Congress secures first cooperation from National Archives in Biden document probe

House Republicans on Thursday secured their first cooperation from the National Archives to gain information about the classified documents found in President Joe Biden's Delaware home and former Washington D.C. think tank. The agreement ends a stalemate over a growing scandal that has rocked Washington and led to a request for all living former presidents and vice presidents to search their own possessions for any missing national secrets.

House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) told Just the News that his committee will be interviewing the National Archives' top lawyer, Gary Stern, next Tuesday to get the first answers about what documents were located, where they were located and who may have had access to them.

"They have finally agreed to come in and sit down for a transcribed interview," Comer said on the "Just the News, No Noise" television show on Real America's Voice. "So we will be able to have a formal interview. We're going to ask them all the questions that everyone in America wants answered. And hopefully they'll provide those answers."

Comer had gotten a cool response from the White House and Justice Department in his initial requests for information, a stark contrast to last fall when the Biden administration routinely leaked details about a similar controversy involving documents found at former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate during an FBI raid.

News of the first cooperation from the Archives with Majority Republicans in the House came the same day the nation's historical preservation agency called on former U.S. presidents and vice presidents from the last six administrations to re-check any personal presidential records they have for the presence of any classified or otherwise relevant materials. 

Comer said his committee will query Stern on the documents found in Trump's, Biden's and former Vice President Mike Pence's possession over the last six months and "why was there such a difference in how the Trump document case was handled versus how the Biden case was handled."

"We want to know who had access to those documents," the chairman added. "We're going to remind them that we have a very serious Biden family influence peddling investigation going on. And we're very concerned about not only who had access to those documents, but whether or not those documents ended up in the hands of our adversaries around the world, especially those who were involved in some of the Biden influence peddling scheme."

Comer's comments come as several lawmakers and experts are ramping up demands for the FBI and intelligence community to conduct a damage assessment to determine if national security was compromised by Biden's possession of national secrets in insecure locations like his home and think tank office.

Comer also confirmed his committee is seeking to interview the California art dealer who sold some of Hunter Biden's recent art pieces to determine if any foreign powers were using the purchases as an avenue of additional influence with the first family.

"We need to know who's buying this artwork," he said. "And I'm willing to sign a confidentiality agreement. You know, I need to know about this art, because there's a pattern here of our adversaries, especially in China, sending money to Biden interests, whether it be some of Hunter's or [his uncle] Jim Biden's shady business dealings, whether it be to the University of Pennsylvania to fund the Biden center for diplomacy, or reportedly to purchase some of Biden's artwork at very high prices.

"We're concerned that there's a pattern of corruption here with respect to the CCP that may be compromising this White House."