on Tuesday , has said he declassified while still in office the more than 100 secret documents he took to his Florida resort home, Mar-a-Lago, a contention echoed by Republican lawmakers and other supporters.
“The statute is very clear. There’s nothing that says the president can make that decision,” said a former US national security official familiar with the classification system, who asked to remain anonymous. The Department of Energy downgrades from RD to FRD nuclear weapons data it needs to share with the Pentagon, but the materials remain classified, experts said.
FRD information only can be declassified through a process governed by the AEA in which the secretaries of energy and defense determine that the designation “may be removed,” according to a Justice Department FAQ sheet.