This letter comes after numerous reports about Trump’s handling sensitive and classified information while he was president and after his departure from the White House. Federal investigators who are responsible for investigating government secrets may also be interested in the revelation, although the FBI and Justice Department have not stated that they will.
Although federal law prohibits the removal of classified documents from unauthorized locations, Trump may be able to argue that he is the ultimate declassification authority.
It is a legal risk that it poses, but it also exposes him to hypocrisy because of his constant attacks on Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign for her use of an email server private as secretary of state. The FBI conducted an investigation but did not recommend that charges be brought.
Trump denied recent reports that his administration had a tenuous relationship to the National Archives. His lawyers stated that they are still searching for presidential records that belonged to the National Archives.
Trump stated Friday night that while the National Archives didn’t ‘find’ anything but they gave them, upon request, Presidential Records as an ordinary and routine procedure.
He said, “If this were anyone other than Trump, there would not be a story here.”
In a letter to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform in response, the archivists explain how certain social media records weren’t captured and kept by the Trump administration. It also states that agency received information that White House staff often used unofficial messaging accounts as well as personal phones to conduct official business.
These staff didn’t copy or forward official messaging counts as required under the Presidential Records Act. Further, the letter reveals that the National Archives discovered that Trump had transferred additional paper records to the agency after he left the White House.
The letter stated that while some records were taped and recovered by White House staff under the Trump Administration, others that had been transferred have not been reconstructed.
Lawmakers also want to know the contents of the boxes found at Mar-a-Lago, but the agency said that the records act prevents them from disclosing.
Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.), the Oversight Committee chairwoman, stated in a Friday statement that “these new revelations deepen [my concern] about former President Trump’s flagrant disregard of federal records law and its potential impact on our historic record.”
She said, “I am determined to uncover the full extent of the Presidential Records Act violations made by former President Trump’s top advisors and use those findings to advance crucial reforms and prevent future abuses.”
The Washington Post reported first that Trump’s archivist had asked the Justice Department for an investigation into the discovery of 15 boxes of White House documents at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, Palm Beach, Florida. The Washington Post also noted that Trump used to tear up both mundane and sensitive records in his office.
House investigators will investigate whether Trump’s actions during his presidency or afterward violated the Presidential Records Act. This act was created in 1978 by former President Richard Nixon to destroy documents connected to the Watergate scandal.
This law states that the presidential records of the United States government are to be considered the property of the U.S. government and not the president. It is a crime to conceal, or deliberately destroy, government records, and can result in a maximum of three years imprisonment.
