White House tells court it's preserving presidential records even though DOJ said law is unconstitutional

Source: CNN Politics

Updated Apr 22, 2026, 4:33 PM ET
PUBLISHED Apr 22, 2026, 2:56 PM ET


White House staff are still following the “preservation” mandates of the Presidential Records Act, the Justice Department told a federal court as it pushes back on a new lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s disavowal of a Watergate-era documents law.

The filings made public the White House’s official approach to records retention now that the Justice Department – via an opinion from the department Office of Legal Counsel – told President Donald Trump that he no longer had to comply with the Presidential Records Act. White House Counsel David Warrington issued a memo on April 2, the day after the OLC opinion was published, that was released publicly with Tuesday’s court filings.

The law requires that presidents and their staffs preserve records related to government activity, and that those records be turned over to the National Archives at the end of each administration – with provisions of the law eventually making some of those documents available to the public.

The new White House memo did not address what steps President Trump or Vice President JD Vance should take to preserve records, nor did it lay out plans to ultimately turn White House documents over to the Archives. Critics have raised concerns that Trump will take with him when he leaves office the same kinds of highly sensitive government records that he brought to Mar-a-Lago after his first administration, leading to charges against Trump by special counsel Jack Smith for allegedly mishandling classified documents.

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2026/04/22/politics/white-house-presidential-records-act