The average American has very little idea of what the word “classified” actually means. Most seem to think it indicates that a paper or idea listed as “classified” simply means “very private” or “for the listed parties only.” I doubt they have much concept of the importance of governmental and business information, or why something would be considered classified or confidential.
The news is rife today with media reports about how classified papers were found at Biden’s office from 2017. “His personal lawyers found the classified material while packing files in a locked closet at an office that Mr. Biden used beginning in 2017. After the discovery, the National Archives was notified the same day, and the papers were handed over the following morning. Some of the documents were designated as ‘sensitive compartmented information,’ which means they were classified above Top Secret (Biden’s Classified Document Stash).”
As pointed out by the Wall Street Journal in the above article, this is rather poor timing for Biden, as well as being somewhat comical. It puts the Left into a rather uncomfortable position, where they are forced to either push forward with charges against Biden, or walk away from the current press against Trump for his own papers held past his tenure as President.
There are differences between Trump and Biden’s cases, however, and they’re not small. I’m sure someone with a better grasp of the political system will do a more involved discussion of the details, but let’s look at some basics.
The Democrats and the Left are currently downplaying Biden’s role in holding onto the papers. The story currently being pushed is that Biden’s lawyers discovered the papers, ones that Biden didn’t even know about, and that they immediately handed them over to the National Archives (How the Discovery of Classified Files in Biden’s Office Compares With the Trump Case). Trump, as we all know, hid the papers, fought returning them, and impeded investigations into his holding onto the papers in question.
What the Dems and the Left are leaving out is more interesting to me. Whatever your personal feelings are on Trump holding onto classified documents and fighting their return, he had a right to see and hold them. As President, and as a former President, it is entirely legal and permissible for him to read them, have them, and hold onto them. Those rights are outlined in the Presidential Records Act.
Vice Presidents are not covered by the PRA. Biden did not, at any time prior to being named President himself, have any right to see, hold, or keep those documents. His being President now does not give him retroactive permission to have the papers in question, either.
The Left’s argument is that Trump was hiding “vast numbers” of papers, whereas Biden was only guilty of holding onto a few. Trump didn’t want to return his papers, and Biden’s people reported it immediately. Those differences are what the Left want you to see (Biden classified docs vs. Trump classified docs: What’s the difference?).
The problem is quality versus quantity, however. The files that were found in Biden’s old storage closet were ones from the Obama Presidency, files he should never have had. Sources (unnamed, see the articles linked below) say that they had to do with the Ukraine and were not all that important.
The question not being asked by the Left is, why did Biden have classified files about the Ukraine? On its own, it doesn’t feel like much. When you bring in the very real possibility that Biden’s son was involved at that time with the Ukraine, and the events surrounding Hunter Biden’s laptop information, it suddenly makes much more sense.
It points to a rather nepotistic abuse of power.
That abuse of power is vastly different than the boxes of papers Trump didn’t feel like returning to the National Archives. But no one on the Left wants to talk about that. In fact, if you bring it up, if you talk about how Biden should be treated the same way Trump was, there’s a sudden lull in conversation. It’s not the same, you’re told.
They’re correct. It’s not the same. I see no evidence that Trump was doing anything nefarious with the boxes of papers he had. While I wish he’d just returned them to the National Archives, I can easily put that off as his personal pig-headdedness. Biden, on the other hand, should never have had access to those papers to begin with. Now that is something that everyone ought to be investigating.
Heuristic Hagar
As the federal judge said when klinton had those classified audio tapes-“ what the president decides to call unclassified and keep is up to him”(yes loosely quoting)… however, finding classified stuff in a vp office whether returned “right away” is a whole nuther thing.. I bet zip happens to ol pedojoe…
Don’t forget the fbi files on repubelicans found in Hildacunts possession.
and they’ve apparently found a second cache of papers in another forgotten location.
Sources (unnamed, see the articles linked below) say that they had to do with the Ukraine and were not all that important.
Does everyone forget Biden strong-arming the Ukrainian government into stopping an investigation into Hunter’s “business” connections? And Zelensky talking to Trump about sharing what records still exist?
These papers were either about Hunter’s dealings, and in Biden’s possession to hide them, or leverage over the Ukrainian government to keep them from exposing those dealings.
In the end Trump had ever right to keep them, legally speaking, if he acted to declassify them and when the same federal overreach wasn’t done for Obama and Clinton it was hard for me to do more than grunt in acknowledgement. He wanted to make a spectacle of the thing, as is his personality, and so he did. I am still not sure if it was a good thing but it exposed more of the pettiness of bureaucrats corruption of federal agents so….thats something?
Vice President Biden had SCI files and in a just world it would be investigated whether or not he was read in, who read him in and granted him access, and why. In my few jaunts with classified documents they were expected to be viewed on site or if authorized to be taken kept under a strict chain of custody and returned promptly when the assignment was done.
I’m not going to go into more detail on this one, only because I feel like my response is mostly going to be “nodnod, yep”. However…
Some of you are name calling. Now, you’re entirely allowed to do that. But I will say that I, as a thinking, educated, intelligent woman, tend to look at people who resort to name calling and write off their response. People who get to the point of name calling generally have lost control of whatever argument they’re in, and are verbally “throwing spaghetti at a wall to see what sticks”, and have lost control of themselves.
I realize that this is y’all’s safe space, and you’ll say what you say. I’m not interested in forcing you to change. I just thought you should know that I generally won’t reply to people who use name calling. And that I apply this 100% equally. I don’t respond to people who use the nasty nicknames for Pres. Trump, either.