Republican lawmakers condemn ‘hypocrisy’ in Biden, Trump classified document cases

Republican House members have accused US authorities of “hypocrisy” when it comes to the handling of classified documents by President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump after leaving office.

Biden's legal team acknowledged this week that it had found classified documents relating to his time as vice president in the Obama administration at Biden’s Wilmington, Delaware, residence, including some in his garage.

Aides previously found another batch of classified documents at his residence and at a Washington think tank he was associated with.

US Attorney General Merrick Garland named a special counsel on Thursday to probe the matter, just as was done after an FBI search last summer uncovered hundreds of classified documents at former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence.

Representative James Comer (R-Ky.) the newly appointed chairman of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, on Sunday, called Biden’s Delaware residence a “crime scene.”

“My concern is that the special counsel was called for, but yet hours after that we still had the president’s personal attorneys, who have no security clearance, still rummaging around the president’s residence, looking for things — I mean that would essentially be a crime scene, so to speak, after the appointment of a special counsel,” Comer told CNN.

Republicans have criticized the response of US authorities to the discovery, calling it hypocritical that Trump’s home was “raided” for the documents when Biden’s was not.

“Joe Biden used as his closing argument during the midterm elections that Republicans were a threat to democracy. And he cited the fact that President Trump mishandled the documents. While he was doing this, he knew very well that he himself had possession of classified documents,” Comer said.

“So the hypocrisy here is great. We’re very concerned about a lack of transparency. We’re very concerned, as I have said many times, about a two-tiered system of justice in America. And we just want equal treatment. And, hopefully, we will get some answers very soon,” he added.

Biden’s team reportedly turned over the documents to the National Archives upon finding them.

Comer called for visitor logs from the Delaware residence. 

“So you know, we have a lot of questions for the National Archives. We have a lot of questions for the Department of Justice, and hopefully, we’ll be getting some answers very soon,” Comer said. 

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said the US government’s response to the handling of classified documents by Biden and Trump “just shows the hypocrisy and why the American public does not trust their government.”

MG