华盛顿-美国官员提出向国会领导人简要介绍他们对在前总统身上发现的机密文件的调查情况唐纳德·特朗普据知情人士周日透露，他在美国佛罗里达州的住所以及总统乔拜登在特拉华州的家和前私人办公室。
简报最早可能在本周发布。但这可能不会满足立法者的要求，他们不仅想审查从Mar-a-Lago拿走的文件，还想审查从属于拜登和前副总统迈克·彭斯在印第安纳州的家的地方拿走的文件。
在联邦特工首次对一位前总统的住宅进行前所未有的机密文件搜查六个月后，白宫面临两党压力，要求其与议员分享发现的内容，议员们表示，他们担心对国家安全和情报来源的潜在损害。单独的特别律师正在调查特朗普和拜登持有的文件。
官员们拒绝公开或私下回答有关他们发现的大多数问题，称正在进行刑事调查，并对情报来源可能受到的损害进行了单独的“风险评估”。
众议院情报委员会(House Intelligence Committee)主席、众议员迈克·特纳(Mike Turner)周日在美国全国广播公司(NBC)的“与媒体见面”(Meet the Press)节目中表示，政府通知他将在本周就这些文件进行简报。
“本届政府需要明白，我们确实有国家安全的紧急事务，”俄亥俄州共和党人特纳说。他还呼吁白宫向他简要介绍周六被击落的中国气球。
“有趣的是，这个气球公开的那一刻，我收到了一份通知，不是来自政府的通知，说我将获得关于这个气球的简报，但他们现在必须赶到国会，与我们讨论唐纳德·特朗普的文件，”他说，并补充说，预计将包括对拜登和彭斯记录的讨论。
三名知情人士证实，国会向“八人帮”提供了一份简报，八人帮是众议院和参议院以及两个情报委员会的共和党和民主党领导人。这些人在匿名的情况下讨论情报问题。
知情人士说，预计任何简报都不会包括直接获取被扣押文件的内容。
弗吉尼亚州民主党参议员马克·华纳和马尔科·卢比奥参议院情报委员会主席兼副主席R-Fla上周在给司法部长梅里克·加兰(Merrick Garland)和国家情报总监艾薇儿·海恩斯(Avril Haines)的一封信中要求获得这一权限。
国家情报办公室主任和司法部周日均拒绝置评。
司法部表示，特朗普离开白宫后，在Mar-a-Lago发现了大约300份带有机密标记的文件，包括绝密级别的文件。去年8月，联邦调查局特工在获得证据后执行了对该房产的搜查令，这些证据使他们相信特朗普和他的代表没有归还所有的机密文件。
当时收集的材料包括大约13，000份政府文件，其中约有100份带有分类标记。一些材料是如此敏感，以至于司法部检察官和联邦调查局反间谍调查人员需要额外的安全许可来审查它们。
特别顾问杰克·史密斯正在调查是否要对川普或其他与文件相关的人提起诉讼。检察官透露，他们正在调查可能违反多项刑事法规的行为，包括故意保留国防信息和阻挠。华盛顿的一个大陪审团一直在听取证据，联邦检察官也采访了多名特朗普的同事。目前还不清楚调查会持续多久。
特朗普声称这些材料已经解密，他只要想想就有权力这么做，尽管他的律师没有重复这一说法。他们试图让一个独立的仲裁者对这些文件进行外部审查，尽管一家联邦上诉法院去年底结束了这项工作，并表示特朗普的团队无权进行这种评估。
拜登的律师表示，他们在2022年11月2日首次在宾夕法尼亚拜登外交和全球参与中心的一个上锁的壁橱中发现“少量带有机密标记的文件”后，联系了当局。这些文件是在拜登的律师清理办公室时发现的。
第二批文件——再次被拜登的律师描述为“少量”——在拜登位于特拉华州威尔明顿附近的车库的一个存储空间被发现，以及在拜登家中的个人图书馆中发现的六页文件。
据拜登的律师鲍勃·鲍尔(Bob Bauer)说，1月20日，联邦调查局特工找到了另外六件含有机密标记文件的物品，还获得了拜登的一些手写笔记。鲍尔后来说，联邦调查局随后搜查了拜登在特拉华州的度假屋，但没有发现机密文件。
US officials offer Congress briefing on Trump, Biden papers
WASHINGTON -- U.S. officials have offered to brief congressional leaders on their investigation into the classified documents found at former President Donald Trump's Florida residence as well as President Joe Biden's Delaware home and former private office, people familiar with the matter said Sunday.
