsel Jack Smith.
The records, reported Monday by Just the News, show investigators used a pen register and trap-and-trace system on Wiles’ phone from at least February through May 2023. FBI analysts recorded contacts involving at least 21 lawyers associated with Trump, numerous campaign staff members and political advisers and at least five journalists.
The system allowed investigators to obtain communications metadata, including telephone numbers, dates, times and durations of contacts. The released records do not show that the pen register itself allowed agents to listen to the contents of calls.
The documents were released through the White House Government Transparency Task Force and concern an FBI investigation codenamed “Plasmic Echo,” which examined Trump’s handling of classified government records after leaving office in January 2021.
The investigation began before Smith became special counsel in November 2022. A March 2022 FBI memorandum seeking authorization for the sensitive investigation shows the case received approval at senior levels of the Biden Justice Department, including then-Attorney General Merrick Garland and Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco.
FBI Director Christopher Wray submitted the request, according to the declassified material. Monaco wrote, “I recommend you approve,” and initialed the memorandum before Garland subsequently approved it.
Smith later assumed responsibility for the classified-documents investigation after Garland appointed him special counsel.
The newly released records show investigators paying particularly close attention to Wiles, who had become a central figure in Trump’s political operation after he announced his 2024 presidential campaign in November 2022.
Wiles served as a co-manager of Trump’s campaign and is now White House chief of staff.
One March 24, 2023, FBI communication documented multiple calls between Wiles and a person identified only as “Lawyer 7.”
“Good afternoon, WFO is continuing to review the PR/TT on Wiles’s phone number and observed that [Lawyer 7] called Wiles at 2:04pm this afternoon for 41 seconds,” the investigator wrote.
“[Lawyer 7] first called Wiles at 2:10pm EST on March 21, and Wiles returned his call for 1 minute and 34 seconds later that day at 2:59pm. These are the only contacts we have observed between the two of them since the PR/TT’s inception.”
The March 24 record concerning “Lawyer 7” demonstrates the level of detail analysts were recording about individual calls.
Other records show journalists appearing in the monitoring.
“There is nothing significant to report on the PR/TT. Today, an ABC News reporter called her at 8:48 AM for 2 minutes and 36 seconds,” an intelligence analyst wrote in a February monitoring thread.
The identities of most lawyers and journalists were redacted in the documents released publicly. Among the names left visible were current FBI Director Kash Patel and Just the News founder John Solomon.
The monitoring continued as Wiles interacted with investigators themselves.
Wiles was interviewed by the FBI on April 7, 2023, in Jacksonville, Florida. A subsequent memorandum indicates investigators reviewed her communications surrounding that interview.
“On 10 April 2023, WFO [redacted] reviewed WILES’s telephonic activity to determine contacts of interest on the date of her FBI interview,” the memo states.
The records covering April 6 through April 8 detail telephone activity around the interview.
Additional released material chronicles Wiles’ contacts from March 7 through March 10 and communications monitored between May 19 and May 22.
The documents have renewed questions among Republican lawmakers about how investigators handled communications involving Trump’s attorneys, campaign personnel and journalists during an active presidential campaign.
The records do not establish that investigators intercepted privileged conversations merely because a lawyer appeared in the telephone metadata. Attorney-client privilege generally protects confidential communications made for the purpose of seeking or providing legal advice, rather than the fact that two people communicated.
Still, the volume and specificity of the metadata collection have intensified congressional scrutiny of Smith and the FBI.
The new disclosure comes shortly after Just the News reported that investigators working under Smith separately obtained telephone records involving several Republican senators and secured a nondisclosure order preventing a communications provider from informing the lawmakers.
Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., subsequently filed a lawsuit arguing that the collection of her records constituted an unlawful intrusion into her rights.
Smith has denied that political considerations affected his investigations.
During a Sept. 29 Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Smith defended his conduct and that of his prosecution team as Republican senators questioned him about subpoenas, financial records and investigative methods.
“Anybody who has worked with me and knows me during the course of my career knows that I would not let politics play a role,” Smith said. “And I would just add that if you knew the people I worked with, they would not either.”
