Trump Faces Lawsuit Over Potential Record Destruction Following DOJ’s Reversal of Congressional Safeguards Against Nixon-Era Abuses

Just days after the Department of Justice (DOJ) unveiled its rationale for allowing President Donald Trump to disregard legal obligations, a new lawsuit has surfaced, suggesting there’s a high probability he might retain or destroy numerous records once his presidency concludes.

In a comprehensive 46-page lawsuit submitted in Washington, D.C., the American Historical Association (AHA) and American Oversight argue that they suffer due to a memo from the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC). This memo purportedly grants Trump a “permission slip” to ignore the mandates of the Presidential Records Act (PRA).

The PRA, established post-Watergate following Richard Nixon’s controversial stance on the Presidential Recordings and Materials Preservation Act, ensures that the United States maintains full ownership, possession, and control over presidential documents. It mandates that the President thoroughly document activities, discussions, decisions, and policies reflecting their official duties, to be eventually handed over to the National Archives (NARA) for public access.

However, on April 1, the OLC released an opinion declaring that Trump is not required to comply further with the PRA, deeming it “invalid in its entirety” and “unconstitutional.” The memo boldly asserts that Congress lacks the authority to preserve presidential records simply for historical purposes.

Previously, Law&Crime highlighted that the memo alludes to the dismissed prosecution concerning the classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. It criticizes efforts to hold a former President criminally accountable for handling records that historically were under their sole discretion.

Notably, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche made that argument without success while serving as Trump’s defense attorney, before U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon decided that special counsel Jack Smith was unlawfully appointed and tossed the case on that ground.

Now Blanche’s DOJ has to defend against a lawsuit from “historians, researchers, and educators” and a nonprofit legal group who “rely heavily on access to historical records about the inner-workings of the federal government to undertake their missions.”

Because the Trump administration’s policy “does not prohibit” Trump, Vice President JD Vance, or their staffs from using apps that “auto-delete” messages and “does not require the President to preserve all paper records and other physical records in his possession that constitute Presidential records under the PRA,” it “nullified” the PRA, overrode the Supreme Court, and must be blocked, the plaintiffs said.

“The Executive Branch has declared the power to override the legal determinations of the U.S. Supreme Court, in order to override the laws passed by Congress to preserve and provide public access to official records of the President’s activities. The Executive Branch has nullified the determinations of the other two branches of government so that the President may claim these official government records to be his own,” the filing said. “As of this moment, the Administration believes that the President is legally free to destroy records of his official government conduct, or even spirit away the records for his own future personal use.”

The lawsuit asked a judge to declare that the PRA is constitutional, to force acting Archivist Ed Forst to comply with the law, and to ensure the defendants “disclose to the Court any known instances in which the President destroys, converts for personal use, or otherwise fails to maintain Presidential records as required by the PRA.”

Senior U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell, a Barack Obama appointee, has been assigned the case, the docket shows.

Both American Oversight and the AHA told Law&Crime in statements that the law is clear: Presidential records are not Trump’s to hide or destroy.

“Since Watergate, Congress has made clear that presidential records belong to the American people — not to any one president,” American Oversight executive director Chioma Chukwu said. “The DOJ is now pushing a sweeping view of presidential power that would hand control of those records to the White House — a position the Supreme Court has already rejected. The White House does not get to decide what is preserved, what is hidden, or what is destroyed. The law sets an independent process, followed by every administration for nearly half a century, to safeguard public access. If that framework is cast aside, it puts critical records at risk of being controlled, concealed, or even destroyed before the public ever has a chance to see them.”

AHA executive director Dr. Sarah Weicksel likewise said that presidential “records and the history they tell belong not to any individual, but to the American people,” no matter what the administration attempts here.

“The AHA’s 1910 argument in support of establishing a National Archives remains true in this current fight for preservation: these records are ;materials which historians must use in order to ascertain the truth,’” Weicksel added. “Presidential records are essential for transparency and accountability in our democracy; they are also essential sources for researching and understanding the American past. Those records and the history they tell belong not to any individual, but to the American people.”