A former Senate Intelligence Committee staffer who has been charged with lying to the FBI is pursuing a gag order to prevent President Trump, the Justice Department, and others involved from continuing to make public statements about the case on the grounds it negatively impacts his right to a fair trial.
Attorneys for former director of security for the Senate Intelligence Committee James Wolfe argued in a Monday court filing that Trump’s statements about the case have jeopardized Wolfe’s right to a fair trial, specifically comments from Trump where he claimed the Department of Justice “caught a leaker” and that, “You cannot leak classified information.”
[Also read: Trump says he’s ‘a believer in classified information’ after arrest of Senate staffer]
The filing also noted comments from the top national security official at the Justice Department, John Demers, who claimed that Wolfe’s alleged inaccurate statements were related to the “unauthorized disclosure of sensitive and confidential information.”
“Mr. Wolfe’s Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury and the presumption of innocence have been jeopardized by presidential comments about the merits of the case (“caught a leaker”) and highly prejudicial insinuations – straying far from the language and substance of the Indictment and echoed by the Justice Department – that Mr. Wolfe leaked classified information,” the court filing reads.
“The President’s statements have been particularly prejudicial because they convict Mr. Wolfe in the eyes of the public,” the filing added. “He is charged only with making false statements regarding general and personal contacts with reporters, and the disclosure of merely non-public information or a denial of a personal relationship is a far cry from the improper leaking of classified information.”
The attorneys claimed that unless the court enforces a gag order, Trump will continue to make statements about Wolfe.
In response, U.S. District Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson issued an order asking for Wolfe’s legal team and the Justice Department to submit a briefing schedule for the potential gag order next week.
Wolf retired in May and stopped performing committee tasks in December.
