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FBI: New classified docs found in Pence home

The FBI recovered one additional government page with classified markings during a consensual search on Friday at the Indianapolis residence of former Vice President Mike Pence, after classified documents were discovered at his house last month, a Pence spokesman said. The search, confirmed earlier in the day by a Justice Department official, came after Pence’s attorney Greg Jacobs notified the National Archives in a Jan. 18 letter about the discovery of records with classified markings. The records were then turned over to the FBI. The Associated Press has the story:

FBI: New classified docs found in Pence home

Newslooks- WASHINGTON (AP)

The FBI discovered an additional document with classified markings at former Vice President Mike Pence ’s Indiana home during a search Friday, following the discovery by his lawyers last month of sensitive government documents there.

Pence adviser Devin O’Malley said the Department of Justice completed “a thorough and unrestricted search of five hours” and removed “one document with classified markings and six additional pages without such markings that were not discovered in the initial review by the vice president’s counsel.”

The search, described as consensual after negotiations between Pence’s representatives and the Justice Department, comes after he was subpoenaed in a separate investigation into efforts by former President Donald Trump to overturn the 2020 election and as Pence contemplates a Republican bid for the White House in 2024.

Police secure the entrance to the neighborhood of former Vice President Mike Pence’s Indiana home, Friday, Feb. 10, 2023 in Carmel, Ind. The FBI is searching former Vice President Mike Pence’s Indiana home as part of a classified records probe. That’s according to two people familiar with the search who were not authorized to discuss it and spoke on condition of anonymity. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy)

Pence is now the third current or former top U.S. official, joining Trump and President Joe Biden, to have their homes scoured by FBI agents for classified records. The willingness of Pence and Biden to permit the FBI to search their homes, and to present themselves as fully cooperative, reflects a desire by both to avoid the drama that enveloped Trump last year and resulted in the Justice Department having to get a warrant to inspect his Florida property.

Police blocked the road outside Pence’s neighborhood in Carmel, just north of Indianapolis, on Friday afternoon as the FBI was inside the home. They were seen leaving shortly after 2 p.m. Pence and his wife were out of state, visiting family on the West Coast following the birth of their second and third grandchildren.

Police secure the entrance to the neighborhood of former Vice President Mike Pence’s Indiana home, Friday, Feb. 10, 2023 in Carmel, Ind. The FBI is searching Pence’s home as part of a classified records probe. That’s according to a person familiar with the search who was not authorized to discuss it and spoke on condition of anonymity. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy)

A member of Pence’s legal team was at the home during the search and the FBI was given what was described as unrestricted access to search for documents with classified markings, documents that could be classified but without markings and any other documents subject to the Presidential Records Act.

O’Malley said Pence has directed his legal team to continue to cooperate with the DOJ and “to be fully transparent through the conclusion of this matter.”

The FBI had already taken possession of what Pence’s lawyer previously described as a “small number of documents” that had been “inadvertently boxed and transported” to Pence’s Indiana home at the end of the Trump administration.

The Justice Department did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

FILE – U.S. Secret Service agents are seen in front of Joe Biden’s Rehoboth Beach, Del., home on Jan. 12, 2021. The FBI is conducting a planned search of President Joe Biden’s Rehoboth Beach, Delaware home as part of its investigation into the potential mishandling of classified documents. That’s according to a statement from Biden’s personal lawyer. (Shannon McNaught/Delaware News Journal via AP, File)

Separate special counsels have been investigating the discovery of documents with classification markings at Biden’s home in Delaware and his former Washington office, as well as Trump’s Florida estate. Officials are trying to determine whether Trump or anyone on his team criminally obstructed the probe in refusing to turn over the documents before the FBI seizure. The FBI recovered more than 100 documents marked classified while serving a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago last August.

The circumstances of the Biden and Pence cases are markedly different from that of Trump.

Pence, according to his lawyer Greg Jacob, had requested a review by his attorneys of records stored at his home “out of an abundance of caution” during the uproar over the discovery of classified documents at Biden’s home and former private office. When the Pence documents were discovered on Jan. 16 among four boxes that had ben transferred to Pence’s home during the transition, Jacob said, they were secured in a locked safe and reported to the National Archives. FBI agents then collected them.

FILE – This image contained in a court filing by the Department of Justice on Aug. 30, 2022, and redacted by in part by the FBI, shows a photo of documents seized during the Aug. 8 search by the FBI of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. For years, problems with classified materials have been a shortcut to controversy in Washington. (Department of Justice via AP)

Material found in the boxes came mostly from the Naval Observatory residence where Pence lived while he was vice president. Other material came from a West Wing office drawer.

Pence has said he was unaware the documents had been in his possession.

“Let me be clear: Those classified documents should not have been in my personal residence,” Pence said recently at Florida International University. “Mistakes were made, and I take full responsibility.”

“We acted above politics and put national interests first,” he said.

The National Archives last month asked former U.S. presidents and vice president s to recheck their personal records for any classified documents following news of the Biden and Pence discoveries.

The Presidential Records Act states that any records created or received by the president while in office are the property of the U.S. government and will be managed by the Archives at the end of an administration.

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