(RoyalPatriot.com )- This week, former President Donald Trump defended keeping folders used to store classified documents in a series of rants on Truth Social, claiming that much of what the FBI seized were empty folders.
In a Truth Social post on Tuesday, Trump argued that the classified documents seized during the FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago in August were only empty folders that were marked “confidential” or “classified.”
He insisted that there were no documents inside the folders, claiming that after Oval Office meetings, the papers were “taken back” leaving only the empty folders behind.
The former president claimed that he would keep all of the empty folders stacked in a pile for him to save as “momentous” [sic] (or mementos as the case may be). He argued that there was nothing wrong with keeping the empty folders and suggested that the Justice Department must view empty folders as documents, adding, “They are not!”
Trump initially admitted in January that he held onto empty folders with classified markings because he thought they would make a nice memento of his time in office.
Last Sunday, Timothy Parlatore, who represents the former president in the special counsel investigation into the classified documents, told CNN that all of Trump’s properties had been fully searched, and any classified documents discovered had been turned over “immediately.”
Parlatore also said that Trump’s legal team turned over an empty manilla folder with a classified marking after receiving a subpoena for it. According to Parlotore, the folder was found in Trump’s bedroom where the former president was using it to block the light from his bedside phone because the glowing blue light kept him awake.
When asked why classified records were still being found two years after Trump left office, Parlatore told CNN that fault lies with “an institutional procedural failure” and not with Trump, Mike Pence, or President Biden, all of whom were found to have kept classified documents.
Parlatore suggested that, instead of the Justice Department getting involved, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence should conduct a review of the White House’s current procedures on the handling of classified documents when an administration leaves office.
