Trump looks to block 770 pages of records from Jan. 6 panel: court records

Former President Trump is looking to withhold 770 pages of documents from the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, according to court documents filed by the National Archives.

In a court document filed Saturday, John Laster, who runs the White House Liaison Division at the National Archives, says the former president is looking to withhold a variety of files, including records from senior advisers, schedules, call logs and daily presidential diaries.

The filings came in response to a lawsuit Trump filed earlier this month seeking to block the Jan. 6 panel from obtaining records from his administration.

The panel asked the National Archives in August to turn over a long list of records from the former president’s time in office as well as from the aftermath of the attack.

But Trump is arguing that the committee has not demonstrated a legislative purpose for the documents that would override his assertion of executive privilege.

The White House has said it would not assert executive privilege to block the panel from accessing the records. In a letter to the National Archives on Monday, White House counsel Dana Remus said Trump’s claim of executive privilege is “not justified.”

In his document, Laster lays out three batches of documents that Trump is asserting privilege over.

The first batch of 46 records includes daily presidential diaries, drafts of speeches and remarks, and three handwritten notes from former Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows regarding Jan. 6.

The second batch of records, which contains 656 pages of documents, includes pages of binders containing talking points from former White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany regarding election fraud and the 2020 election. This batch also includes a draft of Trump’s speech for the Save America rally that preceded the riot and a “draft Executive Order on the top of election integrity.”

Additionally, Trump is asserting privilege over a third batch of 68 records, which includes a draft proclamation honoring the Capitol Police and officers Brian Sicknick and Howard Liebengood, who died after the Jan. 6 riot.  

The third batch also contains records relating to a potential lawsuit against states that President Biden won in 2020 and a document concerning the “security of the 2020 presidential election and ordering various actions.”