Biden’s handwritten notes part of docs probe

Washington: President Joe Biden is a man who writes down his thoughts. And some of those handwritten musings over his decades of public service are now a part of a special counsel’s investigation into the handling of classified documents.

It isn’t clear yet what the investigators are looking for by taking custody of notes from his time as vice-president and his decades in the Senate that were found in his Delaware homes in Rehoboth Beach and Wilmington.

Biden’s attorneys did not say whether the notes were considered to be classified, only that they were removed. But over his 36 years in the Senate and eight as vice-president, Biden had a front-row seat to a lot of highly sensitive moments in US history, including the Sept 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the 2011 death of Osama bin Laden and unfolding political turmoil in Ukraine.

The special counsel is working to determine how classified information from Biden’s time as senator and vice-president came to wind up in his home and former office – and whether any mishandling involved criminal intent or was unintentional. But they’ll also have to determine whether the notes they took are considered personal and therefore belong to Biden, and would then likely be returned to him.

Under the Presidential Records Act, records of a presidential administration generally belong with the National Archives, especially classified items.

There are some exceptions, including when records are determined to be purely personal.

Larry Pfeiffer, a former senior director of the White House situation room and chief of staff to retired CIA Director Michael Hayden, said that when he took notes during secret or top-secret meetings, he would mark each page by specific levels of classification.

“It’s pretty clear in those meetings when they’re hearing classified information,” he said. When Pfeiffer left the CIA, he submitted his notebooks to the agency archives.