Keeping the Matter Quiet

 From The Post Millennial:

The White House reportedly colluded with the Justice Department to hide the fact that Joe Biden had classified documents in his personal possession. According to the Washington Post, "Early on, Biden's attorneys and Justice Department investigators both thought they had a shared understanding about keeping the matter quiet."

"The White House was hoping for a speedy inquiry that would find no intentional mishandling of the documents, planning to disclose the matter only after Justice issued its all-clear. Federal investigators, for their part, typically try to avoid complicating any probe with a media feeding frenzy," the Post reports. After the discovery of the first batch of documents at Biden's office at UPenn in November of last year, "in a communication that has not previously been reported, a senior official in the Justice Department’s national security division wrote a letter to Bob Bauer, Biden’s personal attorney, asking for his cooperation with the department’s inquiry."

The official from the DOJ asked that Biden's attorneys refrain from reviewing the UPenn documents or any that could be found at further locations. The DOJ further asked for permission to review the UPenn documents and they asked for a list of locations where more documents could be found.

The White House adopted a "strategy of caution and derference" after those communications with the DOJ that included keeping quiet about the documents to better "move in coordination with federal investigators." (Read more.)

 

 The difference between Biden and Trump in regard to classified documents. From Victor Davis Hanson at American Greatness:

First, a stranger would face a far greater challenge entering a post-presidential Mar-a-Lago than a pre-presidential Joe Biden’s home, office, or garage—or who knows where?  

Secret service agents and private security were stationed at Mar-a-Lago. Prior to the 2020 presidential election they were not at citizen Biden’s various troves for most of 2017-2020 much less prior to 2009. 

Second, we seem to forget that for much of the developing controversy, Joe Biden’s own team was investigating Joe Biden. 

On the other hand, the Biden Administration’s Justice Department and the FBI were not just investigating Trump as an outside party, but as a former president—and possible 2024 presidential candidate and opponent of Biden himself. 

Remember, the narrative of the first Democratic impeachment of Donald Trump was the allegation that Trump had used his powers of the presidency to investigate Joe Biden and his family, a likely 2020 challenger to Trump’s reelection bid.

Third, no one in a position of government authority had passed judgment on Joe Biden’s alleged security violations. 

That was not the case of the still alleged violations of Donald Trump. 

Joe Biden, as president, had weighed in, during his own Justice Department’s ongoing investigations of Trump. Indeed, he proclaimed the former president to be guilty: “How could anyone be that irresponsible?” In contrast, he also dismissed the ongoing investigation of himself with “There is no there, there.” 

Fourth, Trump is certainly right that as president he had a far more substantial claim of declassification rights than did Biden who took the papers out either as a senator or vice president. 

Fifth, the FBI was not merely asymmetrical in melodramatically raiding the Trump home while allowing Biden lawyers to inspect various Biden stashes. The FBI also leaked the purported contents of the subjects of the Trump classified documents (falsely spreading the lie of “nuclear codes” and “nuclear secrets”) in a way it has not with the Biden cache. 

The FBI went so far as to scatter the documents on the floor for a fake news photo-op as if the papers were so messily arrayed when they arrived. 

So far, the FBI has come lightly and belatedly to the Biden case without the SWAT team get-up, and only under pressure from the public and the Republican opposition. 

Six, Biden did not “self-report.” Biden’s team did not call the relevant government authorities the minute they discovered the classified documents in Biden’s office and home and garage. 

In truth, Biden, or someone close to Biden, certainly knew that he or someone close to him had illegally removed classified documents when he left the vice presidency in 2017—or years earlier as a senator. 

For at least the last six years—at least—Biden has felt no compunction to confess to authorities he illegally was in possession of classified documents. 

Indeed, the only reason the current troves are coming to light was apparent White House paranoia that the media, the Biden Justice Department, and the special counsel were so fixated on the Trump documents that they likely feared someone might raise the logical question of whether a hypocritical Biden himself might be guilty of exactly the crime for which they were pursuing Trump. 

Worse, Biden and his staff knew classified documents were in his possession before the midterms, but deliberately suppressed that information until after the elections were over. 

Seventh, Trump’s documents were stored only at one place—Mar-a-Lago, and only for about 19 months. Biden’s were stashed at various locations for nearly seven years—or perhaps over a decade. There were far more opportunities of time and space for those without security clearances to have access to the Biden documents than to the Trump files. 

Eighth, the press has exhaustively speculated, usually wrongly, about how the documents reached Mar-a-Lago and what they contained. In contrast, no one knows or even asks why Biden took classified documents, what they concerned, or who if any in his family circle had access to them. 

Ninth, Trump’s documents did not expose other liabilities of the constantly investigated Trump. The Biden files so far have directed attention to the mysterious tens of millions of dollars in Communist Chinese money that poured into Biden’s think tank at the University of Pennsylvania, the proximity of members of the quid pro quo Biden consortium to these classified papers, and the files’ relevance, if any, to the Biden family’s overseas businesses. Did Hunter Biden ever consult or view classified documents while living in a home with them? Will there be fingerprint or DNA tests on the documents? If Hunter consulted any of these classified documents, then the Biden presidency is finished. (Read more.)

From Red State:

Among the myriad of questions, one is paramount–and its answer is potentially the most revealing:

Who leaked Biden’s documents and why?

The conspiracy theorist keyboard jockeys — God knows the last thing we need is even more conspiracy loons — have been spinning their theories on social media from the outset, but the question remains: Who hung Biden out to dry and for what purpose? Prior to the leak to the media, only a select group of White House and Justice Department officials knew about the document violation and potential security breach.

As The New York Times reported, the original plot — the plot to hide the scandal in the first place — was initially designed by eight of Biden’s closest confidants, with apparent approval from Merrick Garland’s Justice Department. (I know; try to control your shock and amazement.)

The handful of advisors who were aware of the initial discovery on Nov. 2 — just six days before the critical midterm elections — gambled that without going public, they could convince the DOJ that the matter was little more than a “good-faith mistake,” unlike Donald Trump’s “hoarding of documents at his Florida estate.” (Don’t you just love the NYT’s venomous descriptions of all things Trump?)

However, the plot to hide the scandal was abruptly leaked to CBS News, 68 days after Biden’s personal attorney “discovered” the first batch of classified documents at the Penn Biden Center — funded in part by anonymous Chinese donations. Why did it take so long for the documents to be “uncovered” and ultimately leaked? (Read more.)

Share