The US National Archives Calls Donald Trump's Staff Has Not Restorated White House Records
JAKARTA - The administration of former President Donald Trump has not submitted all presidential records, with the National Archives going to consult with the Department of Justice on whether to move to get it back, the agency told Congress.
A congressional panel on September 13 called for an urgent review by the National Archives and Archives Administration, after agency staff members admitted they did not know if all presidential records from the Trump White House had been submitted.
"While there is no easy way to establish absolute accountability, we know that we have no custody of everything we should have done," the acting Archives Wall said in a letter on Friday to the House of Representatives Supervisory and Reform Committee.
Archives knows some White House staff are doing official business on private electronic messaging accounts that were not copied or forwarded to their official accounts, which violate the Presidential Records Act, Wall said.
"NARA has obtained such records from a number of former officials and will continue to pursue the return of similar types of presidential records from former officials," Wall wrote in a letter first reported by the Wall Street Journal.
He said the Archives, the federal agency in charge of storing government records, would consult with the Justice Department about "whether it would start action for illegally deleted records."
The chairman of the Supervisory Committee, illiteracywainy said in a statement he would do everything in his power to ensure the return of all records and prevent future abuse.
"Former President Trump and his senior staff have shown total waivers to our rule of law and national security, by failing to return presidential records as required by law," komittees shared a copy of the letter with Reuters.
Representatives for Trump have yet to return a request for comment on the matter.
Trump is facing a criminal investigation by the Department of Justice for keeping government records, some of which are flagged as highly classified, including "very secret", on his land in Mar-a-Lago, Florida after leaving office in January 2021.
Meanwhile, the FBI confiscated more than 11,000 records, including about 100 documents marked as confidential, during a court-approved August 8 search of Mar-a-Lago.
The Justice Department and Trump's lawyers were 'involved' in legal battles about how the records were handled. Government lawyers have been granted access to classified documents, but on Friday asked the appeals court to speed up its ability to access undisclosed documents seized in Florida.