Trump would carry secret records in his jacket pocket, risking them being seen by staffers without clearance, former press secretary says

Stephanie Grisham said she often saw former President Donald Trump "mishandle" secret records.

Classified documents are meant to be rigorously guarded, with secure rooms and safes.

Grisham said Trump was unconcerned by those rules and risks people without clearance seeing files.

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Former White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said that she regularly saw former President Donald Trump "mishandle" sensitive records.

She told USA Today that this included seeing him putting records in his jacket pocket, risking staffers without the security clearance being able to see them.

Grisham told the outlet that this posed a potential national-security threat, but Trump either didn't realise or didn't care.

The USA today article also drew on officials from past White House administrations saying that Trump's handling of documents appeared to be a troubling breakdown in the protocols meant to kept such files safe.

Concerns about the former president's handling of federal records led to the FBI searching his Mar-a-Lago residence in August. They found more than 10,000 government documents, many of which were classified.

Some of the records were so sensitive that even agents needed special clearance to see them, according to Justice Department court documents.

Exactly how documents are required to be handled depends on their level of classification. The most secret ones are meant only to be viewed in secure facilities.

But, per court filings connected to the raid at Mar-a-Lago, highly classified records were instead kept mingled with other records, newspaper cuttings and scraps of Trump's handwritten notes.

Grisham has previously said that during Trump's time in office, records would "just disappear", and that he carelessly stored classified documents in boxes along with newspapers and miscellaneous paperwork.

She and other former aides have also previously spoken about Trump and his staff's treatment of official documents, including ripping, burning and flushing them.

Grisham joined the Trump campaign in 2016 and went on to serve in various roles, including Trump's press secretary and Chief of Staff and press secretary for First Lady Melania Trump.

She quit the administration on January 6, 2021, as the Capitol riot was unfolding, and has since become a vocal critic of the former president.

Trump in return has attacked Grisham and said that she is not telling the truth about him.