Opinion: the raid on the former US president's home in search of official records shows the importance of government archives - and not just in the United States

Earlier this week, a team of FBI agents raided former US president Donald Trump's estate at Mar-A-Lago in Florida. At the heart of the raid is a question about and search for official records. These presidential archives have tainted the potential run by Trump for president in 2024.

But why did the FBI raid his Mar-A-Lago home? And could the 1978 Presidential Records Act scupper Trump’s potential run for a return to the White House?

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From RTÉ Radio 1's Morning Ireland, RTÉ US Correspondent Sean Whelan on continuing investigations into Donald Trump following the FBI search of his Florida home

Like so many modern political scandals and controversies in American politics, we need to go back to Watergate to understand where we are today. The Presidential Records Act came into law in response to Richard Nixon's attempts or risk of removing his presidential tapes and documents from official sources or to where they could be destroyed. Prior to this, US records law meant that presidential records could be considered private.

Following the Nixon scandal, the act introduced the major change that all presidential records are deemed public property and all must be preserved without exception and transferred to the National Archives of the United States. There was one proviso: records can be omitted if there is prior agreed written permission from the National Archivist.

So why this raid and why now? There is ongoing scrutiny and investigations into Trump’s management of his records. The Washington Post reported in January that the National Archives investigated and removed some 15 boxes of confidential presidential records from Mar-A-Lago.

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From RTÉ Radio 1's Today With Claire Byrne, US correspondent with the Business Post Marion McKeone on the FBI raid on Trump's home

Within these confidential records were correspondence from former US president, Barack Obama and North Korea’s president Kim Jong Un. Trump once described those letters from Kim Jong Un as "love letters" such was his bravado in presenting himself as being in control of a potentially fraught nuclear situation at the time. This deliberate omission of presidential records from transfer to the National Archives is in direct contravention of the 1978 Act.

For an administration that never seemed to be heavy on due-diligence-led policy, the Trump presidency utilised the media and image of Trump as a ‘man-of-action’ figure through his creation of ‘official’ and therefore powerful documents. Trump boasted of the number of executive orders and laws he signed during his time in the White House.

Great ceremony would be played out before press and media of Trump signing into law a raft of policy changes that undid much of recent (decades) of American policy on matters from climate change to education. The president’s signature was always comically large and recognisable as a bizarre brand of his impulsive and bullish style, as he proudly presented the signed document, always in a leather binder, to the camera while being applauded by his associates. A viral Twitter account TrumpDraws lampooned this act by altering the content from an official signed document instead to a childlike stick figure of someone playing golf or a childlike drawing labelled ‘KAT’.

After endless scandals, can Trump’s downfall be attributed to a failure of record-keeping? It would be quite a hill to die on considering the contempt his administration showed for transparent governance, despite his assurances he would ‘drain the swamp’ of Washington’s political quagmires. From refusing to release his tax returns to alleged election collusion with Russian agencies to the January 6th insurrection at the Capital, the attack on truth and transparency has been the stick with which Trump has used to beat democracy. It is perhaps the trust form of 'American carnage' which Trump references in his inauguration speech in January 2017.

Trump supporters focused on the malpractice of email governance and archiving of federal email by Hillary Clinton during her term as Secretary of State during the 2016 election campaign, chanting "Lock Her Up" at rallies in relation to the use of a private email server rather than an official channels. Could Clinton’s near miss at the White House have been avoided by archiving her email properly? Maybe but unlikely. Will Trump’s growing 2024 campaign lose momentum by this recent records scandal? Also unlikely. What is more certain now, and as history has amply demonstrated, is that those who control the narrative often control the outcome in this age of "info wars".

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From RTÉ Radio 1's Morning Ireland in November 2016, RTÉ US Correspondent Caitríona Perry reports on the controvery over Hillary Clinton's emails a week before the presidential election

Here in Ireland, the management of official records, government archives and electronic records is sorely lacking. There is currently no legislation securing the legal deposit and preservation of Government electronic records or of Government websites.

The National Library of Ireland maintains Ireland’s only web archive of Irish political parties, and of other major political and social events, from Brexit, to Commissions of Investigation, Covid-19, to recent referenda on marriage equality and the Eighth Amendment. This comprises a vital record of contemporary Ireland’s online history and a snapshot of specific selected websites which connect to major events in Ireland’s digital and online memory, as well as of websites of Irish political parties.

The forms of media through which official governance is carried out has rapidly changed in recent years. Think of all online and cloud channels we all used when working remotely during the Covid-19 lockdowns, and which many still use. Official records may only exist if official channels of communication are used.

Here in Ireland, the management of official records, government archives and electronic records is sorely lacking

For example, Tánaiste Leo Varadker was recently the subject of a Garda investigation over the sharing of private health policy documents via the encrypted messaging service, WhatsApp, as reported by Village magazine. The Director of Public Prosecutions subsequently decided Varadkar would not face prosecution following the investigation.

In May 2022, Sinn Féin also came under scrutiny as an Irish Independent report revealed that the party removed and deleted over 52,000 past public media statements over 20 years from its website. In response, Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald later stated that "the website is getting a long overdue overhaul. So the archives are being changed".

The apparent ‘changing’ of archives is a peculiar statement when it refers to their removal from public access with no clear preservation or access strategy made public. What can be more certain is that without addressing proper legislation for electronic records, the e-business of Government, and of how public representatives communicate and work online, will be an unrepairable gap in the transparency of our democracy.

The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