Congress to Trump: Your tweet deletes might break the law
Members of the House Oversight Committee warn that the president's habit of deleting tweets may violate the Presidential Records Act.
Remember that trouble President Donald Trump had earlier this month when he was trying to spell "hear by" ... I mean "hearby" ... I mean hereby in a tweet about Rep. Nancy Pelosi's alleged close ties to Russia?
Well, it turns out his three attempts (final version posted below) -- and, more significantly, two deletions -- may have violated federal law.
That's according to Utah Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz and Maryland Democrat Rep. Elijah Cummings, chairman and ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, respectively. They sent a letter to the Trump administration Wednesday voicing broad concerns about the administration's record keeping habits and transparency issues when it comes to social media and other electronic forms of communication.
Specifically, they said Trump's habit of deleting tweets "could pose a violation to the Presidential Records Act" if the deleted tweets are not archived. They were referring to use of both Trump's personal @realDonaldTrump account and his official @POTUS account.
"Many of the messages sent from these accounts are likely to be presidential records and therefore must be preserved," they wrote.
The White House didn't immediately respond to a request for comment on the letter.