Donald Trump ‘repeatedly tears up important documents that have to be taped back together by staff’

Donald Trump has been accused of repeatedly ripping up important official documents, leaving staff with the task of taping them back together.

It has been reported that the US president regularly tears up papers he is legally required to keep, meaning staff have no choice but to somehow retrieve them.

Former Washington aides claim they were regularly asked to tape up documents that Mr Trump had torn up.

His habit of ripping up documents he felt he was finished with was known by some staffers as his “filing system”, Politico reported.

It spoke to former staffers who say they had to ensure the Trump administration did not break the law about preserving presidential records.

The White House must keep every document the president touches under the Presidential Records Act.

Solomon Lartey, 54, and Reginald Young Jr, 48, were terminated from their roles in records management in the spring.

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Mr Lartey, who earned a salary of $66,000 and spent the first five months of the Trump administration working in the Old Executive Office, said he was asked to use Scotch tape to fix documents.

He told Politico it was like a “jigsaw puzzle”.

He said: “We got Scotch tape, the clear kind. You found pieces and taped them back together and then you gave it back to the supervisor.”

Once restored, the documents would be sent to the National Archives.

Mr Lartey said he received newspaper clips on which Mr Trump had scribbled notes, as well as letters from other politicians, including one from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

Mr Lartey said: “I had a letter from Schumer — he tore it up. It was the craziest thing ever. He ripped papers into tiny pieces.”

He said his whole department was asked to tape up torn documents.

His colleague, Mr Young, worked as a senior records management analyst. He said in his 20 years of service to the US government he had never been asked to do such a thing.

He told Politico: “We had to endure this under the Trump administration. I’m looking at my director, and saying, ‘Are you guys serious?’ We’re making more than $60,000 a year, we need to be doing far more important things than this.

“It felt like the lowest form of work you can take on without having to empty the trash cans.”