House Judiciary Committee launches probe into Biden’s handling of documents

The House Judiciary Committee is spearheading an investigation into the discovery of classified documents at President Biden’s home and office, less than two weeks after Republicans took control of the lower chamber.

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the chairman of the panel, and Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) penned a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland on Friday announcing the probe and requesting documents. The communication came one day after Garland named a special counsel to look into the potential mishandling of classified materials.

“We are conducting oversight of the Justice Department’s actions with respect to former Vice President Biden’s mishandling of classified documents, including the apparently unauthorized possession of classified material at a Washington, D.C. private office and in the garage of his Wilmington, Delaware residence,” the letter reads.

The Republican duo said Garland’s decision to appoint a special counsel raises “fundamental oversight questions that the Committee routinely examines.”

“We expect your complete cooperation with our inquiry,” they added.

The White House announced on Monday that Biden’s attorneys discovered documents at an office at a University of Pennsylvania building in Washington in November. Biden had used the room as an office from 2017 to 2019, when he was an honorary professor at the college.

Days later, the White House said a second batch of documents had been found at Biden’s residence in Wilmington, Del. The president’s attorneys found all but one of the documents in storage space in the garage.

The discoveries prompted Garland on Thursday to appoint Robert Hur, a Trump appointee who previously served as U.S. attorney in Maryland, to serve as special counsel and investigate the matter.

Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), the chairman of the House Oversight Committee, requested information from the National Archives and Records Administration and the White House Counsel’s Office regarding the discovery of classified documents from Biden’s time as vice president.

Jordan and the Judiciary Committee are now launching their own investigation, requesting that Garland produce documents and communications relating to the appointment of Hur as special counsel and Biden’s mishandling of classified materials, among other subjects. They also want documents and communications between the Justice Department, FBI and Executive Office of the President.

The committee requested the materials be sent by Jan. 27.

The letter zeroed in on concerns that it took the White House two months to announce the discovery of documents. Biden’s lawyers alerted the National Archives the day they found the materials in November — days before the midterm elections — and the agency then retrieved the materials the next day. The second batch of documents were found in Wilmington on Dec. 20 in a review that ended on Wednesday night.

Garland said the Justice Department learned about the documents found in Wilmington on Dec. 20. The White House, however, first alerted the public of the discoveries this week. 

“It is unclear when the Department first came to learn about the existence of these documents, and whether it actively concealed this information from the public on the eve of the 2022 elections,” Jordan and Johnson wrote. “It is also unclear what interactions, if any, the Department had with President Biden or his representatives about his mishandling of classified material.”

The Republicans went on to juxtapose the Justice Department’s handling of the Biden documents with how it dealt with classified materials found at former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence — which involved a search warrant being executed at the Florida location.

In the Trump case, however, authorities raided Mar-a-Lago after several attempts to recover classified materials that they believed to be at the residence.