A federal judge in Florida formally rejected the Justice Department’s plea Monday to keep an affidavit underpinning the Aug. 8 raid at former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate completely private.

In his 13-page ruling, US Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart found that the government had not justified “keeping the entire Affidavit under seal” due to “the intense public and historical interest in an unprecedented search of a former President’s residence.”

Following a hearing last week, Reinhart — who signed off on the initial search warrant of Mar-a-Lago earlier this month — gave the government until noon Thursday to submit proposed redactions to the affidavit.

The Justice Department’s top counterintelligence official, Jay Bratt, had argued that releasing the affidavit in full would “provide a roadmap to the investigation” and allow “amateur sleuths on the internet” to identify key witnesses.

“This is a volatile situation with respect to this search across the political spectrum — but on one side in particular,” Bratt told the judge. “The government is very concerned about the safety of the witnesses in these cases and the impact of all the attention on these witnesses on other witnesses.”

News outlets including all three major TV networks, the Associated Press, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal and CNN had sought to make the affidavit public. The former president himself also called last week for the “immediate release” of the document — though Reinhart noted Monday that Trump’s legal team had not taken a formal position on the affidavit’s unsealing.

Charles Tobin, an attorney representing several media outlets, argued before Reinhart Thursday that “maximum transparency” was imperative in the case, and called the Mar-a-Lago raid “one of the most significant law enforcement events in the nation’s history.”

The outlets asked for a redacted version of the affidavit to be public. However, Bratt had argued earlier that so much of the document’s contents would need to be concealed that “there would be nothing of substance that would remain.”

Reinhart warned of that possibility in his Monday order, writing: “I cannot say at this point that partial redactions will be so extensive that they will result in a meaningless disclosure, but I may ultimately reach that conclusion after hearing further from the Government.”

Federal agents seized 27 boxes from Trump’s estate, including 11 sets of classified documents that were labeled top secret, secret, or confidential, according to an inventory list made public by Reinhart on Aug. 12.

Reinhart had approved the search warrant as part of a federal probe into whether Trump illegally took classified material with him to Mar-a-Lago when he left the White House.

The search warrant authorized the FBI to seize “all physical documents and records constituting evidence, contraband, fruits of crime, or other items illegally possessed” in violation of three federal laws — including the Espionage Act of 1917.

Trump and his attorneys have both claimed he used his power to declassify the now-seized material before leaving the White House.

On Friday, Trump teased on his Truth Social media platform that he would soon file a “major motion pertaining to the Fourth Amendment” in connection with the Mar-a-Lago search. There was no record of any such filing as of Monday.

The Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution protects people against “unreasonable searches and seizures.”

“My rights, together with the rights of all Americans, have been violated at a level rarely seen before in our Country,” Trump wrote. “Remember, they even spied on my campaign. The greatest Witch Hunt in USA history has been going on for six years, with no consequences to the scammers. It should not be allowed to continue!”