The discovery of classified documents at President Joe Biden’s residence in Wilmington, Delaware, and office in Washington, D.C., continues to reverberate on Wednesday.
Newly empowered Republicans are pushing forward with their own congressional probe of Biden’s retention of documents. The White House is blasting them for “faking outrage,” while declining to answer many questions, even after more documents were discovered and Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed a special counsel to investigate.
In other political news, lawmakers continue to squabble as the deadline nears for raising the limit on nation’s debt ceiling. A lawsuit has been filed accusing conservative activist Matt Schlapp of groping a Herschal Walker campaign staffer. And former president Donald Trump has announced plans to hit the campaign trail in South Carolina.
Here’s what’s happening:
- Kevin McCarthy blasts Dems for double standard
- White House accuses Republicans of “faking outrage”
- House Republicans plowing forward with investigations
- Karine Jean-Pierre declines to answer questions
- Go deeper on the docu-drama: Everything all in one place
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Lawsuit accuses conservative activist Matt Schlapp of groping Walker campaign staffer
A staffer for Herschel Walker’s 2022 Republican Senate campaign filed a lawsuit against prominent conservative activist Matt Schlapp on Tuesday, accusing Schlapp of groping him during a car ride in Georgia before the midterm election.
Schlapp denies the allegation, and his lawyer says they are considering a countersuit.
The staffer’s battery and defamation lawsuit was filed in Alexandria Circuit Court in Virginia, where Schlapp lives, and seeks more than $9 million in damages. It accuses Schlapp of “aggressively fondling” the staffer’s “genital area in a sustained fashion” while the staffer was driving Schlapp back to his hotel from a bar in October the day of a Walker campaign event. The allegations were first reported earlier this month by The Daily Beast.
The staffer filed the lawsuit anonymously as “John Doe,” citing his status as an alleged sexual assault victim and fearing backlash from supporters of Schlapp, a longtime adviser to former President Donald Trump and chair of the American Conservative Union, which organizes the Conservative Political Action Conference.
— Associated Press
Trump plans to hit the campaign trail Jan. 28 in Columbia
More than two months after announcing he would again seek the presidency, Donald Trump hits the campaign trail next week with a low-key stop in the early primary state of South Carolina.
It will not be a rally; instead, the former president will travel to Columbia, S.C., to appear with prominent Republican supporters, including Gov. Henry McMaster and Sen. Lindsey Graham.
Trump, who is being blamed by some Republicans for the party’s faltering performance in last year’s elections, will also appear with “members of the South Carolina congressional delegation and state lawmakers as he unveils his South Carolina Leadership Team,” the campaign said in a statement.
As a number of Republicans consider challenging Trump for the Republican nomination, it seems he is eager to show off his support in a state that is again expected to hold an early primary.
South Carolina also just happens to be the home of two potential Trump opponents: Former Gov. Nikki Haley and current U.S. Sen. Tim Scott.
– David Jackson
House Republicans plow ahead with probes of Biden documents
Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, had barely taken the Judiciary Committee gavel from Democrats when he announced the panel’s first investigation would target Biden’s document discoveries.
Jordan fired off a letter Friday to the attorney general asking who knew what and when about the documents at the president’s Delaware residence and office in Washington. He said some were marked “sensitive compartmented information” and kept in an unsecure space, suggesting the mishandling of the most sensitive intelligence information in the U.S. government.
“The American people deserve transparency and accountability from our most-senior executive branch law enforcement officials,” Jordan wrote.
Republicans take over:Biden’s most vocal Republican antagonists emerge from the sidelines – with subpoena power
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., sent a letter Sunday to White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain asking for more information and alleging that Biden’s “mishandling of classified materials raises the issue of whether he has jeopardized our national security.”
White House officials declined to say Tuesday whether they will provide documents sought by House Republicans in their investigation. “We’ve received a few letters from the House Oversight chairman on this issue,” White House counsel spokesperson Ian Sams said. “We’re reviewing those letters. We’ll make a determination about our response in due course.”
— Donovan Slack and Michael Collins
How the GOP got here:The rise of ultra conservatives from Barry Goldwater to Donald Trump
Kevin McCarthy: double standard on Biden and Trump
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Republican investigators are looking into both Biden’s and Trump’s handling of classified documents with a goal of ensuring fair treatment and handling of both cases.
He excoriated Democrats for criticizing former President Donald Trump for retaining classified documents at his Florida home, when it turns out Biden also had some.
“We’ve had all the Democrats attacking — they even have a special counsel, prosecutor, to go after President Trump about this,” McCarthy told reporters Tuesday. “Before the election they found out that President Biden had these documents… At no time did he get raided by the FBI.”
In November, Garland appointed former federal prosecutor Jack Smith special counsel to oversee the Trump document investigation. Federal agents located the documents while executing a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago in August.
The first Biden documents were discovered at a Washington office by the president’s personal lawyers before the election in November – and more than two weeks before Garland announced the appointment of Smith. But it wasn’t until the discovery became public and more Biden documents were found that Garland appointed a different special counsel, Robert Hur, to investigate Biden’s handling of classified documents.
— Donovan Slack
White House blasts Republicans for “faking outrage” on classified documents
The White House accused congressional Republicans of “political theater” and “rampant hypocrisy” for investigating how classified documents ended up in President Joe Biden’s home and former personal office.
“They’re faking outrage even though they defended the former president’s actions,” White House counsel spokesperson Ian Sams said Tuesday, referring to Donald Trump storing classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
Sams also slammed GOP lawmakers for claiming to care about disclosure and transparency “at the same time, for example, that they will not ask their speaker to release the secret deals that he made in order to get support from the far right, extreme MAGA members of his caucus for speaker.”
— Michael Collins
How the GOP got here:The rise of ultra conservatives from Barry Goldwater to Donald Trump
Karine Jean-Pierre declines to answer questions
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre repeatedly declined to answer questions about the Biden document discoveries Tuesday, saying she wanted to allow the Department of Justice to continue its probe without interference.
She referred inquiries to Ian Sams, the White House counsel spokesperson, and to the Justice Department and special prosecutor.
“I’m just not going to go down any rabbit hole here,” she said. “I’m going to be very consistent. I’m going to be very prudent. And, again, I’ve been asked, just asked that question. I’ve answered it. It’s been noted, the question, and we’re just going to move on.”
— Donovan Slack
