The Justice Department told a federal court that President Trump’s recent tweets about the declassification of Trump-Russia investigation documents did not actually constitute formal declassification orders as the DOJ opposed a motion to release more information connected to former special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.
Judge Reggie Walton, who has critiqued Attorney General William Barr’s handling of the Mueller report in the past, had ruled on Thursday in response to an emergency motion filed by BuzzFeed. The motion seeks access to the entire April 2019 report on Russian interference in the 2016 election and unproven claims of Trump-Russia collusion that the Justice Department needed to speak with the White House about whether Trump’s recent tweets mean Mueller’s 448-page report should be released in full.
The emergency motion seeking a court order requiring the DOJ to reprocess the Mueller report before the November election was filed by the media outlet after Trump posted a series of tweets saying that a host of documents should be released and seemingly claiming that everything related to the Russia investigation had been declassified by him.
“There is no basis to require the Federal Bureau of Investigation to reprocess over 4,000 pages of FD-302s from the Special Counsel’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential election by October 28. The President’s recent statements on Twitter referencing the ‘declassification’ of information were not an order to the Department of Justice to declassify the materials in this case,” the Justice Department said Tuesday.
“The Twitter statements do not constitute a self-executing declassification order. Indeed, they provide no more authority to the Department to declassify material that the Presidential Memorandum giving the Attorney General authority to declassify information that the President signed on May 23, 2019. As with that memorandum, the President’s Twitter statements do not require the declassification of any particular documents and have not resulted in the declassification of any FD-302s at issue in this case,” the department added. “The Twitter statements also provide no basis for the Court to order the FBI to release material that has been withheld under any Freedom of Information Act exemptions.”
“I have fully authorized the total Declassification of any & all documents pertaining to the single greatest political CRIME in American History, the Russia Hoax. Likewise, the Hillary Clinton Email Scandal. No redactions!” Trump tweeted Oct. 6, adding that “all Russia Hoax Scandal information was Declassified by me long ago. Unfortunately for our Country, people have acted very slowly, especially since it is perhaps the biggest political crime in the history of our Country. Act!!!”
The legal team for BuzzFeed pointed to Trump’s Twitter activity in its Thursday court filing, claiming that “as a result” of Trump’s tweets, “any FOIA exemptions have been waived,” with the exception of disclosures prohibited by the Privacy Act, rules protecting grand jury material, “or other statutes that prohibit release.”
Mueller’s report concluded that Russia interfered in the 2016 election in a “sweeping and systematic fashion,” but it “did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government.” DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s December report outlined a host of problems with the FBI’s Trump-Russia investigation, especially with its abuse of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act process.
The Justice Department said Tuesday that “after the President made those statements on Twitter, DOJ officials conferred with the White House Counsel’s Office and were informed that there was no order requiring declassification or disclosure of any document at issue in this case.”
The DOJ added that “although in May 2019, the President did delegate declassification authority to the Attorney General, to date, the Attorney General has not exercised that declassification authority to release any of the redacted material in this case based on the President’s Twitter statements.”
Associate Deputy Attorney General G. Bradley Weinsheimer also said that the Justice Department “was further informed that the President’s statements on Twitter were not self-executing declassification orders and do not require the declassification of any particular documents.”
Trump’s tweets came hours after Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe declassified two heavily redacted Russia-related documents, including handwritten notes from former CIA Director John Brennan that showed he briefed then-President Barack Obama in 2016 on an unverified Russian intelligence report alleging that Clinton planned in July 2016 on tying then-candidate Trump to Russia’s hack of the Democratic National Committee to distract from her use of a private email server.
He also declassified a September 2016 CIA counterintelligence referral on the allegations to former FBI Director James Comey and Deputy Assistant Director for Counterintelligence Operations Peter Strzok.
Brennan responded to Ratcliffe’s declassification move on CNN, saying, “It is appalling, his selective declassification of information that clearly is designed to advance the political interests of Donald Trump and Republicans who are aligned with him.”
Democratic Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Mark Warner said last week, “It’s very disturbing to me that 35 days before an election, a director of national intelligence would release unverified Russian [rumor intelligence].”
Soon after he released a letter last week about the Russian intelligence analysis on Clinton, Ratcliffe issued a follow-up statement that said, “This is not Russian disinformation and has not been assessed as such by the intelligence community.”
Ratcliffe announced Wednesday that he handed over nearly 1,000 pages of documents to assist in the Justice Department’s inquiry into the Trump-Russia investigators being led by U.S. Attorney John Durham.
