President Joe Biden Was 'Surprised To Learn' Of Potentially Classified Documents In His Former Office
Jan. 11 2023, Published 1:15 p.m. ET
Months after President Joe Biden’s attorneys stumbled across a series of potentially classified documents detailing his time as Vice President in his former Washington D.C. workspace, the Commander-in-Chief is getting candid about the find.
As news of the documents discovered in the Penn Biden Center first made headlines this week, Biden revealed that he, too, “was surprised to learn there were any government records that were taken there to that office.”
"Let me get rid of the easy one first. People know I take classified documents and classified information seriously,” Biden explained of cooperating with the Justice Department’s review while attending the North American Leaders Summit in Mexico City, Mexico.
Biden, who served as Vice President during ex-POTUS Barack Obama’s two White House terms, then detailed the measures his team took upon encountering the papers while clearing out the office last fall.
"They did what they should have done,” he elaborated, noting that his team “immediately called” the National Archives before handing the documents over to the federal agency.
Though 46 said he “was briefed about this discovery,” he was still unsure over what information appeared in the possibly classified materials.
"I don't know what's in the documents,” Biden explained. “My lawyers have not suggested I ask what documents they were."
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Biden’s special counsel Richard Sauber corroborated these claims, detailing how the President’s attorneys proceeded after finding “a small number of documents with classified markings” inside of a “locked closet.”
“Since that discovery, the President’s personal attorneys have cooperated with the Archives and the Department of Justice in a process to ensure that any Obama-Biden Administration records are appropriately in the possession of the Archives,” Sauber explained, noting that the White House Counsel’s office gave the documents to the National Archives and Records Administration the following day.
Fox News and the Associated Press previously reported on Biden and his team’s reaction to the documents.