The chair of the powerful House Oversight Committee wants the National Archives and Records Administration (Nara) to determine whether any more records that should have been given to the archives at the end of former president Donald Trump’s term remain missing.
In a letter to Acting Archivist of the United States Debra Wall, Representative Carolyn Maloney raised the possibility that Mr Trump is continuing to harbour stolen government records at properties other than the Florida beach club where he maintains his private residence.
Ms Maloney said the “serious risk” that the ex-president still has “sensitive government records at Mar-a-Lago or his other properties” made it necessary for her to “urge” Ms Wall to “seek a personal certification from Donald Trump that he has surrendered all presidential records that he illegally removed from the White House after leaving office”.
The New York Democrat added that Nara should also “conduct an urgent review of presidential records recovered from the Trump White House” for the purpose of determining whether more records — apart from the 11,000 records recovered from Mr Trump’s Palm Beach home — remain unaccounted for.
“The Committee is concerned that ... Mr Trump may continue to retain presidential records at non-secure locations, including classified material that could endanger our nation’s security and other important records documenting Mr Trump’s activities at the White House,” she wrote.
The letter from Ms Maloney comes just one day after the Department of Justice said it would not oppose one of Mr Trump’s selections for a third-party special master who will review the more than 11,000 documents recovered during the 8 August search of Mar-a-Lago to determine whether any should be protected by attorney-client privilege.
Prosecutors have asked the Florida judge overseeing that case to allow the FBI to make use of 100 documents which bear classified markings so the US intelligence community can continue a damage assessment aimed at determining whether Mr Trump’s retention of classified documents at his club harmed national security.
