The National Archives and Records Administration quietly removed multiple boxes from former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago offices a few months ago, according to new reports.
The Drudge Report, a popular news aggregation website that often criticizes Trump supporters, called it a raid.
The removal of the boxes was related to the Presidential Records Act, a law that requires many presidential memos, letters, emails, and other communications be preserved by the National Archives.
Advisers to Trump told the Stamford Advocate the documents seized by the National Archives were small gifts, letters, and other mementos from Trump’s first term. Included was a note from former President Barack Obama and letters from world leaders like North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.
Trump’s advisers had discussed with the National Archive what had to be returned in December.
Every recent administration has had at least some Presidential Records Act violations such as not including some emails and phone call documentation — which means the National Archive’s removal of the documents isn’t considered extraordinary.
“I don’t think he did this out of malicious intent to avoid complying with the Presidential Records Act,” a former Trump White House official told the Advocate.
“As long as he’s been in business, he’s been very transactional and it was probably his longtime practice and I don’t think his habits changed when he got to the White House.”
President Joe Biden’s National Archives last made headlines when it provided a House committee with more than 700 pages of presidential documents after the Supreme Court rejected a bid by Trump to block the release to the Democrat-led House panel investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.
The Supreme Court ruled that the archives could turn over the documents, which include presidential diaries, visitor logs, speech drafts, and handwritten notes dealing with Jan. 6 from the files of former chief of staff Mark Meadows.
Trump’s lawyers had hoped to keep the documents on hold. As the sitting president, Biden approved the release of most of the records. The White House did ask the panel to defer some of its requests, citing national security and executive privilege concerns designed to protect the office of the presidency.
The Horn editorial team