The Biden White House has agreed to release Trump-era presidential records to the House committee investigating the January 6th riot on Capitol Hill, even as former President Donald Trump reportedly moves to assert executive privilege over the documents.
During her Friday afternoon press briefing, White House press secretary Jen Psaki confirmed that the White House supports the panel’s request for the documents.
“As a part of this process, the president has determined an assertion of executive privilege is not warranted for the first set of documents from the Trump White House that have been provided to us by the National Archives,” Psaki told reporters.
“This is just the first set of documents, and we will evaluate claims of privilege on a case by case basis, but the president has also been clear he believes it to be of the utmost importance for both Congress and the American people to have a complete understanding of the events of that day to prevent them from happening again.”
In a letter to the Archivist of the United States, White House counsel Dana Remus writes that Biden has determined that invoking executive privilege “is not in the best interests of the United States.” This comes days after Trump lawyers sought to block the testimony of former Trump officials to the House committee citing executive privilege. On Friday, a lawyer for Steve Bannon said the former White House aide won’t comply with the House committee’s investigation because of Trump’s claim.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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