Judge Orders Administration to Obey Presidential Records Act

A federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to follow a post-Watergate law governing presidential records, rejecting the Justice Department's argument that the statute violates the Constitution. US District Judge John Bates ruled Wednesday that the Presidential Records Act likely is constitutional and that a group of historians showed there is a "substantial risk" the White House is not complying with it, ABC News reports. The law, in place for nearly a half-century, requires that presidential records be preserved and transferred to the National Archives so they can eventually be made public.

In a 54-page opinion that cited George Orwell, William Shakespeare, and the inscription on the National Archives building—"What is past is prologue"—Bates concluded that Congress has authority under the Constitution's Property Clause to regulate presidential records. "Almost 50 years of practice" and Supreme Court precedent, he wrote, support Congress' power to set the rules for presidential documents. The order directs the White House Office, the National Security Council, the US DOGE Service, and President Trump's advisers to fully comply with the act, per the Washington Post. Bates set May 26 as the date for it to take effect.

White House chief of staff Susie Wiles and deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller are named in the order as being required to follow it. Trump and Vice President JD Vance are excluded, per CBS News. The records act has been invoked in debate since Trump was accused of taking sensitive presidential records to his Mar-a-Lago estate after leaving office. He was later indicted on charges of retaining classified information and obstruction of justice, a case that was dismissed by Judge Aileen Cannon, who maintained special counsel Jack Smith's appointment was improper.