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Classified documents were found in a damaged cardboard box in President Joe Biden鈥檚 cluttered Delaware garage, near where golf clubs hung on the wall. A photo in former President Donald Trump鈥檚 indictment, meanwhile, shows stacks of boxes filled with documents under a chandelier in an ornate Mar-a-Lago bathroom.

In Mr. Biden鈥檚 case, special counsel Robert Hur, a former U.S. attorney for Maryland nominated by Mr. Trump, concluded in a report released Feb. 8 that the president should not face criminal charges, despite finding evidence that Mr. Biden willfully retained classified information. Mr. Trump, on the other hand, is scheduled to stand trial on charges alleging he hoarded classified documents at his Florida estate and thwarted government efforts to get them back.

Mr. Trump, who has denied any wrongdoing in the case brought by special counsel Jack Smith, slammed the decision not to charge Mr. Biden, saying: 鈥淭HIS IS A TWO-TIERED SYSTEM OF JUSTICE!鈥� Mr. Biden, late Feb. 8, angrily lashed out at Mr. Hur for unflattering characterizations of his memory in the report and said he never shared classified information.

At look at the similarities and differences between the Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump investigations:

What kinds of documents are we talking about?

Biden documents: FBI agents found classified documents about Afghanistan in Mr. Biden鈥檚 Delaware garage in 2022, along with drafts of a handwritten memo Mr. Biden sent to President Barack Obama to persuade Mr. Obama not to send more troops into the country, Mr. Hur鈥檚 report said.

In an office and basement den in the Delaware home, agents also found notebooks with classified information that Mr. Biden wrote on during briefings with Mr. Obama and in White House Situation Room meetings, the report said. Investigators said the notebooks included national security and foreign policy information that touched on 鈥渟ensitive intelligence sources and methods.鈥� Mr. Hur found that on at least three occasions during interviews with his ghostwriter, Mr. Biden read aloud from classified parts from his notebooks 鈥渘early verbatim.鈥�

Trump documents: Prosecutors have alleged that Mr. Trump stored hundreds of classified documents in boxes as he packed to leave the White House in 2021. After an attorney for Mr. Trump told the FBI that there were no more classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, the FBI searched the property in August 2022 and found more than 100 documents with classified markings, according to his indictment. Each of the 32 counts of willful retention of national defense information Mr. Trump is charged with pertains to a specific classified document found at Mar-a-Lago that was marked 鈥淪ECRET鈥� or 鈥淭OP SECRET.鈥� Topics addressed in the documents include details about U.S. nuclear weapons and the nuclear capabilities of a foreign country.

Why wasn鈥檛 Mr. Biden charged?

Mr. Hur concluded there is not enough evidence to convict Mr. Biden of 鈥渨illfully鈥� retaining the Afghanistan documents or the notebooks. When the Afghanistan documents were found in the garage in 2022, Mr. Biden was allowed to have them because he was president at the time, the report said. To bring charges, Mr. Hur said prosecutors would have to rely on a comment that Mr. Biden had made to his ghostwriter in 2017 鈥� when Mr. Biden was a private citizen and living in Virginia 鈥� that he had 鈥渏ust found鈥� classified documents downstairs.

But Mr. Hur said Mr. Biden could convince some jurors his actions weren鈥檛 willful by arguing, for example, that he forgot about the documents shortly after finding them in 2017. It鈥檚 also possible the Afghanistan documents were never in the Virginia home at all, but were accidentally kept without Mr. Biden鈥檚 knowledge in Delaware since he was vice president, Mr. Hur concluded.

Mr. Hur also cited limitations with Mr. Biden鈥檚 memory and the president鈥檚 cooperation with investigators that 鈥渃ould convince some jurors that he made an innocent mistake.鈥� The report described the president as 鈥渟omeone for whom jurors will want to identify reasonable doubt.鈥�

鈥淲e have also considered that, at trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory,鈥� the report said. 鈥淚t would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him 鈥� by then a former president well into his eighties 鈥� of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.鈥�

Regarding the notebooks containing classified information, Mr. Hur concluded that Mr. Biden could plausibly argue if there were a trial that he believed that the notebooks were his personal property and he was allowed to take them home.

鈥淒uring our interview of him, Mr. Biden was emphatic, declaring that his notebooks are 鈥榤y property鈥� and that 鈥榚very president before me has done the exact same thing,鈥� that is, kept handwritten classified materials after leaving office,鈥� the report said.

Other classified documents found at the Penn Biden Center, Mr. Biden鈥檚 Delaware home, and among Senate papers at the University of Delaware 鈥渃ould plausibly have been brought to these locations by mistake,鈥� Mr. Hur concluded.

What have prosecutors said in Mr. Trump鈥檚 case?

Mr. Trump is accused of not only hoarding classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, but trying to hide them from investigators and working to block the government from clawing them back. Prosecutors have alleged that Mr. Trump showed off the documents to people who did not have security clearances to review them and enlisted others to help him hide records demanded by authorities.

Mr. Hur鈥檚 report says the differences between the two cases are 鈥渃lear.鈥� Unlike Mr. Biden 鈥� who cooperated with investigators, agreed to searches of his homes, and sat for a voluntary interview 鈥� the allegations in Mr. Trump鈥檚 case present 鈥渟erious aggravating facts,鈥� Mr. Hur wrote.

鈥淢ost notably, after being given multiple chances to return classified documents and avoid prosecution, Mr. Trump allegedly did the opposite,鈥� the report said.

For instance, prosecutors say, after the Justice Department issued a subpoena for the records in May 2022, Mr. Trump asked his own lawyers if he could defy the request and said words to the effect of, 鈥淚 don鈥檛 want anybody looking through my boxes.鈥�

鈥淲ouldn鈥檛 it be better if we just told them we don鈥檛 have anything here?鈥� one of his lawyers described him as saying, according to the indictment.

Prosecutors allege that during the July 2021 meeting at Bedminster, Mr. Trump also waved around the classified attack plan to his guests.聽鈥淭his is secret information,鈥� he said, according to a recording prosecutors have cited, claiming that, 鈥渁s president I could have declassified it鈥� but hadn鈥檛.

Prosecutors have also accused Mr. Trump of scheming with his valet, Walt Nauta, and a Mar-a-Lago property manager, Carlos De Oliveira, to try to conceal security camera footage from investigators after they issued a subpoena for it. Video from the property would ultimately play a significant role in the investigation because, prosecutors said, it captured Mr. Nauta moving boxes of documents in and out of a storage room 鈥� including a day before an FBI visit to the property. The boxes were moved at Mr. Trump鈥檚 direction, the indictment alleges.

This story was reported by The Associated Press.聽