Judge rules Trump tweets not declassification orders and sides with DOJ to keep Carter Page FISA documents redacted

A federal judge ruled against a multiyear effort to further declassify information from Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act filings related to onetime Trump campaign associate Carter Page. Amit Mehta, an Obama-appointee judge for the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., agreed with the Justice Department in a three-page opinion that President Trump’s tweets and a White House press release did not constitute formal declassification orders. The Monday ruling reinforced a March decision, which reached a similar conclusion. The Freedom of Information Act lawsuit was filed in 2017 by investigative journalist Brad Heath, formerly of USA Today and now of Reuters, and the James Madison Project, and more than 400 pages of heavily redacted Page FISA documents were released as a result of it in June 2018. The plaintiffs have sought further FISA disclosures for nearly two more years. Last month, Republican Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham posted versions of the Page FISA application and renewals that were unredacted a bit more than in 2018.

The James Madison Project argued that the court should reject the Justice Department’s hundreds of pages of redactions because two tweets from Trump “cast doubt on the good faith bases for the redactions and withholdings made by the Government.” The first Trump tweet in question, sent on July 22, 2018, said: “Congratulations to @JudicialWatch and @TomFitton on being successful in getting the Carter Page FISA documents. As usual they are ridiculously heavily redacted but confirm with little doubt that the Department of ‘Justice’ and FBI misled the courts. Witch Hunt Rigged, a Scam!” Trump’s second tweet, sent the next day, claimed: “It was classified to cover up misconduct by the FBI and the Justice Department in misleading the Court by using this Dossier in a dishonest way to gain a warrant to target the Trump Team. This is a Clinton Campaign document. It was a fraud and a hoax designed to target Trump….”

The Justice Department said in March that “in their motion for summary judgment, Plaintiffs relied on two tweets that they claim reflect the President’s criticism of the redactions, but these vague and nonspecific tweets, based on no personal knowledge and not commenting on the precise issues presented to the Court, are insufficient to overcome the presumption.” Mehta agreed, ruling that “neither tweet causes the court to doubt the agency’s declarations in this case.” The judge said, “The President’s tweets amount to little more than ‘a mere assertion of bad faith [that] is not sufficient to overcome a motion for summary judgment.'” "Although Plaintiffs tout that the tweets ‘come from the highest governmental authority,’ neither tweet reveals any personal knowledge on the part of the President with respect to the actual withholdings and the exemptions invoked," Mehta added. The judge also said, “The President’s statement that the disclosed records are ‘ridiculously heavily redacted’ does not undermine the validity of the [Justice Department’s] invocation of” specific FOIA exemptions. And Trump’s “insistence that the records were ‘classified to cover up government misconduct’ is unsupported and, without more, cannot overcome the national security justifications put forward in the detailed affidavits submitted by Defendant," Mehta said.

The lawyer for the James Madison Project, Bradley Moss, told the Washington Examiner that options are being explored regarding an appeal. “In a mere three years, Donald Trump has managed to help produce reams of judicial case law standing for the idea that presidential tweets on national security matters are irrelevant,” Moss said. “Today’s decision was just another reminder of that legacy.”

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/judge-rules-trump-tweets-not-declassification-orders-and-sides-with-doj-to-keep-carter-page-fisa-documents-redacted

Statement from the Press Secretary September 17, 2018

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-press-secretary-34/

Court order (moar here)

https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/6881901/Order-on-Motion-for-Reconsideration.pdf

>>9032864

From memory, he has stated so..not sure if we have anything in writing as a direct order to him here. But as I recall, he did give the authority to Barr in 2018, when this statement was released by the press secretary.

'He's a tough guy': Actor Paul Giamatti says 'hardass' John Durham helped inspire Billions character

Actor Paul Giamatti gave U.S. Attorney John Durham some credit for informing his character on Showtime's Billions. The Hollywood star plays fictional U.S. Attorney-turned-New York Attorney General Chuck Rhoades, who is loosely based on former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, on the show, but Bharara isn't the only inspiration for the role. Speaking with GQ last week, Giamatti revealed that Durham influenced the portrayal of his character too.

"There was a guy that was interesting to me early on, and his name is John Durham," he said. "And he’s actually the guy who William Barr tagged to do the investigation of the Russia investigation. He used to be the federal attorney for the state of Connecticut, and he’s a pretty intense guy." "He’s one of the guys who brought down Whitey Bulger, but he also took down the FBI guys who were colluding with Whitey Bulger," he continued. "I thought there were a lot of things about him that were interesting. The way he looks, too, is interesting. If you look him up, you can see." Giamatti added, "You see him? He doesn’t look like what you normally think these guys are gonna look like, and he’s a tough guy, too. He’s a hardass."

Durham, the top federal prosecutor in Connecticut, was handpicked by Attorney General William Barr last year to lead an investigation into the origins of the Russia investigation and the actions taken by law enforcement and the intelligence community during it. The effort has since turned into a criminal investigation, and at least one former FBI lawyer is under criminal investigation after it was uncovered that he altered a document related to the surveillance of a Trump campaign adviser. Last week, it was reported that Durham is focused on the Justice Department’s handling of its case against retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn after recently released FBI notes showed that agents discussed Flynn's possible prosecution before they interviewed him. He is also putting scrutiny on CIA Director John Brennan and any undue influence he may have had during 2017’s intelligence community assessment of Russian interference. Durham's review is expected to wrap up this summer.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/hes-a-tough-guy-actor-paul-giamatti-says-hardass-john-durham-helped-inspire-billions-character

https://www.gq.com/story/paul-giamatti-billions-season-five-interview