Presidential Power to Declassify Information, Explained

WASHINGTON — Former President Donald J. Trump’s claim that he had declassified all of the documents that the F.B.I. seized in the search of his Florida home last week — including those marked as top secret — has heightened interest in the scope of a president’s power to declassify information.

On Friday, Mr. Trump’s office claimed that when he was president, he had a “standing order” that materials “removed from the Oval Office and taken to the residence were deemed to be declassified the moment he removed them,” according to a statement read on Fox News by a right-wing writer Mr. Trump has designated as one of his representatives to the National Archives.

Apart from whether there is any evidence that such an order actually existed, the notion has been greeted with disdain by national security legal specialists. Glenn S. Gerstell, the top lawyer for the National Security Agency from 2015 to 2020, pronounced the idea that whatever Mr. Trump happened to take upstairs each evening automatically became declassified — without logging what it was and notifying the agencies that used that information — “preposterous.”

The claim is also irrelevant to Mr. Trump’s potential troubles over the document matter, because none of the three criminal laws cited in a search warrant as the basis of the investigation depend on whether documents contain classified information.

Still, the novel claim is striking. Here is a closer look at what a president can and cannot do when it comes to removing protections for government secrets.

What is the classification system?

It is the administrative process by which the federal government controls how executive branch officials handle information whose potential public exposure is deemed likely to damage national security.

Officials with the authority to classify or declassify matters can deem information as falling into three categories: confidential, secret or top secret. Access to particularly sensitive information can be restricted even further with a designation of S.C.I., for sensitive compartmented information.

If information is classified, access to it is restricted. Any documents containing that information are supposed to be marked, and only officials with proper security clearances — and a “need to know” — are permitted to see them or be told of their contents. There are also rules limiting how they can be stored, physically transported or electronically transmitted.

The legal basis for the classification system comes from the president’s constitutional authority as commander in chief. Presidents have established and developed it through a series of executives orders dating to the era encompassing World War II and the early Cold War. The current directive, Executive Order 13526, was issued by President Barack Obama in 2009.

Is the classification system enforced by criminal law?

Largely not.

For the most part, the classification system is about bureaucratic controls. The main punishment for disobedience is administrative: Officials can be admonished, lose their security clearances and be fired.

As such, the classification system…