After secret documents were found in the private homes of US President Joe Biden and his predecessor Donald Trump, secret documents were also discovered on Trump’s former deputy Mike Pence.
An attorney for the former vice president told the National Archives in a letter released Tuesday that a “small number” of documents containing potentially classified information were found at the Republican’s home in Indiana last week.
The files were “accidentally wrapped up” when Pence left office in early 2021. Accordingly, after the discovery of secret documents in Biden’s home in the state of Delaware, Pence had hired a lawyer to check documents at his home in Indiana as a precautionary measure.
According to CNN, a dozen secret files
The news channel CNN spoke of around a dozen suspected secret documents that had been found. The files were therefore handed over to the Federal Police FBI.
The chairman of the US House Oversight Committee, Republican James Comer, said Pence had informed the body about the discovery of classified files in his house and promised “full cooperation”. Information on the content of the discovered documents was not given.
At the beginning of January it became known that around a dozen confidential government documents from his time as Vice President under President Barack Obama had been found in an office formerly used by Biden. Other classified documents were subsequently also discovered in Biden’s garage and at his home in Delaware.
The US Department of Justice then appointed a special prosecutor to investigate the case. The affair is highly explosive for Biden, who wants to decide on a new presidential candidacy in the coming weeks or months – partly because of the parallels to his predecessor Trump.
Special Counsel in the Trump case
FBI agents had already searched Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in the state of Florida last August and confiscated numerous secret documents. In this case, a special prosecutor was appointed in November.
This also examines Trump’s role in the Capitol storming of January 6, 2021. A US law requires presidents and vice presidents to turn over all their emails, letters and other documents to the national archives after leaving office.
Pence served as Vice President of the United States under Trump from 2017 to 2021. The arch-conservative politician and former governor of Indiana is considering running for president in the 2024 election – and could thus become a competitor to his former boss Trump, who announced his renewed candidacy for the presidency in November.
Trump defended Pence on Tuesday after the discovery of the files became known. “Mike Pence is an innocent man,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, a platform he founded. “He never knowingly did anything dishonest in his life. Leave him alone!” (AFP)
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