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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   32183 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 23, 2023

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Mike Pence joins the File Why? Club

The former VP has turned in "a small number of documents bearing classified markings" after his lawyer found them in a sealed moving box. He's taking the Biden approach of denying all knowledge while cooperating with NARA, which I would describe as "begging forgiveness." The coverage looks relatively soft; CNN offers an innocuous explanation for how they'd have gotten from his former SCIF at the Naval Observatory. It is definitely being used for comparison with the similar Biden situation and contrast with Trump's approach of screaming bloody murder.

Points to anyone who claimed classified document messes were common among officials. I do wonder if this triggers a mass search among Congressmen's residences. Or if it already has. I don't think other findings would have been kept quiet, but I guess it could be possible.

The Biden-Senate-documents case might be unique. Every congressman I've seen comment on the issue has stated that they aren't allowed to take files out of the SCIF and there is a check-in-check-out process for each one for each viewing. Executive branch officials seem to have much more ability to craft their own systems, which seem to be less secure.

Executive branch officials seem to have much more ability to craft their own systems, which seem to be less secure.

Not only is the regulation for classified documents defined (almost) exclusively by Executive Order [1], but I suspect high-level executive branch officials are, by nature of their jobs, unable to fully "leave work at the office." Some bedtime background reading on foreign leaders to meet tomorrow or late-night national emergencies could easily see documents outside of normal locations. And that's not even considering the acknowledged epidemic of over-classification: it's possible to have a file marked "secret" that has nothing you couldn't learn from a cursory read of the New York Times -- though there are reasons this can legitimately be the case as well.

This isn't to say that I don't want them to do better, but I can at least see how it'd be difficult for the White House to keep all the files locked up every night.

[1] This is one of the defenses Trump has attempted to raise -- although I'm not completely certain I think it should prevail, it is an interesting argument and complicates the whole matter.

[1] This is one of the defenses Trump has attempted to raise -- although I'm not completely certain I think it should prevail, it is an interesting argument and complicates the whole matter.

Indeed. I've opined from time to time that imposing criminal penalties based on the classification system might not even be legal for this reason. I think it probably needs to be revamped into an actual statutory framework.

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