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President Joe Biden talks with reporters at the White House on Jan 20, 2023. (AP) President Joe Biden talks with reporters at the White House on Jan 20, 2023. (AP)

President Joe Biden talks with reporters at the White House on Jan 20, 2023. (AP)

Louis Jacobson
By Louis Jacobson January 24, 2023
Amy Sherman
By Amy Sherman January 24, 2023

GOP congressman oversimplifies claim on classified documents amid Biden investigation

If Your Time is short

  • There are scenarios in which classified documents can be removed from a sensitive compartmented information facility, also known as a SCIF. It’s a physical space that meets intelligence community protocols that allows officials with the proper security clearance to study classified documents. 

  • Sensitive compartmented information facilities are used typically for materials categorized as "top secret/sensitive compartmented information." 

  • There are differing levels of classified documents, with escalating levels of security clearances required to view them. Not all classified documents must be viewed in a SCIF.

President Joe Biden has been grappling with the discovery of classified documents at two locations: his post-vice presidential office in Washington, D.C., and his home in Wilmington, Delaware. U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed a special counsel to determine whether Biden or his staff have broken any laws governing the handling of classified materials.

On "Fox News Sunday," Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., who has served on the House Intelligence Committee, called for equal treatment of Biden’s case and the one involving former President Donald Trump, who is facing his own special counsel investigation of how classified documents and other government papers were stored at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.

Referring to Biden’s handling of materials with classified markings, Fitzpatrick cited his experience as an FBI special agent and a federal prosecutor, and said: "Classified documents can never be taken out of a SCIF, ever." 

A SCIF, pronounced "skiff," is intelligence community shorthand for "sensitive compartmented information facility." It is a physical space that meets intelligence community protocols in which classified documents can be studied securely by officials with the proper security clearance. 

We contacted Fitzpatrick’s office to ask for evidence to support his statement, but got no reply. Fitzpatrick made much the same point Aug. 14 on "Face the Nation," after Trump’s documents came to light, saying, "Nobody's claiming that it's OK to have a, certainly I'm not, that it's okay to have classified information anywhere outside of a SCIF."

Experts, however, told PolitiFact that Fitzpatrick exaggerated and oversimplified the relationship between classified documents and SCIFs. 

Understanding SCIFs

The federal government and its contractors collectively have thousands of SCIFs in numerous locations, said Robert Deitz, a George Mason University public policy professor who previously worked at the CIA and as the National Security Agency’s general counsel.

A SCIF "is a room — any room — that meets the requirements established by the intel community," Deitz said. Those have to do with factors such as locks, isolation and building security, he said.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence distributes a 100-plus-page memo of specifications for the facilities, including criteria for doors and windows and rules for personnel and telecommunications. The facilities are usually permanent, but they can also be temporary, since the president and vice president need access to sensitive information wherever they may be, including when on vacation. 

Fitzpatrick referred collectively to "classified documents," but there are differing levels of classification, with escalating levels of security clearances required to view them. The least restrictive level is confidential; the most restrictive levels are top secret and above. 

Although all classified documents can be viewed in a SCIF, it is not required that documents in the least restrictive classification categories be viewed in those facilities. The facilities are used typically for materials categorized as "top secret/sensitive compartmented information." 

Classified documents below the top levels typically are stored, retained and viewed in classified spaces that are not SCIFs, said Bradley Moss, a Washington, D.C., lawyer who works on national security cases. These classified spaces do not have the same security guidelines as SCIFs, he said, though they are more restrictive than normal workspaces. 

The only information that must be protected in a SCIF is classified information derived from intelligence sources and methods, said Steven Aftergood, former director of the Federation of American Scientists Project on Government Secrecy.

So, there is a broad swath of "classified documents" that is not required to be brought to a SCIF in the first place.

Can highly secret material be removed from a SCIF?

Even information classified as top secret/sensitive compartmented information may be removed from a SCIF as long as proper protocols are followed, experts said. The same is true for material with lower classifications.

Molly Shadel, a University of Virginia law professor who formerly worked at the Justice Department, gave an example of a Justice Department lawyer working with top secret/sensitive compartmented information materials in a SCIF. The lawyer might find that some of the documents need to be presented to a judge, which would require an off-site meeting. 

