Biden rejects Trump’s claim of privilege for White House visitor logs
Biden-Trump
President Joe Biden ordered the National Archives to hand over a range of visitor logs from the Trump White House to the House committee investigating the January6 attack on the Capitol, rejecting his predecessor’s claim that the material is protected by executive privilege.
The decision boosts the committee’s efforts to gather information about who was coming and going from the White House not just on the day of the attack last year but also in the months preceding it as President Donald Trump sought to overturn the election.
Biden had similarly decided last year not to support Trump’s claim of executive privilege over other batches of White House documents and records sought by the committee. Trump went to federal court to block the release of those earlier batches but lost.
In a letter sent Tuesday to the National Archives, Biden’s White House counsel, Dana Remus, said Biden had rejected Trump’s claims that the visitor logs were subject to executive privilege and that “in light of the urgency” of the committee’s work, the agency should provide the material to the committee within 15 days.
The archivist of the United States, David Ferriero, said in a letter to Trump on Wednesday that unless prohibited by a court, the National Archives would hand over the logs to the committee March 3.
Trump did not respond publicly, and it is not clear whether he might go to court again to try to delay or block the release of the logs.
Remus told the National Archives that the documents needed to be disclosed in a timely fashion because “Congress has a compelling need.”
Last year, the committee asked for a range of documents that could include visitor log information on more than a dozen Trump confidants who could have visited the White House between April 2020 and when Trump left office January20, 2021. Among those confidants were figures like Trump’s former national security adviser, Michael Flynn; Trump’s longtime adviser Roger Stone; and the head of the Proud Boys, Enrique Tarrio.
In her letter, Remus declined to say what specific materials were being handed over, only revealing that the records in this case “are entries in visitor logs showing appointment information for individuals who were processed to enter the White House complex, including on January6, 2021.”