Silhouettes of former Vice President Joe Biden (left) and President Donald Trump on the campaign trail.
Reuters
President Joe Biden has rejected efforts by former President Donald Trump to halt an investigation by the Capitol Rebellion Chamber on Jan. 6 into receiving diaries of White House visitors from the day of the attack.
Biden adviser Dana Remus told the National Archives and Records Administration in a letter Tuesday that the president ordered the release of these and other records by the House of Representatives’ election commission.
Trump claimed that the entries – entries in visitors’ diaries showing who was processed to enter the White House complex, including on January 6, 2021 – are protected by executive privilege, a legal doctrine that allows some to be kept. documents of the executive power hidden.
But Biden “decided that the claim to executive privilege was not in the best interests of the United States and was therefore unjustified with respect to these records and parts of records,” Remus told US National Archivist David Ferriero in a letter received. from CNBC.
In a letter to Trump on Wednesday, Ferriero said he planned to submit the controversial documents to the elected committee on March 3, “unless prohibited by a court order.”
A spokesman for the elected committee rejected CNBC’s request for comment.
The New York Times first reported Remus’ letter earlier Wednesday.
Last year, Biden’s White House rejected Trump’s attempt to assert executive privilege over a diverse set of records sought by an elected committee investigating what led a mob of hundreds of Trump supporters to storm the Capitol.
Trump filed a lawsuit and lost in federal district court and the U.S. Court of Appeals to block the release of this tranche of more than 700 pages of White House records.
The Supreme Court last month dismissed Trump’s case; the records were handed over to the commission by the National Archives days later.
In a letter Tuesday, Remus said Ferriero had “asked for President Biden’s opinion on the disclosure of these documents to the elected committee and on the former president’s claims to privileges.”
“President Biden has considered the allegations of the former president, and I have engaged in consultations with the Office of Legal Advisers at the Ministry of Justice,” Remus wrote.
“The president has ruled that upholding executive privilege is not in the best interests of the United States and is therefore not justified in these records and parts of records,” the White House adviser wrote.
She noted that the Biden administration, like former President Barack Obama’s administration, has voluntarily released diaries of White House visitors on a monthly basis as a matter of course. The Trump administration initially refused to disclose all such diaries to visitors, but released many after a lawsuit.
“As practice under this policy shows, maintaining the confidentiality of this type of record is generally not necessary to protect the long-term institutional interests of the executive,” Remus wrote to Ferriero.
“Accordingly, President Biden does not support the former president’s claims about the privilege. He therefore instructs you, in accordance with section 4 (b) of Executive Order 13489, to provide the elected committee with the records and parts of records identified as privileged by a former president, “she wrote.
Biden ordered the archives to hand over the visitor records to the select committee 15 days after notifying Trump.
This is evolving news. Please check again for updates.