WATCH: Maggie Haberman Says Trump Message to Merrick Garland Was ‘Implicit Threat’ Of Violence Over Mar-a-Lago Raid

New York Times correspondent and CNN analyst Maggie Haberman said that former President Donald Trump‘s back-channel message to Attorney General Merrick Garland was actually an “implicit threat” of violence from supporters over the search of Mar-a-Lago.

A little over a week ago, Haberman was first to report that Trump reached out to AG Garland through his attorneys. That outreach was confirmed by Team Trump in a new court filing challenging the search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort home, which is part of an investigation of Trump for crimes involving the Espionage Act.

On Monday night’s edition of CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360, anchor Anderson Cooper asked Haberman to weigh in on the strategy behind that filing:

COOPER: Maggie, do you have a sense of what the former President’s overall strategy is right now? Because his lawyers included this purported back-channel message to Merrick Garland.

MAGGIE HABERMAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Right, Anderson, this is a Court filing, and I’m not a lawyer, but this Court filing seems to have a lot of public relations elements to it, less a defense strategy, or any kind of a Court strategy, and more about trying to sway public opinion.

It is notable that he referenced that conversation, that an intermediary had with Garland, that is, as Kaitlan said, a classic Donald Trump move where he starts trying to have a negotiation with a prosecutor, but there is also an implicit threat, it seems in what he is saying, which is, well, people are angry, and who knows what will happen.

You know, for all the reasons that were said here, Anderson, his argument, not only is it coming very late, but he is making an argument about privilege that it is hard to see where it applies here.

I think that everything they are doing right now is about basically a time buy which is another classic Donald Trump’s strategy.

Haberman went on to say that Trump’s lawyers “were clearly surprised” and that ” now, they are sort of playing catch up. And Donald Trump, I would note, it is interesting about how late this Court filing has come, however questionable, it might be that privilege because it’s not a lawyer, it is not a law firm.”

“When Michael Cohen’s home and office and hotel room were searched a couple of years ago, in 2018, Trump moved very quickly to file a request for a Special Master and that was one of his lawyers. So, it does suggest they recognize this is not a clear standing issue,” Haberman said.

Watch above via CNN.