BUTLER COUNTY, IOWA – U.S. Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), Ranking Member of the Senate Budget Committee and former chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), Ranking Member of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, are demanding that the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) provide records and responses to the senators’ two year-inquiry regarding then-Vice President Joe Biden’s apparent use of pseudonyms and personal email addresses for official government business.

In a letter this week to NARA Archivist Colleen Shogan, Grassley and Johnson are following up on NARA’s responsibility to fully review records for production as requested by the senators. NARA has made insufficient efforts to comply with Grassley and Johnson’s requests with respect to the process and procedure it has employed to review the Biden records. The letter follows reports that, in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, NARA has identified more than 5,000 emails and documents – first exposed by the senators in 2021 – that may contain pseudonyms and email addresses used by then-VP Biden.

The White House has similarly failed to respond to inquiries made by the senators in July 2021, June 2022 and January 2023 regarding then-VP Biden’s compliance with federal record-keeping standards.

The senators are requesting NARA provide the following information:

  1. A detailed update on the status of the review of the “approximately 5,138 email messages, 25 electronic files and 200 pages of potentially responsive records” that are connected to the Southeastern Legal Foundation’s June 9, 2022 FOIA request, including:
    1. Which presidential offices participated in this review?
    2. Have representatives of the current and former presidents completed the review of the records?  If so, which offices have completed their review and when?
    3. If not, how many records still need to be reviewed and by which office?
  2. Regarding the discovery of Biden records in the Boston office of Pat Moore, as of March 7, 2023, NARA informed our offices that it had not reviewed the contents of the boxes found at Mr. Moore’s Boston office. Has NARA reviewed the contents of these boxes?  If so, did any of the Biden records discovered at Mr. Moore’s Boston office include the pseudonyms and email addresses listed below that then-Vice President Biden used?
      1. “RobinWare456@gmail.com”;
      2. “Robert.L.Peters@pci.gov”;
      3. “JRB Ware”; and
      4.  “67stingray”.
    2. If not, is NARA confident that the “approximately 5,138 email messages, 25 electronic files and 200 pages of potentially responsive records” are the complete subset of records that contain Biden’s pseudonyms and personal email addresses used for official government business? Please explain.
  3. Please produce all records that have been identified responsive to the Southeastern Legal Foundation’s June 9, 2022 FOIA request.

The full text of the letter can be found HERE.

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