The Justice Department during Donald Trump’s first term failed to comply with its own procedures when it sought journalists’ phone and email records in leak investigations, according to a DOJ watchdog report released Tuesday.
And the department never conducted any high-level review as it swept up the records of 43 congressional staffers and two Democratic House members, the report found.
DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz said he also found no evidence that federal prosecutors got express approval from then-Attorney General Bill Barr or told federal courts that the subpoenas were for records of lawmakers and their aides, despite the potential for the probes to intrude on legitimate oversight efforts by Congress.
Obtaining the records of lawmakers and their staff during criminal investigations “risks chilling Congress’s ability to conduct oversight of the executive branch,” Horowitz wrote in his 91-page report.
Barr told POLITICO in 2021 that he did not know the Justice Department sought any lawmaker’s records in the leak probes, which involved disclosures about the FBI’s investigation into 2016 Trump campaign aide Carter Page and ties between that campaign and Russia.
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