Scandals
Senator Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat, and chair of Senate Intelligence Committee has criticized President Joe Biden’s continued handling of the classified documents situation.
Between November and January last year, more than 25 classified documents were found at several properties associated with Biden, including at his personal Wilmington, Delaware residence and an attorney’s desk at the Penn Biden Center think-tank in Washington, D.C. After repeatedly asking for them to be turned over, the FBI discovered the documents in the months following the FBI’s August discovery of such documents at the Mar-a-Lago home of former President Donald Trump. These two incidents have brought back the spotlight on sensitive documents and how they’re handled by elected officials.
Robert Hur, the special counsel to the Department of Justice (DOJ), has been appointed by the DOJ to oversee an investigation into Biden’s handling of the documents. A second investigation is being launched by the GOP-controlled House Judiciary Committee. During a Sunday appearance at CBS News’s Face the NationWarner stated that he and other senators from the Senate Judiciary Committee had asked for more information about the documents and expressed frustration with the way the situation was handled.
Warner stated, “We have an obligation of seeing these documents and again making sure that any potential compromise is mitigated.” “We took the first step. I’m not satisfied. We have made that clear and it doesn’t make sense that the special prosecutor’s equities in criminal proceedings somehow preside over our article one responsibility of supervising the intelligence community. That’s what we have made clear.”
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The Senate and House received briefings on the Biden document incident. Warner however stated that the information was “very disappointing.” He stressed that transparency is a bipartisan desire, with both he (and Republican Senator Marco Rubio from Florida) pushing for more information.
Warner said that all Democrats and Republicans on the committee felt the same. “We will also press the Justice Department harder to ensure that we can do our jobs as well.”
Biden and his White House staff insist that they are fully cooperating with investigators in this case. They were asked to inspect his Delaware residence by investigators after initial discovery of sensitive files at Penn Biden Center. However, Republican lawmakers and critics have criticized the president’s alleged mishandling the documents as irresponsible.
Newsweek For comment, we reached out to the White House Press Offices and the DOJ via email.
