US Attorney General Merrick Garland announced today (Thursday) the appointment of a special counsel to investigate President Joe Biden’s handling of sensitive government documents. This, after earlier today the White House announced that a second set of classified documents from his time as Lt. President was found at Biden’s home.
Biden continues to get into trouble: a second set of classified documents was found at his home
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Biden addresses the issue of classified documents found in his home (Reuters)
Special counsels are appointed to investigate politically sensitive cases and carry out their responsibilities with a degree of independence from Justice Department leadership, including Garland himself, who was appointed by Biden. Special counsels sometimes, but not always, face criminal charges.
As you may recall, Garland in November appointed a special counsel, Jack Smith, to oversee Justice Department investigations related to Donald Trump, including the former Republican president’s handling of classified documents and efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
An independent counsel, a role similar to that of a special counsel, served during the presidency of Bill Clinton who investigated the Democratic president’s sexual relationship with a White House intern named Monica Lewinsky. This investigation led to Clinton’s impeachment by the House of Representatives, although he was acquitted by the Senate.
Biden, 80, is expected to officially launch a re-election campaign in the coming months, and the revelations about the documents are already raising political concerns for him. The president told reporters Thursday that he would get a chance to talk about “all of this soon,” before reading from a prepared statement that echoed the information the White House released moments earlier.
“As I said earlier this week, people know that I take classified documents, classified material, seriously. I also said that we are fully and completely cooperating with the Justice Department’s audit,” Biden said, explaining that his legal team had found a small number of documents with classified designations in areas Storage and filing cabinets in his personal library at his home in Wilmington. The library is adjacent to his garage, which Biden says is locked.
Richard Sauber, the president’s special counsel, said in a statement Monday that classified materials were discovered in a locked cabinet by Biden’s personal lawyers on Nov. 2 as they packed files at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement.
Officials said Biden’s lawyers discovered less than a dozen classified records inside the office and notified the U.S. National Archives, the agency responsible for preserving government records, turned over the materials and cooperated with the archives and the Justice Department. Biden said he was “surprised to learn that there were any government records taken.” there to this office” and did not know their content.
As you may recall, in Trump’s case, last August, FBI agents conducted a court-authorized search of his mansion in Mar-a-Lago, Florida. About 100 documents marked as classified were among thousands of records seized during the search. Biden in September called his predecessor’s handling of classified documents “absolutely irresponsible.”