Dec 16: The mystery of the missing binder

By Jeremy Herb, Katie Bo Lillis, Natasha Bertrand, Evan Perez and Zachary Cohen, CNN, December 15, 2023

The mystery of the missing binder: How a collection of raw Russian intelligence disappeared under Trump

By Jeremy Herb, Katie Bo Lillis, Natasha Bertrand, Evan Perez and Zachary Cohen, CNN, December 15, 2023

A binder containing highly classified information related to Russian election interference went missing at the end of Donald Trump’s presidency, raising alarms among intelligence officials that some of the most closely guarded national security secrets from the US and its allies could be exposed, sources familiar with the matter told CNN.

Its disappearance, which has not been previously reported, was so concerning that intelligence officials briefed Senate Intelligence Committee leaders last year about the missing materials and the government’s efforts to retrieve them, the sources said.

In the two-plus years since Trump left office, the missing intelligence does not appear to have been found.

The binder contained raw intelligence the US and its NATO allies collected on Russians and Russian agents, including sources and methods that informed the US government’s assessment that Russian President Vladimir Putin sought to help Trump win the 2016 election, sources tell CNN.

The intelligence was so sensitive that lawmakers and congressional aides with top secret security clearances were able to review the material only at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, where their work scrutinizing it was itself kept in a locked safe.

The binder was last seen at the White House during Trump’s final days in office. The former president had ordered it brought there so he could declassify a host of documents related to the FBI’s Russia investigation. Under the care of then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, the binder was scoured by Republican aides working to redact the most sensitive information so it could be declassified and released publicly.

The Russian intelligence was just a small part of the collection of documents in the binder, described as being 10 inches thick and containing reams of information about the FBI’s “Crossfire Hurricane” investigation into the 2016 Trump campaign and Russia. But the raw intelligence on Russia was among its most sensitive classified materials, and top Trump administration officials repeatedly tried to block the former president from releasing the documents.

The day before leaving office, Trump issued an order declassifying most of the binder’s contents, setting off a flurry of activity in the final 48 hours of his presidency. Multiple copies of the redacted binder were created inside the White House, with plans to distribute them across Washington to Republicans in Congress and right-wing journalists.

Instead, copies initially sent out were frantically retrieved at the direction of White House lawyers demanding additional redactions.

Just minutes before Joe Biden was inaugurated, Meadows rushed to the Justice Department to hand-deliver a redacted copy for a last review. Years later, the Justice Department has yet to release all of the documents, despite Trump’s declassification order. Additional copies with varying levels of redactions ended up at the National Archives.

But an unredacted version of the binder containing the classified raw intelligence went missing amid the chaotic final hours of the Trump White House. The circumstances surrounding its disappearance remain shrouded in mystery.

US officials repeatedly declined to discuss any government efforts to locate the binder or confirm that any intelligence was missing.

The binder was not among the classified items found in last year’s search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, according to a US official familiar with the matter, who said the FBI was not looking specifically for intelligence related to Russia when it obtained a search warrant for the former president’s residence last year.

There’s also no reference to the binder or the missing Russian intelligence in the June indictment of Trump over the mishandling of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.

One theory has emerged about the binder’s whereabouts.

Cassidy Hutchinson, one of Meadows’ top aides, testified to Congress and wrote in her memoir that she believes Meadows took home an unredacted version of the binder. She said it had been kept in Meadows’ safe and that she saw him leave with it from the White House.

“I am almost positive it went home with Mr. Meadows,” Hutchinson told the January 6 committee in closed-door testimony, according to transcripts released last year.

A lawyer for Meadows, however, strongly denies that Meadows mishandled any classified information at the White House, saying any suggestion Meadows was responsible for classified information going missing was “flat wrong.”

“Mr. Meadows was keenly aware of and adhered to requirements for the proper handling of classified material, any such material that he handled or was in his possession has been treated accordingly and any suggestion that he is responsible for any missing binder or other classified information is flat wrong,” Meadows attorney George Terwilliger said in a statement to CNN. “Anyone and any entity suggesting that he is responsible for anything missing does not have facts and should exercise great care before making false allegations.”

