Batches of classified documents in President Joe Biden’s possession from his time as vice president were discovered on Nov. 2 and Dec. 20, 2022, and Jan. 12 and Jan. 14 of this year.
On Saturday, the White House revealed that another five pages were found at Biden’s home in Wilmington, Delaware, according to CNN.
He told reporters last week that he “was surprised to learn that there were any government records that were taken there to that office,” the Deseret News reported.
How classified were the documents Biden had?
That is unclear. What we know is the documents did have information related to Ukraine, Iran and the United Kingdom. After Biden completed his vice presidency, the documents should have been sent to the National Archives, as mandated by the Presidential Records Act, per CNN.
Is Biden’s situation different than Donald Trump’s?
The National Archives first contacted former President Donald Trump to obtain some missing documents in May 2021. Initially, Trump refused, but once the Department of Justice had the boxes in possession, they discovered some documents marked classified at the highest level, which were mixed in with random items like news articles and mementos. This prompted further investigation, The Washington Post reported.
Once the FBI obtained a warrant to search Trump’s Mar-a-Lago hotel, the investigation revealed 184 classified documents, 25 of which were marked as top secret.
The reason Trump’s investigation was considered criminal was “only because Trump and his lawyers delayed at first and then obstructed,” Mark S. Zaid, a security violations lawyer, told the Post.
In Biden’s case, when the documents were discovered, Biden handed over all the boxes that might contain documents to investigators, even if the boxes included personal items. He also allowed his staff to search to see if they could find any others, which they did, including some at his personal residence.
White House officials said they did not maintain a record of visitor logs of who has visited Biden’s home, since it is not official government property, The New York Times reported.
“We are confident that a thorough review will show that these documents were inadvertently misplaced, and the president and his lawyers acted promptly upon discovery of this mistake,” Richard Sauber, a White House lawyer, said in a statement, per NPR.
What happens next with the Biden classified document investigation?
Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Robert Hur as special counsel to oversee the DOJ investigation. Hur is a former Justice Department official who “has previously worked on a variety of national security, public corruption and corporate fraud cases,” NPR reported.
More details will likely unfold as the investigation continues.