Page 13 - Declassification Process News Today

Tens of thousands of e-mails, power points, all kinds of stuff, all stored somewhere in the cloud. but we still have a tiny staff of people at the national archives for the declassification process. he estimated that it could take five years for a request to declassify a single document to even make it to the agency that has to decide whether to do so. another scholar, matthew connelly of columbia points out that the u.s. government spends $18 billion a year on classifying and protecting informa...

So there is a lot of questions there. at the end of the day, the same underlying crime exists even if there are differences in aspects of the case. >> laura: the argument is often made that the president, himself, has the legal authority, jonathan, to declassify documents but the vice-president does not. is that correct? >> right. in terms of the declassification process, you are with the same position in many respects. donald trump said that he declassified everything. we havent seen a record o...

When we find out about them is because we need to deter other people from acting this way, who are generally people all the time for far less crimes, more minor ones, drug offenses, and the like. i think its impossible for merrick garland to look the other way. >> the cross memo, as they call, it points out that it is not legally relevant weather data documents that were found or classified or not that the charges that they are talking about do not turn on the classification status of the docume...

Little bit. >> the big declassification in his trump administration. and his cronies stopped the declassification process. there is this mountain of documents and he walked out, and his cronies would say were not gonna do that. >> well pretty huge development. the attorney general just cried to describe kash patel limited immunity for prosecution in exchange for his testifying about trump stash of stolen documents. joining me now is joyce vance, former used to deter any for the district of north...

Can disclose it. the fact that he kept secret, that is the part that does not make sense. you dont say anything about it. you werent interested in having the sources hand -- that is normally what you would do if you went to declassification process. >> and then we have the new york lawsuit against trump, his children, and the business that charges say he defrauded the value of the assets. trump took to social media. but he said james is a racist attorney, unquote. how serious is this case agains...

Moral win for garlands approach. hes very modest. they took a very sharp scaled back approach. they didnt engage in hyperbole. they didnt engage in a full frontal attack and it certainly did not work with judge cannon, but with these appellate judges, garr lapped himself, former appeals judge, the judges judge talking to them and that approach seems to have worked very well and resonated with the circuit. >> you know, john miller, we all just heard the former president of the united states claim...

Back to whatever department they came from and ask if they are classified or not and how long do you think that could possibly take if he indeed would take that step? >> well there would certainly be a paper trail. theres a number and attached to every report. but i think the judges point is correct. the evidence is the documents themselves. theres no changes, no corrections, nothing done to redact any information to point out that they be declassified. but indeed, there would be a paper trail b...

His lawyers couldnt find those people? what are the chance this any of that is true -- chance that any of this it true? >> zero chance, i think. number one, a president could initiate a declassification process, but it is the originating agency that has to do that. and they do it after investigating to make sure that sources, lives wont be endangered by declassifying, that programs wont be compromised. you dont just wave a magic wand and say i hereby declassify these documents. youll notice what...

That forgotten little detail from trumps presidency became relevant again today, after the department of justice issued its latest court filing in the ongoing court battle over ongoing access to the fbi search of mar-a-lago. the filing included this shocking picture showing top secret and classified documents that the fbi found during that search, documents clearly labeled, top secret and sci for sensitive compartment and permission. as experts noted, none of the documents spare markings to indi...

Indicate that they have been declassified. it is a typical part of the declassification process. but those documents are also sitting alongside what appears to be, drumroll please, a box with the framed time magazine cover, everyone this time, featuring trump when he was president. now we dont know for sure why the fbi placed the documents next to the box of the framed time cover. maybe trumps filing system is alphabetical. t for time magazine and also tea for top secret. who can no? but what is...