‘No classified documents’ found in search of Biden’s holiday home

The FBI searched President Joe Biden’s holiday home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, without finding any classified documents, the president’s attorney said.

But agents did take some handwritten notes and other materials relating to Mr Biden’s time as vice president for review.

Wednesday’s search was the third for a Biden home or office.

His lawyer Bob Bauer, said FBI agents spent three and a half hours searching the home and that, “no documents with classified markings were found”.

Mr Bauer described the search as “planned” and “a further step in a thorough and timely DOJ process we will continue to fully support and facilitate”.

Searches of Mr Biden’s former office and Delaware homes have all been done voluntarily and without a warrant.

The latest search follows the FBI’s 13-hour, top-to-bottom check of his Wilmington, Delaware, home, where agents located documents with classified markings from his time as a vice president and senator and also took possession of some of his handwritten notes.

One week earlier, Mr Biden’s  lawyers revealed they had found a document bearing classified markings while searching the Wilmington property but said they had not found others during a separate inspection of the Rehoboth Beach home.

The White House did not disclose the Justice Department’s investigation until last month, when it acknowledged the November 2 discovery of a “small number” of classified documents by Mr Biden’s lawyers as they closed an office at the Penn Biden Centre, a think tank affiliated with the Ivy League school.

The Justice Department declined comment on the Wednesday search.

Mr Biden’s lawyers have described the retention of the records as a “mistake”.

The Biden documents probe is being handled by a special counsel, Robert Hur, a former senior Justice Department official during the Trump administration who served as the top federal prosecutor in Baltimore.

He is starting his work this week, inheriting a months-long investigation already undertaken by FBI agents and Justice Department prosecutors.

Investigators in the Biden case have already conducted interviews, including of Biden’s former executive assistant who helped oversee the packing of boxes that went to the Penn Biden Centre.

It is not yet clear if and when the Justice Department might look to question Mr Biden himself.

The Bidens bought their Rehoboth Beach home, which overlooks a state park adjacent to the beach, in June 2017, months after he left the vice presidency.