“That don’t mean he can take them home, does it????”
And that’s the point, he can if they are totally declassified and are no longer a threat to the country and the archive releases their control of them. They are a laundry list at that point. But it isn’t “always” easy to declassify a document as there are rules and a paper trail too many times to follow. An example:
Some of the documents the FBI retrieved from Mar-a-Lago had Formerly Restricted Data classification markings on them. Formerly Restricted Data can include information about the nuclear stockpile size, current and past locations of nuclear weapons, weapons yield information (i.e., how powerful they are), and above- or below-ground test results. Under long-standing interpretations of the Atomic Energy Act, such information may be declassified only by the Departments of Energy and Defense. The president is thwarted with this type of document by previous actions of congress.
However, if a president alters a document’s classification status for some other reason like it being more convenient for him to work at home than in a secure facility, or he simply failed to apply the required protections, such an action is arguably an abdication of his Article II responsibility rather than an exercise of it. And the only difference I have seen on both men is that the documents have never been identified as being worked with. (Especially Biden having the documents in his possession back during his terms as VP. He certainly hasn’t been working the documents for 6 to 7 years especially without the use of a security scif that Trump had in Florida)
wy69
maybe he can take them home, but VPs are covered under PRA and he can’t keep them.
He’s still should be hosed.