In the letter, Wall reiterated the facts of NARA’s role in a months-long effort to recover documents from Trump’s Florida resort — particularly as it has evolved into a criminal investigation by the Justice Department — while defending the agency’s communication with Trump associates and the DOJ. “The National Archives has been the focus of intense scrutiny for months, especially this week, with many people attributing political motivation to our actions. NARA has received messages from the public accusing us of corruption and conspiracy against the former President or congratulating NARA for “Bringing him down,” he wrote. “It is neither accurate nor welcome,” Wall added. “For the past 30-plus years as a career civil servant at NARA, I have been proud to work for a uniquely and fiercely non-political government agency known for its integrity and standing as an ‘honest broker.’ This idea is in our institutional laws and in our very culture. I value it, and I know you do too.” The Washington Post first reported the letter and the agency published it on Monday. Wall also acknowledged in her statement that in February, then-archivist David Ferriero shared with NARA officials “information about the Trump administration’s presidential records and the National Archives.” “In NARA Notice 2022-082 and NARA Notice 2022-087, he wrote that NARA received 15 boxes containing presidential records from former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property in Florida, including items marked as classified national security information and , therefore, has been in contact with the Department of Justice,” he wrote. “He also shared that NARA staff did not visit or ‘raid’ the Mar-a-Lago property; that representatives of President Trump informed us that they were continuing to seek additional presidential records belonging to the National Archives; and that some of the records that we received at the end of the Trump administration included paper files that had been torn up,” the letter adds. In its investigation earlier this month, the FBI discovered 11 sets of classified documents, including some material marked “top secret/SCI” — one of the highest levels of classification. CNN previously reported that the Archives were working throughout 2021 to get the presidential records back from Trump. Wall’s statement comes as Trump is asking a federal judge to appoint a “special master” — a third-party attorney — to oversee the review of evidence gathered in the FBI investigation. The judge handling his request notified both Trump’s team and the Justice Department that he had a “preliminary intention” to appoint a special master, though he cautioned that it should not be interpreted as her final decision on the matter. He has a hearing scheduled for Thursday in Florida. The new statement represents the latest defense the agency has had to make this month following the investigation. After Trump falsely reported former President Barack Obama had mismanaged presidential records after he left office, Trump claimed, keeping more than 30 million documents, many of them classified, and moving them to Chicago, NARA issued a statement explaining that it has “sole legal and physical custody” of the Obama-era records. He added that NARA itself moved about 30 million pages of unclassified files to one of its own facilities in the Chicago area, that classified Obama-era files are kept at a separate NARA facility near Washington, and that “former President Obama did not has no control over where and how NARA stores his administration’s presidential records.” This story has been updated with additional details. CNN’s Katelyn Polantz, Tierney Sneed, Holmes Lybrand and Daniel Dale contributed to this report.
