Several classified documents from President Joe Biden’s time as vice president were discovered last fall in a private office, CNN reports. The National Archives notified the Ministry of Justice for further investigation. Among the documents discovered are 10 classified materials, including US intelligence memos and reports, which dealt with topics such as Ukraine, Iran and Great Britain.

Under the Presidential Archives Act, such materials are considered government property and therefore must be returned by individuals holding public office, even if they are presidents of the United States. This is the same reason why Donald Trump is being investigated, but what risks does the current occupant of the White House expose himself to?” Il Giornale asks.

Differences between Trump and Biden

The main difference from its predecessor is self-disclosure. After a briefing from Washington by the Penn Biden think tank, Biden’s legal team presented everything to the judicial authorities.

Cooperation that Trump has never offered, as demonstrated by an FBI raid last summer at his Mar-a-Lago residence that turned up 33 boxes with more than 300 documents inside.

Biden, on the other hand, reacted almost stunned, confident in the outcome between his lawyers and the judiciary.

“I was informed about this find and I was surprised to learn that documents related to the government were brought to this office. But I don’t know what’s in the documents,” the US president told reporters on the sidelines of a summit with his Mexican counterpart and the Prime Minister of Canada organized in Ciudad de Mexico.

His lawyers will “cooperate fully” in examining the documents, he said, adding that he hoped the examination would be completed “soon.”

The documents were found when “my lawyers were cleaning out an office at the University of Pennsylvania,” Joe Biden said.

According to the president, as soon as lawyers discovered that certain documents were confidential, “they did what was necessary, called the archive” to hand them over.

Political and less judicial implications / Possible suspension attempt

But with a new Republican majority in the House ready for battle, the political, not the judicial, consequences could be disastrous in terms of reputation and communication, the real Achilles heel of the American president.

If the Justice Department were to find that this case could be prosecuted based on the evidence gathered, the fact would remain that every president enjoys criminal immunity while in office to the full extent of his powers. This is likely the same reasoning used by former FBI Director Robert Mueller during the lengthy Russiagate investigation in which Trump was acquitted.

The Republican Party is at war with the Democrats, so Biden’s impeachment procedure is not excluded. American conservatives have already criticized the media’s double standards in covering the two scandals.

That way, the GOP could impeach a Democratic president and face some opposition in the Democratic-controlled Senate, which has twice tried to remove Trump by impeachment. The gesture, symbolic, would symbolize zero tolerance for the new opposition and the new Republican Party, which is moving to an increasingly extremist orientation, writes Inside Over.

What is the Penn Biden Center?

The Penn Biden Center organization offers the University of Pennsylvania, which is based in Philadelphia, an office in the nation’s capital.

Joe Biden used the organization’s office space from mid-2017 until the spring of 2019, when he announced his candidacy for president.

Opened in 2018, the think tank hosts academic programs and events dedicated to foreign policy.

The Center’s sixth-floor offices are located right at the base of the Capitol, with floor-to-ceiling windows offering panoramic views of Congress, CBS News reported.

The Center’s staff is largely made up of former Obama administration officials, many of whom left the Center to later serve in the Biden administration. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, for example, was the Center’s managing director in 2018. Steve Ricchetti, now a senior adviser to Joe Biden in the White House, served as the Center’s managing director in 2019.

The University of Pennsylvania named Joe Biden the Benjamin Franklin Professor of Presidential Practice in 2017 and paid him $917,643 to speak and direct the Benjamin Franklin Center between 2017 and 2019, according to the president’s financial records. For the time being, he has suspended his activities at the university, being on leave.

Joe Biden’s ties to the University of Pennsylvania run deep. His late son Beau and granddaughter Naomi received their bachelor’s degrees from this university. Biden’s daughter, Ashley, received her master’s degree from Penn, and his granddaughter, Natalie, is currently studying there.

When Biden was vice president, he launched the Obama administration’s “Cancer Moonshot” program at the University of Pennsylvania in 2016.

The president discussed how he handles classified information at home during a question-and-answer session with reporters last August. “I have a hidden camera at home that is fully secured. I’m taking it home with me today (the presidential daily file). It’s sealed. I have one person with me – a military man. I read it, locked it and give it to the military,” the president said. Asked if it was appropriate for the president to bring classified materials home, Biden said, “It depends on the document and how secure the room is.”