(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department has started to provide access to a group of bipartisan congressional leaders some of the classified materials recovered from the residences of former President Donald Trump, President Joe Biden and former Vice President Mike Pence, sources familiar with the matter confirmed to ABC News Tuesday.
Administration officials began sharing the documents with House and Senate leadership as well as the Democratic and Republican leaders of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees — known as the “Gang of Eight” — last week, sources said.
The production follows months of increasingly contentious back-and-forth negotiations between lawmakers and the Justice Department, which now has two separate special counsel probes investigating the potential mishandling of classified materials by Trump and Biden.
Trump is under scrutiny for his alleged obstruction of the government’s efforts to retrieve classified materials he retained after leaving the White House, while Biden has pledged full cooperation with the special counsel investigating him.
Punchbowl News first reported news of the agreement.
The Justice Department declined to comment on the developments. ABC News has reached out to lawmakers in the “Gang of Eight” but did not immediately receive a response.
What is not clear is the level of access to the documents the administration is providing to lawmakers, given sensitivities surrounding the ongoing criminal investigations of Trump and Biden.
Attorney General Merrick Garland acknowledged those sensitivities when he was pressed on the administration’s hesitance to provide access to some of the materials recovered from Trump, Biden and Pence’s homes in an appearance before Congress two weeks ago, though he also noted negotiations were progressing.
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