United States Attorney General Merrick Garland announced on Thursday that he would be naming a special counsel to investigate the classified documents case involving President Joe Biden.
Much speculation about the case has come up, being that the Justice Department is already investigating classified documents discovered at former President Donald Trump’s Florida home.
Former US Attorney Tom Heffelfinger joined News Talk 830 WCCO’s Chad Hartman to talk about the move from Garland and what it means.
Documents from President Biden’s time in office as vice president have been found in two separate locations, including his home and one of his offices.
When it comes to how the Justice Department should move forward with this case, Heffelfinger shared that Garland made the right call by appointing a special counsel, saying “it was the right thing to do.”
“He had to do this in order to provide the appearance of equality between the investigation being conducted of Former President Trump and of current President Biden,” Heffelfinger said.
Now Heffelfinger says that two separate investigators will be looking at the cases, applying the same laws for each of them. Heffelfinger says that both cases should be approached by investigators, and potentially prosecutors, in the same way.
However, even with both cases involving the possession of classified documents, Heffelfinger noted that the two situations are not the same.
“There’s a big difference between what’s happened with Biden and what’s happened with Trump,” Heffelfinger said.
Part of what makes the cases different is how both men handled the documents, as Biden handed them over voluntarily, and Trump’s were taken by force after a search warrant was executed.
The public has been kept in the dark on the president’s situation, being that the documents were found and handed over on Nov. 2, 2022, days before the midterm elections.
While many have criticized the White House for not coming out sooner, Heffelfinger says it wasn’t up to them. He says once the documents were handed over, it was up to the Justice Department to share information on their investigation.
No matter how each of the cases move forward, Heffelfinger acknowledged that there will be those who don't agree with the outcome, as most are sticking to party lines.
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