Schiff, Maloney ask for security damage assessment on Mar-a-Lago documents
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Two high-ranking House members are asking for a national security damage assessment of the documents the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago, according to a letter sent to the Director of National Intelligence on Saturday.
The big picture: The FBI seized highly sensitive documents in their search of former President Trump's Florida residence on Monday, including some marked as "top secret."
- Trump on Friday afternoon said in a statement that "it was all declassified" and insisted that "they didn't need to 'seize' anything. They could have had it at anytime."
- The Justice Department has rebutted his claims.
What they're saying: "Former President Trump’s conduct has potentially put our national security at grave risk," Reps. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) said in a letter to Avril Haines, the director of national intelligence.
- The unauthorized disclosure of top secret information would cause “exceptionally grave damage to the national security.”
- "In addition, at least one report indicates that FBI’s investigation focused in part on highly classified documents 'relating to nuclear weapons,' which are among our nation’s most closely guarded secrets," the letter added.
- "If this report is true, it is hard to overstate the national security danger that could emanate from the reckless decision to remove and retain this material."
Details: The FBI removed 11 sets of classified information, including:
- "Various classified/TS/SCI documents" — referring to documents containing "top secret" or "sensitive compartmented information."
- 21 boxes of "miscellaneous confidential documents," "miscellaneous secret documents" or "miscellaneous top secret documents."
- The executive grant of clemency for Trump's associate Roger Stone, "Info re: President of France," a leatherbound box of documents, two binders of photos and a handwritten note.
Go Deeper: Mar-a-Lago search warrant's clues