"In that situation, the lawyer would use a special DOJ-issued bag with special locks and other security features" to transport the materials, Shadel said. "But that lawyer would need to lock the materials up in a SCIF when she’s not using it, perhaps at a local FBI field office. She couldn’t just keep it overnight in her hotel room." 

Moss said classified documents, no matter their level, "cannot simply be removed and taken outside of any secured space without complying with security protocols." However, he called Fitzpatrick’s characterization of the process an "oversimplification."

Dietz said, "Of course, Trump and Biden and every other (president and vice president) have taken sensitive information home. "Therefore, it is not true that sensitive information can never leave a SCIF."

Deitz said that a president’s or vice president’s home might be considered tantamount to a SCIF.

Finally, it’s unclear how relevant Fitzpatrick’s point is to the Biden case.

CNN, The Washington Post and NBC, without naming sources, stated that some Biden documents included "sensitive compartmented information." If true, that would mean those documents require a SCIF. Meanwhile, the list of items taken by federal agents during the Mar-a-Lago search include materials described as "various classified/TS/SCI documents." The FBI photographed documents marked top secret found at Mar-a-Lago.

Biden’s personal attorney, Bob Bauer, said in a Jan. 21 statement that Biden’s lawyers gave the Justice Department access to search his Wilmington home. The Jan. 20 search turned up "six items consisting of documents with classification markings and surrounding materials, some of which were from the President’s service in the Senate and some of which were from his tenure as Vice President."

Our ruling

Fitzpatrick said, "Classified documents can never be taken out of a (sensitive compartmented information facility), ever."

This is exaggerated. SCIFs must be used when documents with the highest-level classifications have to be reviewed. But even the most highly classified documents can be taken out of a SCIF, as long as specific precautions are taken that ensure similar levels of security. 

In addition, it’s not required that documents with lower levels of classifications be viewed in a SCIF in the first place. 

Fitzpatrick’s statement is partially accurate but leaves out important details.

We rate it Half True.

RELATED: Trump is wrong; Biden did have the right to declassify records as VP

RELATED: Read the Mar-a-Lago search warrant, what agents took

Our Sources

Fox News, GOP, Dems agree that Biden classified documents scandal must be investigated, Jan. 23, 2023

"Fox News Sunday," Clip of Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, Jan. 22, 2023

CBS, U.S. attorney reviewing documents marked classified from Joe Biden's vice presidency found at Biden think tank, updated Jan. 10, 2023

CNN, Classified documents from Biden’s time as VP discovered in private office, Jan. 9, 2023

Washington Post, Biden ‘surprised’ by classified documents as Hill demands more information, Jan. 10, 2023

NBC, Special counsel named to investigate Biden classified records that included top secret document, Jan. 12, 2023

NPR, Why the DOJ's photo of top secret documents held by Trump matters, Sept. 1, 2022

Oak Ridge National Laboratory, "Security Classification of Information," accessed Jan. 24, 2023

Director of National Intelligence, Technical Specifications for Construction and Management of Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities, July 26, 2021

White House, Remarks by President Biden Before Marine One Departure, Aug. 26, 2022

Factcheck.org, Timeline of Biden’s Classified Documents, Jan. 19, 2023

CNN, FBI searches Biden’s Wilmington home and finds more classified materials, Jan. 21, 2023

PolitiFact, "Trump, Biden classified documents cases differ in key ways. Here’s how.," Jan. 10, 2023

PolitiFact, "Could Trump argue he declassified the documents found in the Mar-a-Lago search?," Aug. 11, 2022

PolitiFact, "Have people been prosecuted for mishandling White House records?," Aug. 10, 2022

PolitiFact, "Could Donald Trump declassify documents with just a thought? Three legal precedents say no," Sept. 23, 2022

Email interview with Robert Deitz, professor of public policy at George Mason University and former senior councilor to the director of the Central Intelligence Agency and general counsel at the National Security Agency, Jan. 23, 2023

Email interview with Elizabeth Goitein, senior director of the liberty and national security program at New York University Law School’s Brennan Center for Justice, Jan. 23, 2023

Email interview with Bradley Moss, Washington, D.C., lawyer who works on national security cases, Jan. 23, 2023

Email interview with Molly Bishop Shadel, law professor at the University of Virginia, Jan. 23, 2023

Email interview with Steven Aftergood, former director of the Federation of American Scientists Project on Government Secrecy, Jan. 23, 2023

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GOP congressman oversimplifies claim on classified documents amid Biden investigation

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