Friday, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Jim Jordan, opened a fresh investigation into Vice President Joe Biden following accusations that he may have violated federal law by possessing confidential papers from the Obama administration.
In a letter to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, the Ohio Republican stated that such “oversight” was the obligation of his committee and that he expected the Justice Department to assist. The Judiciary inquiry follows an investigation by Rep. James Comer’s Oversight Committee and an investigation by a special counsel appointed by Garland last week.
“On January 12, 2023, you appointed Robert Hur as Special Counsel to investigate these matters,” Jordan and Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) wrote. “The circumstances of this appointment raise fundamental oversight questions that the Committee routinely examines. We expect your complete cooperation with our inquiry.”
#BREAKING: @Jim_Jordan and @RepMikeJohnson launch first investigation into @JoeBiden’s classified documents scandal. pic.twitter.com/sR8E5J2ZTd
— House Judiciary GOP (@JudiciaryGOP) January 13, 2023
Jordan also questioned the timing of the document revelation earlier this month after discovering that the initial batch was discovered at the Penn Biden Center in Washington, D.C. only days before the November elections.
“It is unclear when the Department first came to learn about the existence of these documents, and whether it actively concealed this information from the public on the eve of the 2022 elections,” the two lawmakers wrote.
“It is also unclear what interactions, if any, the Department had with President Biden or his representatives about his mishandling of classified material. The Department’s actions here appear to depart from how it acted in similar circumstances,” the letter continued.
In addition, the chairman criticized Garland for approving an FBI raid on the Mar-a-Lago home of former President Donald Trump to retrieve classified documents the government knew he possessed well in advance, but not approving a similar raid on Biden’s home in Delaware, where additional documents were also discovered.
“In fact, on August 8, 2022, despite the publicly available evidence of President Trump’s voluntary cooperation, you personally approved the decision to seek a warrant for excessive and unprecedented access to his private residence. On August 15, 2022, Committee Republicans wrote to you and FBI Director Christopher Wray requesting documents and information related to the FBI’s raid of President Trump’s residence,” the letter noted.
U.S. Attorney John Lausch Jr. located in Chicago, one of the few holdovers from the Trump administration, has briefed Garland on the continuing investigation into the subject on many occasions. Trump named Lausch as the attorney for the Northern District of Illinois in November 2017.
“The documents were not the subject of any previous request or inquiry by the Archives,” Richard Sauber, special counsel to the White House, said in a Monday statement, according to Fox News. “Since that discovery, the President’s personal attorneys have cooperated with the Archives and the Department of Justice in process to ensure that any Obama-Biden Administration records are appropriately in the possession of the Archives.”
Fox News noted further:
The discovery echoes revelations last year that Trump had housed a trove of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago home after leaving office. The FBI ultimately raided his residence to recover some 300 classified documents.
Trump himself was quick to make the comparison on social media Monday, and a number of other Republicans called for more information about the Biden documents.
“Why didn’t the ‘Justice’ Department announce the Highly Classified documents found in the Biden Office before the Election?” Trump asked on his Truth Social platform.
“Biden’s documents are HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL, many pertain to UKRAINE, where Hunter was ‘raking in the dough,’ and FUNDED BY CHINA, which gave $55 Million to Biden, through Penn, and probably had easy access,” he noted further.
Donald Trump Jr. also asked, “When will the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team storm one of Biden’s many vacation homes bought and paid for somehow by a lifetime of being a humble public servant?”
Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-Texas), who served as White House physician over a portion of the Trump administration, posed same questions.
“It’s just been discovered that Biden had HIGHLY CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS that were improperly stored in one of his private offices. INCREDIBLE! WHERE is the FBI? WHERE is the dramatic raid? We have two systems of justice in this country: one for them and one for us,” he wrote on Truth Social.