In the years since Trump left office, his allies have pursued the redacted binder so they can release it publicly, suing the Justice Department and the National Archives earlier this year. And Trump’s lawyers are now seeking access to the classified intelligence from the 2016 election assessment as they prepare for his defense against charges stemming from efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

This account of the classified binder’s journey to the White House, how its trail went cold once Trump left office, and the lingering questions it raises is based on interviews with more than a dozen sources familiar with the matter, all of whom requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive issue.

The CIA, the FBI, the National Archives and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment for this story. A spokeswoman for the Senate Intelligence Committee declined comment. A lawyer for Hutchinson also declined comment. A spokesman for Trump did not respond to a request for comment.

‘A safe within a safe’ at the CIA

The missing binder is at the heart of one of the most contentious fights waged behind the scenes by then-President Trump. Despite fierce opposition from his own national security officials, Trump spent years trying to declassify material that he said would prove his claims the FBI’s Russia probe into his campaign was a hoax.

The binder’s origins trace back to 2018, when Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee, led by Chairman Devin Nunes, compiled a classified report alleging the Obama administration skewed intelligence in its assessment that Putin had worked to help Trump in the 2016 election.

The GOP report, which criticized the intelligence community’s “tradecraft,” scrutinized the highly classified intelligence from 2016 that informed the assessment Putin and Russia sought to assist Trump’s campaign. House Republicans cut a deal with the CIA in which the committee brought in a safe for its documents that was then placed inside a CIA vault – a setup that prompted some officials to characterize it as a “turducken” or a “safe within a safe.”

Republican and Democratic sources disagreed on the substance of the report. GOP sources familiar with its details said the report argued the intelligence community assessment was skewed by senior Obama administration officials to exclude intelligence suggesting that Russia actually wanted Hillary Clinton to win in 2016, while overemphasizing the significance of intelligence indicating that Russia preferred Trump.

Democratic sources, however, say the Republican allegations were overblown. One source said the intelligence referenced in the report actually proved the opposite of what Republicans were claiming – saying it showed that Russia was meddling in US elections and seeking to personally manipulate Trump and help him win.

The Democratic view was corroborated in 2020 by the Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee, which concluded that the 2016 assessment was a “sound intelligence product” and that analysts were under no political pressure to reach specific conclusions, undercutting Nunes’ allegations.

Nunes, who left Congress to become CEO of Trump's media company, provided a statement in response to questions mocking CNN for focusing on "secret Trump binders.”

National security leaders resist

Nunes’ 2018 report became one of many documents connected to the Russia investigation that Trump and his allies wanted to make public.

But Trump’s national security leaders, particularly CIA Director Gina Haspel, vehemently resisted public release of the report and other Russia documents, fearing the exposure of sources and methods. The disagreement followed Haspel throughout her tenure in the Trump administration.

Trump privately made clear that he wanted to get his hands on the GOP report. During one exchange in October 2020, Trump suggested he should personally visit CIA headquarters and demand access to it, according to a source familiar with the conversation.

In the leadup to the 2020 election, two Trump intelligence leaders, acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell and his successor, John Ratcliffe, declassified some documents and intelligence related to Russia and the FBI. But the House GOP report remained classified.

Trump considered firing Haspel after the election as he pushed to release more information about the Russia investigation. At least one Trump adviser floated replacing Haspel with Kash Patel, an aide to Nunes in 2018 when the GOP report was drafted. In 2019, Patel went to work for Trump on the National Security Council before becoming chief of staff to the acting defense secretary in Trump’s final months.

In December 2020, then-Attorney General William Barr worked with Ratcliffe to dissuade Trump from declassifying at least a subset of the intelligence related to Russia, arguing that it would damage national security, sources familiar with the matter said. Other current and former officials say Barr and aides in his office also pushed the FBI and the intelligence agencies to satisfy Trump’s demands and make public more of the information, pressure that continued after Barr left office.

