The National Archives and Records Administration says it is still missing records from former President Donald Trump’s White House that were supposed to be turned over at the end of his term.
The agency’s admission came in a letter dated Friday, but released Saturday, from NARA Archivist Debra Steidel Wall to the House Oversight and Reform Committee’s chairwoman, Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY). Maloney had written to the National Archives in September to ask about presidential records that remain unaccounted for after the August raid of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, which produced scores of documents but raised the question of if other materials were still missing.
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“While there is no easy way to establish absolute accountability, we do know that we do not have custody of everything we should,” Steidel Wall said, going on to reference official Trump administration business that was conducted “using non-official electronic messaging accounts that were not copied or forwarded into their official electronic messaging accounts.”
The immediate staff of the president and vice president, as well as anyone who advises the president, are required under the Presidential Records Act to submit communications relating to official duties to the National Archives.
Steidel Wall said NARA has successfully retrieved some of those materials, though not all, before revealing that NARA would involve the Justice Department in certain circumstances.
“NARA has been able to obtain such records from a number of former officials and will continue to pursue the return of similar types of Presidential records from former officials,” the archivist wrote. “As appropriate, NARA would consult with the Department of Justice on whether ‘to initiate an action for the recovery of records unlawfully removed,’ as established under the Federal Records Act.”
It is not clear if Steidel Wall is referring to former Trump adviser Peter Navarro, who has refused to turn over materials from his unofficial account without legal immunity and is being sued by the Justice Department for the messages, or referring to others who are not yet known to have withheld documents.
With the help of the Justice Department and FBI, NARA has recovered hundreds of presidential records from Trump’s Palm Beach, Florida, golf club over the last year, including dozens of classified documents. Officials visited the Florida estate multiple times this year, once in January and once for the unprecedented search in August that Trump revealed to the public. Those federal authorities have defended the search, arguing it was necessary to retrieve the materials for national security purposes.
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Trump has not been charged related to the matter, though the DOJ’s investigation into his handling of White House documents continues. He has denied any wrongdoing, arguing that the files he possessed were “all declassified.”
Nevertheless, not all of his legal allies agree that his behavior was safe from scrutiny, including famed constitutional attorney Alan Dershowitz, who defended Trump in his first impeachment hearings, and former Attorney General William Barr, who fell out with Trump when he refused to participate in his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
