The raid by the FBI on President Trump’s home at Mar-a-Lago suggests, at least to us, that the case against him is moving into a new, possibly criminal phase — one in which the law really will require that the former president be presumed innocent. And where due process really is going to be paramount — in contrast to, say, the spectacle of the January 6 committee, a political tribunal seeking to block Mr. Trump from returning to elected office.

In drawing that distinction, we don’t mean to suggest that the raid on the former president’s compound is improper, even if Mr. Trump himself is suggesting so in the strongest possible terms. “After working and cooperating with the relevant Government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was not necessary or appropriate,” Mr. Trump said in a statement issued on his Truth Social platform.

“It is,” Mr. Trump went on to say, “prosecutorial misconduct, the weaponization of the Justice System, and an attack by Radical Left Democrats who desperately don’t want me to run for President in 2024, especially based on recent polls, and who will likewise do anything to stop Republicans and Conservatives in the upcoming Midterm Elections.” He suggested that his “political persecution” has been “going on for years.”

It’s striking that the former president sees an analogy between his predicament and that of his opponent in 2016, Secretary Clinton. For both, questions over the handling of official documents led to the involvement of the Justice Department. “Hillary Clinton was allowed to delete and acid wash 33,000 E-mails AFTER they were subpoenaed by Congress,” Mr. Trump rumbled. “Absolutely nothing has happened to hold her accountable.”

Yet Mrs. Clinton contends it was the questions over the handling of her e-mails, and the disclosure of an investigation by the FBI director, James Comey, that cost her the election that year. “I was on the way to winning,” she recently said in an interview with the Financial Times, until “Jim Comey’s letter on October 28 and Russian Wikileaks raised doubts in the minds of people who were inclined to vote for me but got scared off.” 

At the time, Democrats were quick to denounce Mr. Comey and the FBI for what they considered a politically motivated investigation and even election interference. It’s no wonder Mr. Trump was reminded of Mrs. Clinton’s debacle now, at a time when the Justice Department — and other bodies — are once again mounting an investigation of a major party presidential candidate.

Plus, too, the former general counsel to Mrs. Clinton’s 2016 campaign, Marc Elias, suggested on Twitter yesterday that if Mr. Trump is found to have damaged or destroyed federal records, he could be disqualified for the presidency by dint of an obscure provision of the United States Code. It occurs in Title 18, Section 2071, which says such records destroyers “shall be disqualified from holding any office under the United States.” 

Another lawyer — Harry Litman, a U.S. attorney under President Clinton — suggested Mr. Elias’s “HUGE POINT” could end up being “the whole enchilada.” Mr. Elias, though, wisely walked back his remarks, acknowledging “the legal challenge that application of this law to a president would garner.” Qualifications for the presidency are, after all, enumerated in the Constitution and, precedent suggests, can’t be tightened or loosened by Congress.

So the comments are fueling outrage among Republicans — understandable, given the Democrats’ record — that “the raid was,” to quote the Examiner, part of a “move meant to ward off another presidential run.” We favor a robust enforcement of the law limited by the constraints of the Constitution. We favor a strict adherence to due process as the right way to prevent political prosecutors from seizing a decision that belongs to the American people.