The Wiles records are only one portion of the newly declassified material.
Documents also show FBI personnel in Washington expressing reservations about the evidence supporting a search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate before agents executed the Aug. 8, 2022, search.
A July 13, 2022, Plasmic Echo memorandum from an assistant special agent in charge of counterintelligence at the FBI’s Washington Field Office said investigators there did not believe they had established probable cause for the search warrant being sought by the Justice Department.
“WFO does not believe (and has articulated to DOJ CES), that we have established probable cause for the search warrant at Mar a Lago,” the memo states. “DOJ has opined that they do, requesting a wide scope including residence, office, storage space.”
The agent also questioned the amount of time being devoted to building a search-warrant application.
“Finally, if the goal is to identify and recover classified records quickly, so as to protect the information, the 5 weeks spent fixated on probable cause for a search warrant have been counterproductive,” the memo said.
The Washington Field Office suggested alternatives.
“A reasonable step would be to recontact the attorney and inquire about any further documents,” the official wrote.
The memo continued: “WFO has made numerous suggestions to DOJ over the course of this investigation that the most expedient way to ensure recovery of all classified documents would be to go through [redacted] DOJ has persistently disagreed.”
Another option listed in the document was simply to “Ask to speak to FPOTUS/Counsel,” referring to the former president and his attorneys.
The records show disagreement inside federal law enforcement over investigative tactics before the Mar-a-Lago search, although the Justice Department ultimately concluded it had probable cause and obtained a warrant from a federal magistrate judge.
Agents recovered classified and other government documents during the search.
Smith later charged Trump in 2023 with unlawfully retaining classified national-defense information and obstructing efforts to recover government records. Trump pleaded not guilty and repeatedly characterized the prosecution as politically motivated.
The case was dismissed in 2024 by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, who ruled Smith’s appointment violated the Constitution’s Appointments Clause. Smith appealed the ruling but abandoned proceedings against Trump following his 2024 election victory because of Justice Department policy against prosecuting a sitting president.
The newly released records also show agents examining political and campaign activity while pursuing the classified-documents investigation.
Investigators obtained and reviewed a 72-page Federal Election Commission filing from Trump’s Save America political action committee that detailed receipts, donors, expenditures and vendors. The Save America FEC filing released with the records illustrates the financial information available to investigators during the probe.
Agents also monitored social media and examined political endorsements involving potential witnesses.
One Feb. 6, 2023, email concerned former Trump national security adviser Robert O’Brien, who investigators were attempting to interview.
“I’m going through all of it, and it looks like O’Brien is active in endorsing Republican candidates,” a member of the investigative team wrote.
“Can FBI please look at his social media and see if there’s anything of relevance we would want to ask him about? Has he endorsed Trump again? Thanks.”
The email discussing O’Brien’s political endorsements was sent two days before Smith subpoenaed the former national security adviser.
The timing does not by itself establish that O’Brien was subpoenaed because of his political endorsements, but the email shows investigators considered his political activity while discussing how to approach him.
The records are likely to deepen an already heated dispute over the breadth of the investigations directed at Trump and people around him during the 2024 campaign.
Republicans have characterized the collection of congressional, campaign and attorney-related records as evidence that federal law enforcement crossed constitutional and political lines. Smith and his defenders maintain that prosecutors were conducting legitimate criminal investigations authorized through established legal procedures.
The declassified documents now provide a more detailed picture of what investigators collected.
In Wiles’ case, agents were not simply obtaining a historical list of calls after the fact. The memoranda describe analysts repeatedly reviewing pen-register and trap-and-trace information as it arrived, noting individual contacts with lawyers and journalists and examining her communications around her FBI interview.
At the same time, the records reveal that some career FBI personnel had raised concerns months earlier about whether investigators had established sufficient grounds for the extraordinary step of searching a former president’s home.
Those concerns did not stop the search, and they do not establish that the court-authorized warrant was unlawful.
They do, however, show that disagreement existed within the FBI before agents entered Mar-a-Lago — a detail that, together with the Wiles monitoring records, is certain to fuel continued congressional examination of how the classified-documents investigation was conducted.
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