The House Select Committee investigating the January 6 Capitol insurrection recently obtained many official White House documents from the Trump Administration. Unfortunately, many of those papers were ripped apart and taped back together. Yes, kindergarten style. The former president had a bad habit of tearing up official records and did so countless times during his four-year run despite being told repeatedly it was against the law.

This may sound shady, but the damage goes beyond that and into the illegal department. His actions again caused undue stress on his staff, who had to take care of the torn-up pages consistently. According to one source, “The ripping was so relentless that Trump’s team implemented protocols to try to ensure that he was abiding by the Presidential Records Act.”

From the Washington Post:

One senior Trump White House official said he and other White House staffers frequently put documents into “burn bags” to be destroyed, rather than preserving them, and would decide themselves what should be saved and what should be burned.

Even though there are many witnesses and physical evidence to verify Trump’s illegal actions, it is just one more thing that will go unpunished and that his followers will turn a blind eye to. James Grossman, the American Historical Association executive director, explained, “It is against the law, but the problem is that the Presidential Records Act, as written, does not have any real enforcement mechanism.”

Without any way precedented punishment, it is unlikely that Trump will see any repercussions. That leaves the House Select Committee literally piecing together the information in these documents, as some were not even actually taped back together. It seems unlikely that they even got a hold of all the documents that could be useful to them, as per the former POTUS’s habit of throwing them right into the trash bin.

From The Washington Post:

The ripping was so relentless that Trump’s team implemented protocols to try to ensure that he was abiding by the Presidential Records Act. Typically, aides from either the Office of the Staff Secretary or the Oval Office Operations team would come in behind Trump to retrieve the piles of torn paper he left in his wake, according to one person familiar with the routine. Then, staffers from the White House Office of Records Management were generally responsible for jigsawing the documents back together, using clear tape.

The Presidential Records Act states that all official White House documentation, such as schedules, memos, briefings, and more, must be put into the National Archive. Trump’s staff tried to keep up with this law, and typically, “aides from either the Office of the Secretary or the Oval Office Operations Team would come in behind Trump to retrieve the piles of torn paper he left in his wake.”