The former United States Vice President Mike Pence in his first public comments since classified documents were found at his residence in Indiana said he takes “full responsibility” for the incident, on Friday (January 27). This comes days after media reports first emerged that dozens of documents marked classified were discovered at Pence’s residence in Indiana by his lawyers on January 16. However, the former VP’s legal counsel at the time had said that Pence was “unaware” of the existence of the papers in question which have since been handed over to the FBI.
While speaking about the economy and promoting his new book “So Help Me God” at Florida International University he said, “Let me be clear: Those classified documents should not have been in my personal residence…Mistakes were made, and I take full responsibility”, reported the Associated Press. A total of four boxes containing copies of administration paper documents found at Pence’s Indiana residence are said to be from his time as the vice president from 2017 to 2021 when Trump was president.
The discovery of the documents was first reported by CNN on January 25 after two letters written by Greg Jacob, Pence’s legal counsel to the National Archives were procured by the US media. This comes as incumbent President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are under investigation by the Department of Justice investigation (DOJ) for retaining classified documents from their time in office.
“We acted above politics and put national interests first,” said Pence in Florida on Friday and hoped that people would acknowledge that he swiftly acted to correct the error. The former vice president also noted that national security depends on the proper handling of classified documents. Notably, Pence had previously said that he did not retain any classified documents or information from his time in office.
In a letter dated January 18, the former VP’s lawyer wrote that the records “appear to be a small number of documents bearing classified markings that were inadvertently boxed and transported to the personal home of the former vice president at the end of the last administration”. According to Jacob, out of the four boxes two had a “small number of papers appearing to bear classified markings” while the other two contained “courtesy copies of vice presidential papers.”
The former US VP’s lawyer said that the search was called for by Pence following the discovery of classified documents at Biden’s Wilmington residence “out of an abundance of caution.” However, since the discovery, he said that his legal counsel will “cooperate fully” with the National Archives, Department of Justice and Congress for the inquiry.
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