Former US President Donald Trump also took government documents classified as secret or confidential with him to his private residence following the end of his term in office. The National Archives have also informed the Ministry of Justice regarding the seized documents, said the head of the authority, David Ferriero, in a letter to a parliamentary committee on Friday (local time).
the essentials in brief
- It was recently announced that the National Archives had found 15 boxes of official documents in Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in the state of Florida and taken them to Washington.
Former US President Donald Trump also took government documents classified as secret or confidential with him to his private residence following the end of his term in office. The National Archives have also informed the Ministry of Justice regarding the seized documents, said the head of the authority, David Ferriero, in a letter to a parliamentary committee on Friday (local time).
It was recently announced that the National Archives had found 15 boxes of official documents in Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in the state of Florida and taken them to Washington.
According to Ferriero’s letter to the relevant House Committee, a full cataloging of the material is not expected to be completed until late next week. The documents also include “national security information classified as secret,” said the head of the agency. In the United States, documents and communications from the President must be archived and preserved for posterity.
According to US media reports, letters from North Korean ruler Kim Jong Un and a letter from Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama were also in the boxes. Trump had confirmed the transfer of the boxes to the National Archives. “The papers were handed over without any problems, without conflict and on a very friendly basis,” Trump said last week. Individual US media had reported that Trump had refused to release the material and only gave in following lengthy negotiations.
In the letter to the committee, Ferriero also explained that some Trump officials had conducted government business via social media or messaging platforms, the content of which was not archived. The archive is trying to secure all communication content, he wrote.
The material, which was handed over to the National Archives by the White House following Trump’s term ended, also contained documents torn by the ex-president. Some of them were glued back together by White House staff, while others were handed over in pieces, it said.
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