Biden’s classified files were sent to ANOTHER DC location before they were stored at the think tank

The long, winding document trail that leads classified documents from Joe Biden’s vice president’s office to the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement in Washington, DC, and now back into the hands of the government, includes another stopover: a temporary facility in the nation’s capital, a source tells DailyMail.com.

The documents were transferred in the summer of 2017. after spending about six months in a government transition office near the White House after Biden left the vice presidency.

The space, in DC’s Chinatown neighborhood, was overseen by the Penn Biden Center as its prized location near the Capitol was prepared. The office had its formal opening, attended by Biden, in 2018.

“Everything was moved en masse to a temporary space, then moved to Penn Biden,” the person told DailyMail.com.

The new location adds an additional address to the multi-stop route for the classified documents, which ended up inside a locked cabinet at the Penn Biden Center where they were discovered, while raising new questions about the total universe of people who could have had access. to documents over a period of years.

People involved in the process included former Biden staffers, General Services Administration staff, and staff from the think tank, an entity that would later have roles for senior advisers who remain in Biden’s orbit, including the now-Secretary. of State Antony Blinken, who served as the managing director of the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement.

The woman who oversaw the packing and mailing of Biden’s documents in 2017 was former administrative assistant Kathy Chung, who secured the position with a well-placed recommendation from Hunter Biden, who touted her abilities to her father.

Hunter Biden recommended it. They had worked together at the Commerce Department years ago,” the person said. Hunter notified her of the opportunity, asked if she was interested, and found that she was.

“He told his father about her,” the person said. So did former Delaware Sen. Ted Kaufman, a longtime Biden associate who is among a trio of Democratic senators he had worked for in the past.

Hunter Biden spent a stint at the agency under Secretary William Daley at the end of the Clinton administration from 1998 to 2001, following a job at a bank early in a career in law and lobbying.

Then, as now, he had his father’s ear on a variety of matters.

Chung was the first person to be publicly identified in a meeting with federal investigators on the matter. She spoke with US Attorney John Lausch’s office before Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed special counsel Robert Hur to oversee the document investigation.

Officials working with Biden at the time and who remain associated with him are senior advisers Steve Richetti and Kate Bedingfield, and senior adviser Mike Donilon.

The former aide helped oversee the packing of the files during the hectic end of Biden’s second term as vice president. That was a moment that saw a flurry of activity from Biden himself, even in his final days in office. He was required to keep his office running even while things were being put away for his safekeeping.

There is no indication that Chung knew that the boxes of documents also included documents marked as classified that Biden’s attorney, Patrick Moore, discovered while cleaning out Biden’s former DC office in November.

“She helped pack up the contents of the vice president’s office, including documents, and was responsible for them being transferred to the transition office,” said the person, who said Chung had “responsibility” for the move. “She just didn’t know the contents of each box that was being moved.”

Mixed in with what have been reported to be 10 government documents, some marked “top secret,” were the contents of desks and cabinets from Biden’s former office, documents related to the funeral of late son Beau Biden, and a document related to repairs. at home at Biden’s. Wilmington House – A site revealed to contain additional classified material.

The GSA has previously confirmed that the Biden team left its transition office in July 2017, which is when the documents began the next leg of their journey, heading southeast through the city. The Penn Biden Center did not respond to a request for comment on exactly how long the boxes of material remained at the Chinatown location and who had access to them.

The discovery of the documents has presented an immediate political problem for Biden, who said Thursday he has “no regrets” about the situation and scolded reporters for asking him about it as he toured the devastation in California.

‘There is no there there,’ he said. In addition to the special counsel, House Republican investigators have already begun submitting information requests.

Hunter Biden’s role was previously identified in emails found on his infamous laptop.

“Thank you for calling and thinking of me,” Chung wrote to Hunter in May 2012, according to foxnewsafter being proposed for the position when his predecessor Michelle Smith was leaving.

‘After the initial shock of taking in what you said… How could I pass up the opportunity to work for the Vice President of the United States?!’

As DailyMail.com reported this week, a newly surfaced photo of the laptop appears to show the president’s son driving the classic Corvette Stingray out of the same Wilmington home where the car and documents marked “classified” were stored.

At the White House on Friday, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre again insisted that Biden and his team were cooperating with investigators, after alerting the National Archives following the discovery of classified material. Once again, she declined to comment further, including to specify what Biden meant when she said he had no regrets and referred the matters to the Justice Department.