The House’s two top watchdogs are concerned the Trump administration is not preserving official documents and correspondence.
In a new twist on worries over President Trump’s twitter account, House Oversight Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, and his Democratic counterpart, Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, said Trump’s use of the social media application could run afoul of federal laws.
“Federal recordkeeping and government transparency laws such as the Presidential Records Act and the Federal Records Act ensure the official business of the federal government is properly preserved and accessible to the American public,” the duo wrote the White House and 55 agencies in a letter made public Thursday.
“Official business must be conducted in such a way as to preserve the official record of actions taken by the federal government and its employees,” they stated, referring to allegations that President Trump and his advisers may be communicating through applications that do not archive messages.
“Many of the messages sent from [President Trump’s Twitter] accounts are likely to be presidential records and therefore must be preserved,” they wrote. “It has been reported, however, that President Trump has deleted tweets, and if those tweets were not archived it could pose a violation of the Presidential Records Act.”
They reminded the Trump administration that the Oversight and Government Reform Committee investigated similar questions about the administration of President George W. Bush and discovered it had illegally destroyed 22 million emails.
Bush officials improperly used Republican National Committee email accounts to discuss official business.
