The US president and his predecessor are both under investigation over the suspected mishandling of secret documents
A team of federal investigators seized at least a half-dozen additional classified documents and related handwritten notes following a thorough search of President Joe Biden’s residence in Wilmington, Delaware that lasted about 13 hours on Friday, as part of an ongoing probe into suspected mishandling of top secret materials.
According to Biden’s personal lawyer, Bob Bauer, the federal investigators had been granted “full access to the president’s home” in Wilmington and their search “covered all working, living and storage spaces” of the residence.
The FBI search was conducted with consent of the president’s attorneys, according to CNN. A member of the White House counsel’s office, Richard Sauber, said that neither the President nor the First Lady were at the residence at the time.
“DOJ took possession of materials it deemed within the scope of its inquiry, including six items consisting of documents with classification markings and surrounding materials,” Bauer said in a written statement on Saturday. “DOJ also took for further review personally handwritten notes from the vice-presidential years.”
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Saturday’s search marks at least the fourth time officials have found government documents allegedly mishandled by Biden. The first trove was initially found by his aides in November, but the discovery only became public this month. As the controversy unfolded, White House was forced to admit that a follow-up at Biden’s Wilmington residence in December turned up six more documents. Another trove was found on January 12 by Sauber, who traveled to Biden’s home to collect a single page of classified information but instead found “five additional pages with classified markings.”
Attorney General Merrick Garland, an ally of the president, appointed a special counsel to investigate Biden’s handling of the documents earlier this month.
Back in November, Garland appointed a separate special counsel to probe former President Donald Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified files, after an FBI raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in August uncovered “hundreds” of government documents. Trump claims that he declassified the files prior to removing them from the White House in 2021.
Before his own private stashes of confidential files were found, Biden called Trump “totally irresponsible” for the Mar-a-Lago incident.