At one point after the election, Haspel, FBI Director Christopher Wray and NSA Director Gen. Paul Nakasone trekked to Capitol Hill on short notice to speak to congressional intelligence leaders about their deep concerns of Trump possibly releasing the material, sources said.

Secrets arrive at the White House

On December 19, four days after Barr announced his resignation, Nunes met with Meadows at the White House to discuss how to declassify documents related to the FBI’s investigation into the Trump campaign and Russia, Hutchinson testified to Congress.

Eleven days later, sources say that a copy of the GOP report was brought to the White House as one part of the massive binder of documents on Russia and the FBI investigation. Hutchinson told the January 6 committee she signed for the documents when they arrived at the White House.

Over the next few days, Meadows discussed the documents with then-White House Counsel Pat Cipollone and also met with Republican staffers from the House Intelligence Committee to review them, according to Hutchinson.

In his book about his time as Trump’s chief of staff, Meadows wrote that Trump demanded the documents be brought to the White House. “I personally went through every page, to make sure that the President's declassification would not inadvertently disclose sources and methods,” he wrote.

Along with the GOP report scrutinizing the intelligence on Russia, the binder’s contents included the FBI’s problematic foreign intelligence surveillance warrants on a Trump campaign adviser from 2017; interview notes with Christopher Steele, author of the infamous dossier on Trump and Russia; FBI reports from a confidential human source related to the Russia investigation; and internal FBI and DOJ text messages and emails, among other documents.

The version of the binder Hutchinson signed for was kept in Meadows’ office safe, she testified, except when it was being worked on by congressional staffers.

“He wanted to keep that one close-hold. He didn't want that one to be widely known about,” Hutchinson told the January 6 committee. “I just know Mr. Meadows. He wouldn't have had that one copied unless he did it on his own, but I don't think he knows how to use a copy machine.”

In her book, Hutchinson recalled a moment when Meadows asked her to retrieve the binder and complained when she told him it was in the safe. “I told you not to let it out of your sight. It should have been in your desk drawer,” Meadows told her.

“My desk drawer, Mark, is not where classified documents belong. It was in the safe. You have nothing to worry about,” Hutchinson writes that she responded.

Once the committee aides completed their proposed redactions, additional copies were made at the White House so the binder could be declassified and released.

A botched rollout

Meanwhile, at the FBI, top officials scrambled to protect the most sensitive details and limit the damage of what they felt were insufficient redactions.

“Any further declassification would reveal sensitive intelligence collection techniques, damage foreign partner relations, jeopardize United States Intelligence Community equities, potentially violate court orders limiting the dissemination of FISA information … (and) endanger confidential human sources,” a top FBI official wrote to White House officials, according to a source who read portions of the letter to CNN.

On January 19, 2021, Trump issued a declassification order for a “binder of materials related to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Crossfire Hurricane investigation.”

The White House had planned to distribute the declassified documents around Washington, including to Trump-allied conservative journalist John Solomon. But Trump’s order did not lead to its release – and earlier this year Solomon sued the Justice Department and National Archives for access to the documents.

His court filings provide colorful details of the last-minute scramble.

Solomon claims that on the night of January 19, Meadows invited him to the White House to review several hundred pages of the declassified binder. One of Solomon’s staffers was even allowed to leave the White House with the declassified records in a paper bag.

“Mr. Solomon’s staff began setting up a scanning operation for the complete set of documents to be released the next morning,” Solomon’s attorneys wrote in a court filing last month. “But as they set up the equipment, they received a call from the White House asking that the documents — still under embargo — be returned because the White House wished to make some additional redactions to unclassified information under the Privacy Act.”

Hutchinson writes in her book that Cipollone told her after 10:30 p.m. on January 19 to have Meadows retrieve the binders that had been given to Solomon and a right-wing columnist. “The Crossfire Hurricane binders are a complete disaster. They’re still full of classified information,” Hutchinson writes that Cipollone told her. “Those binders need to come back to the White House. Like, now.”

