TRUST SESSIONS
House investigates possible shadow operation in Trump justice department
Judiciary committee wants to know if officials violated policies in issuing secret subpoenas against congressional Democrats
Hugo Lowell in Washington
Thu 24 Jun 2021 01.00 EDT
Top Democrats in the House are investigating whether Trump justice department officials ran an unlawful shadow operation to target political enemies of the former president to hunt down leaks of classified information, according to a source familiar with the matter.
The House judiciary committee chairman, Jerry Nadler, is centering his investigation on the apparent violation of internal policies by the justice department, when it issued subpoenas against Democrats Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell in 2018.
But with the former Trump attorneys general Bill Barr and Jeff Sessions denying any knowledge of the subpoenas, Democrats are focused on whether rogue officials abused the vast power of the federal government to target Trump’s perceived political opponents, the source said.
That kind of shadow operation – reminiscent of the shadow foreign policy in Ukraine that led to Trump’s first impeachment – would be significant because it could render the subpoenas unlawful, the source said.
And if the subpoenas were issued without proper authorization from the attorney general level, it could also leave the officials involved in the effort open to prosecution for falsely operating with the imprimatur of law enforcement.
The sharpening contours of the House judiciary committee’s investigation into the Trump justice department reflects Democrats’ determination to uncover potential politicization at the department.
Current and former justice department officials have described the subpoenas as part of a fact-gathering effort that ensnared Schiff and Swalwell because they had been in contact with congressional aides suspected of leaking classified information.
As the justice department investigated leaks, they obtained records of House intelligence committee staffers, as well as the records of their contacts. Schiff and Swalwell were not the target of the investigation, the Wall Street Journal reported.
But Democrats are also concerned about the denials from Barr and Sessions and are set to look at whether they made publicly misleading representations to obfuscate the extent of their involvement.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jun/24/house-democrats-justice-department-shadow-operation-investigation