washington –
President Joe Biden’s legal team has discovered additional documents containing classification marks, a person familiar with the matter told The Associated Press on Wednesday. The disclosure comes days after a lawyer for the president said Biden’s lawyers had discovered a “small number” of classified documents in his former Washington office.
Earlier this week, the White House confirmed that the Justice Department was reviewing “a small number of classified documents” found in the office. Biden’s lawyers discovered the documents in the offices of the Penn Biden Center and then immediately called the National Archives about the discovery, the White House said. Biden maintained an office there from when he stepped down as vice president in 2017 until shortly before launching his 2019 Democratic presidential campaign.
The person who spoke to the AP on Wednesday said the president’s legal team found additional classified material in a second place. The person was not authorized to publicly discuss the details of the sensitive matter and spoke on condition of anonymity. The person did not say when or where the material was found or specific details about the classification level of the documents.
The revelation that Biden’s lawyers discovered additional classified documents came hours after White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre evaded questions about Biden’s handling of classified information and management of the discovery. by the west wing. She said the White House was committed to handling the matter in the “right way,” pointing to immediate notification of the national files by Biden’s personal lawyers.
But he declined to say when Biden himself was informed, whether there were more classified documents potentially located in other unauthorized locations and why the White House waited more than two months to disclose the discovery of the initial batch of documents, which found 2 of November, days before the midterm elections.
“As my colleagues on the Board have stated and told all of you yesterday, this is an ongoing process under review by the Department of Justice. Therefore, we are going to be limited in what we can say here,” said Jean-Pierre. .
The White House and the Justice Department declined to comment Wednesday on the reports of the second set of classified records. It was first reported by NBC News.
The Justice Department is reviewing records found at the Penn Biden Center and Attorney General Merrick Garland has asked John Lausch, the US attorney in Chicago, to look into the matter, another person familiar with the matter told the AP this week. . That person was also not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.
Lausch is one of the few US prosecutors retained from the administration of former President Donald Trump.
Regardless of the Justice Department’s review, the revelation that Biden potentially mishandled classified or presidential records could prove a political headache for the president, who called Trump’s decision to keep hundreds of those records “irresponsible.” his private club in Florida.
Biden has said he was “shocked to learn that there are government records that were taken there to that office,” but his lawyers “did what they should have done” when they immediately called the National Archives.
The top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee has called for the US intelligence community to conduct a “damage assessment” of potentially classified documents.
The revelation may also complicate the Justice Department’s consideration of bringing charges against Trump, a Republican who is trying to recapture the White House in 2024 and has repeatedly claimed that the department’s investigation into his own conduct amounted to “corruption.”
There are significant differences between the Trump and Biden situations, including the severity of an ongoing grand jury investigation into the Mar-a-Lago affair.