The documents were returned the next morning, on January 20, after they were picked up by a Secret Service agent in a Whole Foods grocery bag, according to Hutchinson.

‘How quickly can we get this to DOJ?’

On the morning of January 20, the final day of the Trump presidency, Meadows rushed to the Justice Department to turn over a copy of the binder Trump ordered declassified for a final review.

Hutchinson told the committee that sometime between 11 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. that morning, Meadows emerged from the White House in a hurry to deliver a copy of the binder to the Justice Department.

Hutchinson recalled Meadows asking his security detail, “How quickly can we get this to DOJ?”

Meadows also delivered a memo instructing the Justice Department to conduct its own privacy review of the bulk of the documents Trump had declassified before they were released.

“I am returning the bulk of the binder of declassified documents to the Department of Justice (including all that appear to have a potential to raise privacy concerns) with the instruction that the Department must expeditiously conduct a Privacy Act review under the standards that the Department of Justice would normally apply, redact material appropriately, and release the remaining material with redactions applied,” Meadows wrote in the memo.

Solomon’s lawyers contend in a legal filing that Meadows “promised Mr. Solomon that he would receive the revised binder. However, this never occurred.”

As for the unredacted version of the binder, Hutchinson writes in her book that she saw Meadows get into his limo the night of January 19 with the “original Crossfire Hurricane binder tucked under his arm.”

“What the hell is Mark doing with the unredacted Crossfire Hurricane binder?” Hutchinson recalled asking herself as Meadows drove away.

When she looked in Meadows’ safe for the last time before she left the White House, Hutchinson said it was gone.

“I don't think that would have been something that he would have destroyed,” Hutchinson told the January 6 committee. “It was not returned anywhere, and it never left our office to go internally anywhere. It stayed in our safe, in the office safe most of the time.”

Terwilliger, an attorney for Meadows, disputes Hutchinson’s account, saying Meadows did not mishandle any classified documents at the White House.

The hunt continues

Even after Trump left office, the hunt for the binder continued on multiple fronts.

Roughly a year after Trump left office, Senate Intelligence Committee leaders were briefed by intelligence officials about the disappearance of the raw Russian intelligence contained in the unredacted version of the binder and the government’s efforts to retrieve it, sources told CNN.

At the same time, Trump’s allies sought to regain access to the declassified version of the binder that Meadows had taken to the Justice Department.

In June 2022, Trump named Solomon and Patel as his representatives to the National Archives, who were authorized to view the former president’s records. Solomon’s lawsuit included email correspondence showing how Solomon and Patel tried to get access to the binder as soon as they were named as Trump’s representatives.

“There is a binder of documents from the Russia investigation that the President declassified with an order in his last few days in office. It's about 10 inches thick,” Solomon wrote in June 2022 to Gary Stern, the Archives’ general counsel. “We'd like to make a set of copies -- digital or paper format -- of every document that was declassified by his order and included in the binder.”

In February and March, the FBI released under the Freedom of Information Act several hundred pages of heavily redacted internal records from its Russia investigation, following lawsuits from conservative groups seeking documents from the probe.

The Justice Department said in a June filing seeking to dismiss Solomon’s lawsuit that the FBI’s document release had fulfilled Meadows’ request for a Privacy Act review, noting that it had “resulted in the posting of most of the binder” on the FBI’s FOIA website.

Solomon responded claiming the documents that the FBI released were only “a small part of the binder’s contents with substantial additional redactions.”

Last July, Meadows said in an interview with Solomon that he turned over the documents to the Justice Department out of an “abundance of caution.”

“We gave them those declassified documents -- I want to stress they were declassified documents -- to do a final redaction for some of that personal information, with the instruction that they were to go ahead and disseminate those,” Meadows said. “We expected fully that they would do that, at the most a few days -- but here we are a few years later.”

Update: This story has been updated to provide a more detailed description of conservative journalist John Solomon.