A special prosecutor has been appointed to investigate the handling of classified documents from President Joe Biden’s time as vice president recently discovered at one of his residences and in a private office.
Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the appointment of veteran prosecutor Robert Hur to handle the investigation at a press conference Thursday. Hur will replace John Lausch, the U.S. attorney in Chicago previously assigned to the investigation, to ensure the politically sensitive probe is “indisputably guided only by the facts and the law,” Garland said.
Garland has now appointed special counsels to investigate both Biden and his rival in the 2020 election, former President Donald Trump, over their handling of classified material after leaving office. A high-profile FBI raid seized hundreds of documents from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in August, with war crimes prosecutor Jack Smith appointed to take over that investigation in November.
Biden’s aides first found classified documents while packing up one of his private offices in November, which was revealed for the first time on Tuesday. White House attorney Richard Sauber acknowledged on Thursday that more documents were found in the garage of Biden’s home in Wilmington, Delaware, as well as one classified document “among materials stored in an adjacent room.”
During the press conference, Garland said that Biden’s team reported the second batch of classified documents on Dec. 20. He added that “this morning,” Biden’s lawyers told Lausch “that an additional document bearing classification markings was identified at the president’s personal residence in Wilmington, Delaware.”
Sauber said the additional documents were found after the initial discovery prompted Biden’s lawyers to search other places where files from his vice presidential office might have been shipped. “The lawyers completed that review last night,” Sauber stated.
In his first remarks on the disclosure of the November discovery, Biden said he was “surprised” to learn of it, NBC News reported.
This was a breaking news story. The details were periodically updated as more information became available.
