President Joe Biden issued a response to assertions made by former President Donald Trump and his team that he declassified materials that were taken to Mar-a-Lago, which were the apparent subject of an FBI raid earlier this month.
Trump’s team and former aide Kash Patel have said that while president, Trump had a standing order to declassify material that was taken from the Oval Office to Mar-a-Lago.
“He had a standing order that documents removed from the Oval Office and taken into the residence were deemed to be declassified,” Trump’s office told news outlets in a statement issued in mid-August. “The power to classify and declassify documents rests solely with the President of the United States. The idea that some paper-pushing bureaucrat, with classification authority delegated BY THE PRESIDENT, needs to approve of declassification is absurd.”…