Biden Mocks Claim That Trump Declassified Documents Sought & Seized By His Corrupt FBI [VIDEO]
WASHINGTON, DC – During a brief interaction with the press earlier in August, Joe Biden mocked the idea that former President Trump had potentially declassified the materials that were seized during the Mar-a-Lago raid from early-August.
Biden was approached by members of the media on August 26th following the release of the heavily redacted Mar-a-Lago affidavit supporting the FBI raid conducted on August 8th, where Biden was asked about his thoughts regarding the materials seized already being declassified by Trump.
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Delivering his brand of smarmy sarcasm, Biden told reporters, “Well I just want [you] to know I’ve declassified everything in the world, I’m president, I can do what I – c’mon. Declassified everything. I’m not going to comment because I don’t know the details. I don’t even want to know, just let the Justice Department take care of it.”
Despite Biden’s laughing off of the notion that Trump may have declassified the materials seized by the FBI during the infamous raid, it is a serious element to the matter at hand.
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In a statement provided to Just The News’ John Solomon earlier in August, Trump’s office asserted that any and all materials that were transported to Mar-a-Lago were officially declassified by him while in office.
“He had a standing order that documents removed from the Oval Office and taken into the residence were deemed to be declassified. The power to classify and declassify documents rests solely with the President of the United States. The idea that some paper-pushing bureaucrat, with classification authority delegated by the President, needs to approve of declassification is absurd.”
A report from FactCheck.org regarding the conundrum of whether the documents seized were or were not classified admitted that a “standing order” of this nature is somewhat of a gray area, noting, “Whether Trump had the authority to have a standing order to declassify documents taken to Mar-a-Lago — overriding the executive orders of past presidents — is an unknown legal question.”
There’s a lively debate between Trump critics and supporters from his administration pertaining to whether Trump abdicated from established procedures on official declassifications.
Glenn Gerstell, former general counsel for the National Security Agency from 2015 to 2020, claimed that the process to declassify documents is “quite detailed,” with the biggest components being whether the materials sought to be declassified bear a warranted public interest and don’t pose a national security threat.
Gerstell claims that from that point, the president would consult the original agency who classified the materials and get their input on whether to declassify certain materials – but Gerstell also admitted that the president holds the ultimate authority at the end of the day regardless of input rendered by agencies who initiated the classification.
However, Gerstell added that if nothing was ever officially recorded on what specific materials were declassified under this “standing order,” no one outside of Trump would have any way of knowing what is and isn’t declassified.
Kash Patel, chief of staff to the acting defense secretary during the Trump administration, stated during an interview on Fox News earlier in August that it doesn’t matter whether Trump did or did not abide by arbitrary procedures on declassifying documents while in office.
“And this is a key fact that most Americans are missing. President Trump, as the sitting president, is the unilateral authority for declassification. He can literally stand over a set of documents and say, ‘These are now declassified,’ and that is done with definitive action immediately.”
Heritage Foundation senior fellow Charles Stimson made similar remarks during an interview on NBC News earlier in August, telling the outlet, “If any president decides to declassify a document and doesn’t tell anybody — but he has made the decision to declassify something — then the document is declassified.”
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