The FBI is expected to search former Vice President Mike Pence’s Indiana home for classified documents in a matter of days, three law enforcement officials told NBC News.
The planned search was first reported by the Wall Street Journal last week.
In a letter to the National Archives last month, Pence’s attorney said a «small number» of classified documents were found at the Indiana residence on January 16. The attorney, Greg Jacob, said the documents surfaced after Pence asked for «outside counsel.» to search for documents marked as classified, following the discovery of classified records at President Joe Biden’s Delaware home in Wilmington, Delaware.
Jacob said the documents were «inadvertently packaged and transported» to Pence’s home at the end of the Trump administration and that the former vice president was «unaware of the existence of any confidential or classified documents at his personal residence.»
The FBI searched Biden’s home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, last week. No classified documents were found during the FBI search, Biden’s personal attorney Bob Bauer said.
«In accordance with the process in Wilmington, the DOJ has taken for further review some materials and handwritten notes that appear to be related to his time as vice president,» Bauer said in a statement Wednesday.
The FBI pre-searched the offices of the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement in mid-November after classified documents were discovered there on November 2, NBC News reported last week.
On January 12, Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Robert Hur as special counsel to review classified Obama-era material found at Biden’s Delaware residence and the Penn Biden Center. House Republicans have also launched investigations into the matter.
The discovery of documents at the homes of Biden and Pence comes amid the Justice Department’s investigation into former President Donald Trump after classified documents were found at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. FBI agents conducted a search of Trump’s Florida property in August and found more than 100 classified documents, including some marked top secret. In December, two more documents with classified markings were found in a Florida storage facility not far from Mar-a-Lago and turned over to the FBI.