Democrats Spun Biden’s Classified Docs As ‘Six Items,’ But Special Counsel Report Reveals It Was 300-Plus
Thursday’s bombshell report by Special Counsel Robert Hur concluded that “President Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen.” And though the material concerned “issues of national security and foreign policy implicating sensitive intelligence sources and methods,” and presented “serious risks to national security,” Hur recommended against charging Biden in his 380-plus-page report, saying it would be “difficult to convince a jury” to convict such “a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”
Hur’s damning assessment of Biden’s degenerative mental state launched a media frenzy concerning his fitness for office, prompting the president to angrily condemn the report for including what he called “extraneous” matters in a hastily arranged press conference Thursday evening.
Coming on the heels of Biden claiming he had recently conversed with two long-dead foreign leaders, Hur’s conclusion that the president suffered from a “significantly limited” memory as early as 2017 should lead the country — and the Cabinet — to consider Biden’s fitness for president. But the focus on the passages related to Biden’s mental infirmities has distracted from another huge takeaway from the report: the vast amount of top-secret and classified material Biden had removed, stored in unsecured locations, and communicated to the ghostwriter of his memoirs.
Following the FBI’s surprise raid on Mar-a-Lago, headlines blared that former President Trump had retained “more than 300 classified documents” after leaving the White House. In contrast, when news broke that Biden’s attorneys had alerted the National Archives to the discovery of classified documents in a closet at a Washington, D.C., think tank, the accomplice media repeated claims by Biden’s attorney that “’a small number of documents with classified markings’ were discovered as Biden’s personal attorneys were clearing out the offices of the Penn Biden Center.”
A Biden lawyer would later report finding a few additional classified documents at the President’s Delaware home, prompting the FBI to conduct a 12-plus-hour search of the residence. After the search, Biden’s attorney issued a statement acknowledging the “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.” The DOJ also seized “for further view personally handwritten notes from the vice-presidential years,” Biden’s personal attorney announced at the time.
We now know, though, that the “six items” and the “personally handwritten notes” consisted of hundreds of top secret or classified documents, including notebooks filled with Joe Biden’s summary of classified briefings. A quick count from the special counsel’s appendix reveals the government recovered more than 300 pages of top-secret and classified documents. The FBI also seized a hard drive, but the appendix lacks any details on its contents.
The top-secret and classified documents, as well as many others marked confidential, were discovered at the Penn Biden Center, the University of Delaware, and Biden’s Delaware home, including in his garage. According to the special counsel report, the material included notes from classified briefings that discussed “U.S. intelligence sources, methods … capabilities,” and activities, as well as the activities of foreign intelligence services. Other notes discussed “U.S. military programs and capabilities, foreign military programs and capabilities,” and “plans and capabilities of foreign terrorist organizations.”
The quantity and significance of the recovered material far exceed what Biden’s lawyers and their media accomplices had led Americans to believe — that it was but a few documents inadvertently retained. The special counsel’s report also reveals that Biden knew about at least some of the classified documents as early as 2017, when he told the ghostwriter of his book about discovering them.
Yet when asked about Trump’s retention of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, Biden asked rhetorically how “anyone could be that irresponsible.”
“What data was in there that may compromise sources and methods?” Biden added about the materials Trump retained.
Hur also tried to distinguish Trump’s situation from Biden’s, noting that Trump retained the documents after being asked for them to be returned and then allegedly had them moved. According to Hur’s report, though, Biden knew he had the classified documents as early as 2017 and didn’t try to return them.
Further, as the House Oversight Committee revealed last year, the then-White House Counsel Dana Remus had tasked Joe Biden’s former vice-presidential assistant, Kathy Chung, with retrieving boxes from the Penn Biden Center as early as May 2022. That was a full six months before Biden’s attorney would acknowledge the discovery of the classified documents.
James Comer, chairman of the House Oversight Committee, told The Federalist that this fact and the House’s investigation “unravel the White House’s and President Biden’s personal attorney’s narrative of events.” And even though “Joe Biden willfully retained classified documents for years in unsecure locations and intentionally disclosed them,” he “faces no consequences for his actions.”
“Americans expect equal justice under the law and are dismayed the Justice Department continues to allow Joe Biden to live above it,” Comer added.
This is all true. But there may well be something Americans expect even more and something they refuse to allow Biden to deprive them of — a mentally cognizant commander in chief.
Margot Cleveland is an investigative journalist and legal analyst and serves as The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. Margot’s work has been published at The Wall Street Journal, The American Spectator, the New Criterion (forthcoming), National Review Online, Townhall.com, the Daily Signal, USA Today, and the Detroit Free Press. She is also a regular guest on nationally syndicated radio programs and on Fox News, Fox Business, and Newsmax. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prive—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. Cleveland is also of counsel for the New Civil Liberties Alliance. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland where you can read more about her greatest accomplishments—her dear husband and dear son. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.
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