A briefing could come as soon as this week. But it may not meet demands from lawmakers who want to review the documents taken not just from Mar-a-Lago but also from the locations belonging to Biden and the Indiana home of former Vice President Mike Pence.
Six months after federal agents first conducted an unprecedented search of a former president's home for classified documents, the White House faces bipartisan pressure to share what it found with lawmakers who say they are concerned about the potential damage to national security and intelligence sources. Separate special counsels are investigating the documents found in the possession of Trump and Biden.
Officials have declined to answer most questions in public or private about what they found, citing the ongoing criminal investigations and a separate “risk assessment” of the possible damage to intelligence sources.
Rep. Mike Turner, who heads the House Intelligence Committee, told NBC's “Meet the Press” on Sunday that the administration notified him it would brief on the documents this week.
“This administration needs to understand we do have national security urgent matters,” said Turner, R-Ohio. He also called on the White House to brief him on the Chinese balloon shot down Saturday.
“What's interesting is that the moment this balloon became public, I got a notice not from the administration that I'm going to get a briefing on this balloon, but they have to rush to Congress now to talk to us about Donald Trump's documents,” he said, adding that a discussion of Biden and Pence's records was expected to be included.
Three people familiar with the matter confirmed a congressional briefing was offered to the “Gang of Eight” — the Republican and Democratic leaders of the House and Senate and of both intelligence committees. The people spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters.
Any briefing is not expected to include direct access to the documents that were seized, the people said.
Sens. Mark Warner, D-Va., and Marco Rubio, R-Fla., the chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, asked for that access in a letter last week to Attorney General Merrick Garland and Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines.
The director of national intelligence's office and Department of Justice both declined to comment Sunday.
The Justice Department says roughly 300 documents with classified markings, including at the top-secret level, have been recovered from Mar-a-Lago after being taken there after Trump left the White House. Last August, FBI agents executed a search warrant at the property after developing evidence that led them to believe that Trump and his representatives had not returned all the classified files.
The material taken at that time included roughly 13,000 government documents, including about 100 bearing classification markings. Some of the material was so sensitive that Justice Department prosecutors and FBI counterintelligence investigators required additional security clearances to review them.
A special counsel, Jack Smith, is investigating whether to bring charges against Trump or anyone else related to the documents. Prosecutors have revealed that they are investigating possible violations of multiple criminal statutes, including willful retention of national defense information and obstruction. A grand jury in Washington has been hearing evidence and federal prosecutors have interviewed multiple Trump associates. It is not clear how much longer that investigation will last.
Trump has claimed that the materials were declassified and that he had the power to do so just by thinking about it, though his lawyers have not repeated that claim. They tried to have an independent arbiter conduct an outside review of the documents, though a federal appeals court late last year ended that work and said Trump’s team was not entitled to that assessment.
Biden's lawyers say they contacted authorities after first discovering “a small number of documents with classified markings” on Nov. 2, 2022, in a locked closet at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement. The documents were found as Biden's attorneys were clearing out the offices.
A second batch of documents — again described by Biden's lawyers as a “small number” — were found in a storage space in Biden’s garage near Wilmington, Delaware, along with six pages located in Biden’s personal library in his home.
FBI agents on Jan. 20 located six additional items that contained documents with classified markings and also took possession of some of Biden's handwritten notes, according to Biden lawyer Bob Bauer. The FBI subsequently searched Biden's vacation home in Delaware but found no classified documents, Bauer said afterward.
