Clinton and Trump handled classified information carelessly.  Biden has said that he was surprised the classified documents were found at his offices.  Assuming he is telling the truth, that means he was not responsible for them being there and did not know they were there.  So it would be more accurate to say that an employee of Biden, rather than Biden himself, handled classified documents carelessly.

Certainly you can make a "buck stops here" argument that Biden is ultimately responsible for the careless actions of his employees, and should have had policies and procedures in place to ensure such a thing wasn't done.  But there is a notable distinction between being personal carelessness (or outright disregard for the law) and being responsible for the actions of an employee.

Wouldn't the absence of such policies and procedures constitute the same level of carelessness?  

In a military setting, any staff that could potentially be in a position to handle classified materials would be thoroughly trained and have the proper level of clearance.

Should an elected official be held to a lower standard?  IMO, it should be just the opposite.  The higher the level of classification, the greater the burden should be on the person responsible for protecting the information.  Surely Biden was aware of who had access to classified documents in his possession, and had the ability to ensure they were properly instructed on how to handle the documents.  If he failed to do so, then he should be accountable for that.

Having said that, we are still early in the process of discovering the facts surrounding the handling of the documents.  Biden may have had policies and procedures in place, and its possible his staff disregarded them.  Until we know otherwise, Biden is entitled to the benefit of the doubt.

___________________________

The mental gymnastics used to obfuscate what's going on here are Olympian quality..

All government employees go through the same yearly (sometimes more frequent) information systems security training regarding the handling, retention, etc. of classified materials. Secret, Top Secret, TS/SCI, etc. A sitting Vice-President with decades of service in the government should know better. That VP's staff should know better. Everyone. Knows. Better. No one gives a damn if Trump himself packed the stuff up and took it to Maralago or if Trump himself was pushing a handcart stacked with boxes... or if he had a bunch of staffers doing the heavy lifting. INFOSEC 101.

Offices? There were boxes found in the garage at a private residence. . This isn't like they cleared out a desk and forgot to check a drawer. Now, do high level staff occasionally work from their private residences? Sure. Can those residences be certified as a SCIF for the duration of that work, should the situation call for it? Yes. But at the conclusion of that work, that certification is removed and all classified materials need to be removed. For all intents and purposes, these materials (whatever they are... I haven't seen it inventoried yet) have been sitting right there for the 4 years he was out of office as a private citizen plus the first two years of this administration, next to his bicycle tire pump and a ladder the neighbor could come over and borrow.

I'm happy that he's cooperating, but his lack of being an obstructionist is the main saving grace in this situation.

Ron DeSantis just BANNED AP African American Studies from being taught in schools... because “it lacks educational value” and violates Florida’s anti-CRT law...

...wasn't he kissing ass and quoting Dr. King just 3 days ago??

-C!

That's it: everyone empty out your closets, let's see whatcha got!

All of 'em.
I guess EVERYONE sleeps through that INFOSEC training.

It seems that this is evolving into a problem with officials removing docs without proper guardrails and constraints on them, enforcing accountability even for the president. That's a problem.

It doesn't mean Trump shouldn't be prosecuted or Biden investigated. 

The difference is Trump packed up cases of the documents and took them home, and even if that was staff accidentally doing that, he was asked repeatedly to return the documents and would not comply. Biden and Pence are coming forward with documents.

I think all of this is unfortunate as it somehow sets a tone that what Trump did during his reign of terror is equaled by Biden (and now Pence). The documents are just one of many problem areas under Trump, and even if you want to stop there and say well, he did this but Biden did that, even that is not equal.

At least this gets people (and politicians) focused on partisan politics vs the state of the country, 39 mass shootings in 24 days, etc. Wonderful.

Ron DeSantis just BANNED AP African American Studies from being taught in schools... because “it lacks educational value” and violates Florida’s anti-CRT law...

...wasn't he kissing ass and quoting Dr. King just 3 days ago??

=====================================================

I'm sure the African American descendants of Rosewood would tell DeSantis to go fuck himself............