United States: the discovery of confidential documents embarrasses the Biden clan

The obviously uneasy White House on Wednesday faced persistent questions over the discovery of classified documents dating back to Joe Biden’s vice presidency, an embarrassing revelation as authorities investigate a similar, but larger-scale, matter involving Donald Trump.

The Democratic president’s administration has so far confirmed that a “small number of confidential documents” — about a dozen — have been found in a “locked cabinet” at Penn Biden Center, a think tank where Joe Biden once had an office. But his aides discovered “at least one more batch” of the documents, NBC News revealed Wednesday, followed by other outlets.

With this new twist, the case should continue to make noise and could prove cumbersome for the investigation of the numerous documents kept by Donald Trump in his Florida residence after his departure from the White House in 2021.

This case is much more serious, since the federal police (FBI) seized thousands of documents during a spectacular search, including a hundred secret defense secrets, which the Republican refused to return. But the discovery remains embarrassing for a president who promotes his ethics.

Commentators say it could also introduce sensitive political considerations into the inquiry into Donald Trump, who has since called for the same attention to be paid to the Democratic president. “When will the FBI raid Joe Biden’s many residences, or even the White House?” he reacted.

The White House argues that if mistakes were made, the administration at least immediately corrected them. As soon as the first documents were found, in late November, the lawyers returned them to the National Archives, which manages this type of file, she defended. Lawyers have also been looking for possible lost documents in other places, the executive added. This could explain the emergence of other papers on Wednesday, which may not be the last.

To defuse allegations of political interference, Attorney General Merrick Garland assigned the case to a Chicago prosecutor appointed during the Trump administration. The inquiry was cited by White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre to justify her refusal to answer reporters’ questions Wednesday. Which wasn’t enough to stop them. “We will be limited in what we can say here,” he told her.

When questioned several times, she referred to Joe Biden’s cautious statement on Tuesday, during which she assured that she was unaware of their contents. “I was informed of this discovery and was surprised to learn that government-related documents had been brought to this office. But I don’t know what’s in the documents,” she said on the sidelines of a summit with the Mexican president and the prime minister of Canada in Mexico City. “People know that I take classified documents and classified information seriously,” she added.