FBI raids Mar-a-Lago: A look at history and controversies of Donald Trump’s ‘Winter White House’

The raid on former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida – without precedent in the history of US politics – has sent shockwaves through the country.

Trump, disclosing the search in a lengthy statement, asserted that agents had opened up a safe at his home and described their work as an “unannounced raid” that he likened to “prosecutorial misconduct.”

“These are dark times for our nation, as my beautiful home, Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, is currently under siege, raided, and occupied by a large group of FBI agents,” Trump wrote. “Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States before.”

“After working and cooperating with the relevant government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate,” Trump said in his statement.

But what is Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence? Let’s take a closer look:

Located in Florida’s Palm Beach, Mar-a-Lago is a 20-acre, 128-room private members’ club, resort and national historic landmark owned by Donald Trump.

It is open to membership for the rich, famous as well as those that wish to be near the former US president.

History

Mar-a-Lago, which opened in 1927, was built in the 1920s by cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post (then known as EF Hutton).

“Marjorie Merriweather Post (then Mrs. E.F. Hutton) searched for several years to find a proper location between the ocean and Lake Worth. The quest for a new home had begun when it became apparent that she was to be the dowager queen of Palm Beach,” its website states.

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“At the time, there was little else here but undergrowth and swampy grounds, seemingly of not much use for a building site,” the website notes.

“With her realtor, Post crawled through underbrush of jungle-type growth in search of the perfect piece of property; the consequence of that search is the main house ‘Mar-a-Lago,’ which is Spanish for ‘Sea to Lake.’”

Palm Beach Daily News noted in 2017 that “Mar-a-Lago" is also a play on the lady of the house’s first name.

As per the Palm Beach Post, Marion Sims Wyeth was tasked with building a 58-bedroom Spanish-Moorish-Portuguese-Venetian palace on 17 acres of jungle between the ocean and the Intracoastal.

As per Smithsonian Magazine, Marjorie Merriweather Post went to great lengths to turn the mansion into an official wintertime presidential retreat.

It came up at a time when Palm Beach’s rich and famous were forsaking luxury hotels in favour of their own  digs, Debi Murray, chief curator of the Historical Society of Palm Beach County said.

Construction began in 1923 and kept some 600 workers busy, even though, as Murray notes, “Florida entered the Depression earlier than the rest of the country.”

It was an opulent construction: 58 bedrooms, 33 bathrooms with gold-plated fixtures (easier to clean, Post believed), an 1,800-square-foot living room with 42-foot ceilings.

Its 110,000 square feet glinted with gold leaf, Spanish tiles, Italian marble and Venetian silks.

The cost at the time was estimated at $7 million— over $90 million today adjusted for inflation, as per Smithsonian Magazine.

In January 1969, The Department of the Interior designated the estate as “The Mar-a-Lago National Historic Site.” The property was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972 by an Act of Congress.

Ironically, Post’s plans to handover Mar-a-Lago to the US government as a ‘Winter White House’  wasn’t fulfilled during her lifetime.

As per the website, until her death in 1973, Post used the estate as a haven for many notable dignitaries. After her death, the estate was willed to the Federal Government for use as a diplomatic/presidential retreat.

However, due to maintenance and security concerns, the government conferred the title back to the Post Foundation.

Purchase by Trump

Trump purchased Mar-a-Lago in 1985 for around $10 million and used it as a private residence till 1995.

At the time, it had 33 bathrooms, three bomb shelters and a nine-hole golf course.

Daily News quoted Trump telling Palm Beach Life in 1986: “I thought I was buying a museum.”

“I never thought it was going to be a particularly comfortable place, but I thought it was so incredible as a statement that it would be wonderful to own. The fact is, it has turned out not only to be a museum but a very comfortable home.”

In April of 1995, Mar-a-Lago became The Mar-a-Lago Club.

It was only in 2017, that Mar-a-Lago finally became the ‘Winter White House’ that Post envisioned –90 years after it first came up.

In 2018, Forbes pegged the value of the Mar-a-Lago estate at $160 million.

The membership of the club can cost as much as $200,000 with another $14,000 per year as additional fees, as per Fox News.

Controversies during Trump’s term in office

In January 2017, the then president-elect tweeted a photograph of himself seated behind a large desk, legal pad and pen in hand with the caption: “Writing my inaugural address at the Winter White House, Mar-a-Lago.”

Trump, during his time in office, would often visit his private club and golf resort –  at an eye-watering tag to the taxpayer.

The Government Accountability Office estimated a $1 million expense each day Trump spent at his club.

Mar-a-Lago was also at the centre of a furore in 2017 when Trump played host to former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe.

A House panel had asked the White House to explain reports that then president Trump dealt with a sensitive foreign policy issue in view of club guests.

Representative Jason Chaffetz, then head of the House of Representatives oversight committee, sent a letter asking the White House for details on how Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe responded to a North Korean ballistic missile test while visiting Mar-a-Lago.

Photos taken by private guests in the club’s public dining area showed Trump and Abe conferring and looking at documents while surrounded by their aides following Pyongyang’s missile launch.

“Reports and social media accounts have suggested White House staff used their own cell phones to provide illumination for reviewing documents,” Chaffetz said in a letter to then White House chief of staff Reince Priebus.

“Separately, one Mar-a-Lago guest posted to his Facebook page a photograph with a man described to be the holder of the ’nuclear football,’’ he added.

Trump after leaving office

Trump moved permanently to Mar-a-Lago in the aftermath of his defeat in the 2020 US presidential election to Joe Biden.

While the move made perfect sense for Trump – a golf fanatic who loves nothing more than to be surrounded by a legion of admiring and applauding fans – his neighbours in Florida were less than happy.

In December 2020, after it became clear Trump had lost the election and was preparing a move to Florida (where he’d already declared residency), his neighbours sent a letter to the Secret Service and town officials citing a 1993 agreement that stated he did not have the right to live at Mar-a-Lago ‘full time’.

A Trump Organization spokesman said at the time “There is no document or agreement in place that prohibits president Trump from using Mar-a-Lago as his residence.”

Mar-a-Lago has now become something of a destination for GOP lawmakers such as Kevin McCarthy and Marjorie Taylor Greene and conservative personalities such as Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson to visit and pay homage to the GOP king (and possible 2024 kingmaker) by kissing his ring.

With inputs from agencies

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