Democrat Ilhan Omar is among the progressive Democrats calling for an investigation into president Joe Biden’s alleged mishandling of classified documents.
Last week attorney general Merrick Garland appointed a special counsel to investigate the discovery of the classified papers.
Appearing on MSNBC’s Symone, Ms Omar said to host Symone Sanders-Townsend that she believes Mr Biden should face an investigation into the documents.
“I’m glad that there is a special prosecutor that’s been appointed,” Ms Omar said.
On Saturday, White House lawyer Richard Sauber said a total of six pages of classified documents were found from Mr Biden’s time serving as vice president in the Obama administration during a search of Mr Biden’s private library. The White House had said previously that only a single page was found there.
The latest disclosure was in addition to the discovery of documents found in December in Biden’s garage and in November at his former offices at the Penn Biden Center in Washington.
“Anytime there is a deviance in regards to security protocols, that should be taken serious. That should be investigated,” the Democratic lawmaker from Minnesota tld MSNBC.
While Democrats have found themselves in a sticky situation with the discovery of the documents, they have lauded the president for cooperating with prosecutors.
“I think President Biden has handled this correctly. He’s fully cooperated with the prosecutors. When the documents were found, he notified [the National Archives],” Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, was quoted as saying by Newsweek.
“It’s a total contrast to President Trump, who stonewalled for a whole year.”
While Mr Biden has been complying with the investigation into the handling of his documents, Mr Trump’s home was raided by the FBI last August after he refused to comply with a subpoena ordering the return of any materials he removed from the White House at the end of his term in office.
California representative Adam Schiff said to Jon Karl of ABC News that he welcomed the probe.
“We have asked for an assessment in the intelligence community of the Mar-a-Lago documents. I think we ought to get that same assessment of the documents found in the think tank, as well as the home of President Biden.”
Representative Matt Cartwright, a Pennsylvania Democrat, said during a Fox News appearance last week that the two incidents call for introspection.
“It’s clear, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that we’ve got to review how departing presidents and vice presidents are going about organising the archiving of their documents, both classified and unclassified. Because this can’t go on,” he said.
