Appeals court weighs Trump claim that presidential papers are his, not the public's

A federal appeals court in Washington hears arguments Friday on whether papers produced inside the White House belong to Donald Trump personally rather than to the American people — a claim administration lawyers are making about six months after the Justice Department moved to invalidate the Presidential Records Act.

The law, in place since 1978, was passed after the Watergate scandal and disputes over Richard Nixon's records ended two centuries of presidents deciding for themselves what to do with their papers. Every president since then has complied with it, until this year.

'Unconstitutional,' White House says

"The Presidential Records Act is unconstitutional and a clear violation of the separation of powers," White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis said.

Conservative lawyer Michael Edney, speaking on a Federalist Society webinar, placed the administration's position in a longer effort to pare back statutes from that era, describing the law as "a post-Watergate, overbroad statutory incursion into the prerogatives of the executive branch."

The administration told the court that retaining all those records burdens the White House and could chill advisers from having honest conversations with the president.

The move follows Trump's indictment on obstruction of justice charges over classified documents allegedly stockpiled at his Mar-a-Lago resort. A federal judge dismissed the case on technical grounds related to the prosecutor's appointment, and the Justice Department dropped it after Trump won reelection.

A judge's Orwell citation

Senior U.S. District Judge John Bates, an appointee of George W. Bush, ruled against the White House this year, opening his decision with a line from George Orwell's novel 1984: "Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past."

Three judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit will consider the issue Friday.

Nikhel Sus, chief counsel for the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, which sued over the Trump move, said that if courts accepted the argument, "the people really have no right of access to the president's papers" — a major loss for archivists, historians and the public.

Continuity of government

Former officials say access is essential. John Bellinger, who served as legal adviser to the National Security Council under George W. Bush, said records on national security issues are "really vital for the continuity of our government," and that the only record of what a president has said to a foreign leader is often a written document. Losing access, he said, would leave future presidents at a "terrible disadvantage."

Edney, who also worked for Bush's National Security Council and Justice Department, said Congress could probably pass a "thoughtful" records preservation statute, and questioned whether the suing watchdog groups have legal standing. But he said the administration appears to want the question resolved by the Supreme Court, "at a time of their choosing, with arguments of their choosing, and a court of their choosing."

Source: NPR News.