Newly-Released Email Shows National Archives Begged Trump for Records 17 Months Ago: ‘We Need Your Help’
L: Jeff Swensen/Getty Images R: Department of Justice
A newly-released email shows an attorney for the National Archives begged lawyers for former President Donald Trump to help them locate presidential records in May of last year.
The email, according to New York Times reporter Charlie Savage, would become the origin of the Aug. 8 raid by the FBI on Trump’s estate in Florida.
An email from Nation Archive General Counsel Gary Stern to Trump representatives Patrick Philbin, Mike Purpura and Scott Gas asked for cooperation on “various issues with respect to capturing Presidential records.”
The email, which was dated May 5, 2021, noted “problems remain that will likely require further follow up” and “immediate assistance” was needed on numerous missing documents.
Stern wrote, “As the Executive Office of the President continues to transfer the electronic Trump Presidential records into our custody, we have come upon several problems that we need your help in resolving.”
He added, “For example, the original correspondence between President Trump and North Korean Leader Kim Jong-un were not transferred to us; it is our understanding that in January 2021, just prior to the end of the Administration, the originals were put in a binder for the President, but were never returned to the Office of Records Management for transfer to NARA.”
The email continued:
Similarly, the letter that President Obama left for President Trump on his first day in office has not been transferred; since that letter was received by President Trump after his term commenced, it is a Presidential record — note that all of NARA’s other Presidential Libraries maintain the original copy of similar letters, and it is necessary that this one be provided to us as well.
It is also our understanding that roughly two dozen boxes of original Presidential records were kept in the Residence of the White House over the course of President Trump’s last year in office and have not been transferred to NARA, despite a determination by Pat Cipollone in the final days of the Administration that they need to be. I had also raised this concern with Scott during the final weeks.
“We know things were very chaotic, as they always are in the course of a one-term transition,” Stern concluded. “This is why the transfer of the Trump electronic records is still ongoing and won’t be complete for several more months. But it is absolutely necessary that we obtain and account for all original Presidential records.”
The letter was previously reported on by the Times but was not released in full until Monday afternoon.
