(WASHINGTON) — The chairman of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol said Monday it was “too early” to know if the probe has been impacted by the discovery that Donald Trump took boxes of presidential records with him when he left the White House last year.

National Archives officials confirmed Monday that the agency recently retrieved 15 boxes of presidential records from the former president’s Mar-a-Lago Club in Florida that were “improperly” removed after the end of his time in the White House.

According to National Archivist David Ferriero, representatives for Trump are “continuing to search” for more records that may have been improperly taken from the White House.

Sources tell ABC News that the documents, which were retrieved last month, included communications between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jung Un, as well as a letter from former President Barack Obama to Trump that was left as per custom ahead of Trump’s inauguration.

Officials say the records should have been transferred to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) from the White House at the conclusion of the Trump administration in January 2021, as required by the Presidential Records Act.

“NARA pursues the return of records whenever we learn that records have been improperly removed or have not been appropriately transferred to official accounts,” Ferriero said.

The Washington Post first reported the news of the records being retrieved from Mar-a-Lago.

A spokesperson for Trump did not respond to ABC News’ request for comment.

Last month the U.S. Supreme Court paved the way for the House committee investigating Jan. 6 to access hundreds of National Archives records as part of its probe.

Committee chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., told ABC News that it was “too early” to know how Trump’s handling of White House records has impacted the committee’s work to date — and whether it has prevented investigators from obtaining key documents and records.

Thompson on Monday said the committee “would not hesitate” to make a criminal referral to the Justice Department if lawmakers determine that Trump willfully violated the Presidential Records Act.

“We will continue to review, and if the review shows that a referral is warranted, we won’t hesitate to do it,” Thompson said.

As previously reported by ABC News, House investigators have discovered that Trump had a habit of shredding documents, notes and other White House records into little pieces that at times left aides scrambling to pick them up off the floor of the Oval Office, sources said.

“The destruction of documents, the reports of large quantities of documents in Mar-a-Lago, all point to a violation of the record-keeping requirements, and the tearing up certainly seems like a willful violation of the law,” committee member Adam Schiff, D-Calif., told ABC News.

“We’re going to look at how we can have a more effective mechanism of ensuring compliance,” Schiff said. “There is substantive concern about it, and it’s not a concern that began in the last administration, but it certainly has reached a new height.”

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(WASHINGTON) — Following a day of heavy criticism, President Joe Biden’s top science adviser, Dr. Eric Lander, has resigned after an investigation into his mistreatment of staff.

“The President accepted Dr. Eric Lander’s resignation letter this evening with gratitude for his work at OSTP on the pandemic, the Cancer Moonshot, climate change, and other key priorities,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement Monday night. “He knows that Dr. Lander will continue to make important contributions to the scientific community in the years ahead.”

In his letter to the president, Lander said that his resignation “is my fault and my responsiblity.”

“I am devastated that I caused hurt to past and present colleagues by the way in which I have spoken to them,” he wrote.

He cited “ambitious goals” as the driving force behind his demanding behavior.

“I have sought to push myself and my colleagues to reach our shared goals — including at times challenging and criticizing. But it is clear that things I said, and the way I said them, crossed the line at times into being disrespectful and demeaning, to both men and women,” he wrote. “That was never my intention. Nonetheless, it is my fault and my responsibility. I will take this lesson forward.”

Psaki was asked about Lander several times during Monday’s briefing.

She condemned his behavior and said an investigation had taken place. Senior White House officials told him his behavior was inappropriate and “corrective actions needed to be taken,” she said.

“Nothing about his behavior is acceptable to anyone here — at all,” Psaki said at one point.

But the fact that Lander still had a job garnered special scrutiny because of a pledge Biden made on his first day in office.

“If you’re ever working with me and I hear you treat another colleague with disrespect, talk down to someone, I promise you I will fire you on the spot — on the spot,” he said. “No ifs, ands, or buts — everybody, everybody is entitled to be treated with decency and dignity. That’s been missing, in a big way, the last four years.”

Lander said his resignation would be effective “no later than” Feb. 18 “in order to permit an orderly transfer.”

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(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. Supreme Court has reinstated Alabama’s new GOP-drawn congressional map over the objection of civil rights groups and decisions of two lower courts finding that it dilutes the influence of Black voters in violation of the Voting Rights Act.

The vote to temporarily stay a lower court order blocking the map was 5-4, with Chief Justice John Roberts joining the court’s three liberals in dissent.

The decision means Alabama will not immediately have to redraw its political lines to include a second majority-Black district, as had been ordered by a District Court judge, allowing the original maps to take effect for midterm elections.

At the same time, the Supreme Court’s majority said it would take up the Alabama redistricting case on the merits later this year.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh, in a statement concurring with the decision, argued that the court should stay out of the political process so close to an election, insisting the decision makes “no new law regarding the Voting Rights Act” and simply allows time for a full briefing and oral argument.

“To reiterate: The Court’s stay order is not a decision on the merits,” he said.

The court’s liberals, however, weren’t buying it.

Justice Elena Kagan, in a pointed dissent, accused her colleagues of going “badly wrong” and forcing “Black Alabamians to suffer what under that law is clear vote dilution.”

“That decision does a disservice to our own appellate processes, which serve both to constrain and to legitimate the Court’s authority. It does a disservice to the District Court, which meticulously applied this Court’s longstanding voting-rights precedent,” Kagan wrote. “And most of all, it does a disservice to Black Alabamians who under that precedent have had their electoral power diminished—in violation of a law this Court once knew to buttress all of American democracy.”

Roberts also wrote in dissent that he would have allowed the District Court’s order to stand given that its analysis of the case in his view “seems correct.”

“We are disappointed by today’s decision. The fight for fair representation for Black voters in Alabama has been a winding road, generations long,” said Evan Milligan, an Alabama voter who helped bring the legal challenge to the state’s new map. “We won’t dishonor their legacy by putting down the torch they have handed to us. We will continue striving to ensure that our legislature honors the Voting Rights Act and that Black Alabamians have an opportunity to elect a candidate of their choice.”

In a highly fact-intensive review, the lower court concluded Alabama’s maps likely violated the Voting Rights Act by depriving Black voters of influence. Section 2 of the landmark civil rights law makes it illegal to deny minority voters equal opportunity to elect representatives of their choice.

Just over a quarter of Alabama voters are Black, according to Census data, but under the proposed maps the state would have just one majority-Black district out of seven. The appeals court panel said an additional Black-majority district needed to be added.

“Black voters have less opportunity than other Alabamians to elect candidates of their choice to Congress,” the panel wrote.

All three judges were appointed by Republican presidents — two by former President Donald Trump, one by former President Ronald Reagan.

Alabama is appealing the decision, saying it would force the state to draw lines based solely on race and at a “late hour” ahead of midterms, creating voter chaos. Republicans allege the claims are less about racial representation than they are about Democrats trying to take back power.

Experts say the Supreme Court’s reasoning in the case, after it’s argued and decided on the merits, could potentially have a sweeping impact, serving as the basis for challenges to maps in California, Texas, New York, North Carolina and other states where maps face similar objections from minority voters.

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