(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) The head of the National Archives, the infamous agency behind the Mar-a-Lago raid, may soon join the unemployment line.
Colleen Shogan, the so-called Archivist of the United States, was fired Friday evening at President Donald Trump’s request, according to White House Presidential Personnel Director Sergio Gor.
“We thank Colleen Shogan for her service,” Gor wrote on X.
At the direction of @realDonaldTrump the Archivist of the United States has been dismissed tonight. We thank Colleen Shogan for her service.
— Sergio Gor (@SergioGor) February 8, 2025
Shogan was appointed to the role by Joe Biden, the disgraced former president, on Aug. 3, 2022, after her predecessor, David Ferriero, pushed NARA to work with the DOJ to target Trump.
Shogan previously worked at the David M. Rubenstein Center for White House History and the White House Historical Association.
The firing was widely praised on social media, with many citing Shogan’s animosity toward conservatives as demonstrated during her confirmation hearing. She also worked tooth and nail to block transparency at the controversial NARA.
“Shogan was an opponent of transparency and public access to classified historical records,” said former Trump-era Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Ezra Cohen.
This is a great move. Shogan was an opponent of transparency and public access to classified historical records. She systematically defunded efforts to reduce over classification and increase declassification. Also, she showed a terrible bias against conservatives as was…
— Ezra A. Cohen (@EzraACohen) February 8, 2025
Cohen, now a fellow at the Hudson Institute, added, “She systematically defunded efforts to reduce over classification and increase declassification.”
The National Archives and Records Administration is the same agency that accused Trump of violating the Presidential Records Act by allegedly failing to turn over material to federal archivists after his term ended in 2021.
NARA worked with Biden’s Attorney General Merrick Garland and the FBI to orchestrate the raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate.
The raid, along with NARA’s sudden concern over presidential records, was unprecedented. Never before had a former president’s home been raided.
Despite the supposed urgency to protect what the left claimed were classified documents, it later emerged that Biden had kept classified materials for years—long before Trump left the White House in 2021.
Unlike Trump, Biden—then a former vice president—did not have the authority to declassify documents and keep them in his private residence.
To make matters worse, Biden admitted in private recordings to keeping classified materials and even shared them with his ghostwriter.
And here is,
the U.S. Espionage Act of 1917 and Sedition Act of 1918,
JOE BIDEN: "I DID NOT share classified information, I did not, with my ghostwriter, I did not. I'll guarantee it." pic.twitter.com/8TPdmDs2wH
— 🇺🇸RealRobert🇺🇸 (@Real_RobN) March 13, 2024
Trump, meanwhile, maintained that any documents in his possession were declassified and legally his. As president, he held the power to declassify any document he wanted.
Trump’s former vice president, Mike Pence, also had classified documents. Like Biden, he lacked the authority to declassify them.
Yet Trump was the only one hit with criminal charges following Garland’s appointment of Jack Smith as special counsel. The charges were dismissed in a humiliating defeat for NARA.
It is unclear who Trump will pick as Shogan’s replacement. In the meantime, Politico reported that Deputy Archivist Jay Bosanko, a government bureaucrat, will serve as acting head.
