House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) said the Biden administration’s criticism of former President Donald Trump keeping classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago residence doesn’t have a leg to stand on after classified documents from the Obama administration surfaced at a Biden-linked think tank.
In defending the former president, Scalise argued that Trump had the authority to declassify documents before he left office but that President Joe Biden did not have that authority as vice president. The discovery of 10 documents at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement in Washington, D.C., triggered a Department of Justice investigation that was announced Monday.
‘LOCK HIM UP’: REPUBLICANS ERUPT AT BIDEN OVER CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS
“When Vice President Biden left office, it looks like he took classified documents with him. And he was very critical of President Trump, by the way, but the only person that has the constitutional ability to declassify any documents is the president of the United States, not the vice president,” Scalise said at a press conference Tuesday.
“So, if then-Vice President Biden took the classified documents with him and held them for years and criticized former President Trump during that same time that he had those classified documents, and only after it was uncovered, did he turn them back?” he continued. “I wonder why the press isn’t asking the same questions of him as a vice president taking classified documents that they were asking President Trump.”
Biden’s lawyers reported the documents after they were discovered on Nov. 2, while Trump’s Florida residence was raided in August to find the documents. News of Biden’s documents wasn’t announced until this week, prompting some to speculate that the news was withheld out of concern for influencing the Nov. 8 midterm elections.
“The discovery of these documents was made by the President’s attorneys,” Richard Sauber, special counsel to the president, said in a statement. “The documents were not the subject of any previous request or inquiry by the Archives.”
Democrats argue that Biden’s response followed the correct protocol.
“This is exactly the way that you should handle this,” Democratic Conference Chairman Pete Aguilar (D-CA) said at a press conference Tuesday. “So, we’re going to support the fact that the president is following this established protocol, that he did the right thing.”
Republicans were quick to target the “double standard” in how Biden keeping classified documents was treated compared to Trump’s situation. Firebrand Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) tweeted, “Joe Biden took classified documents from the White House when he was Vice President. The VP does NOT have the power to declassify, only POTUS. Joe Biden stole classified documents. This is a very serious crime. DOJ & NARA can’t sweep this under the rug AND persecute Trump.”
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Trump himself wondered when the FBI would raid the White House in a Truth Social statement about the discovery.
The White House has said Biden is cooperating with the National Archives and Records Administration, while U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois John Lausch is investigating how the classified documents wound up at the Biden-aligned think tank. Trump’s documents are under the examination of special counsel Jack Smith.
