FULL GESTAPO: DOJ Targeted Senators Investigating DOJ
In a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland, Senators Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, and Chuck Grassley provide evidence that Biden’s Department of Justice has been spying on the staff of senators who were investigating the weaponization of the Department of Justice.
These are tactics straight out of Stalinist Soviet Union or Nazi Germany
Empower Oversight states: The far-reaching inquiry by the Department raises serious questions about the separation of powers and the constitutional Speech or Debate privilege. In addition, attorney-client communications of those targeted with these subpoenas should have triggered requirements for enhanced procedural protections and approvals. It’s unclear if any proper approvals were received or whether there was an adequate justification for such an overly broad effort to gather records of those overseeing the Justice Department for Congress.
We write to express deep concern regarding recent revelations that the Department of Justice engaged in a campaign of covert surveillance of the personal communications of attorneys advising congressional oversight committees.1 The decision by unelected government bureaucrats to investigate the elected congressional representatives and congressional staff trying to hold them accountable is a true attack on our democracy.
An October 24, 2023 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request by Empower Oversight revealed that the Department subpoenaed a Senate staffer’s private phone and email logs during the pendency of a bicameral congressional investigation of both the Department and the FBI for their involvement in the Russia-collusion hoax known as Crossfire Hurricane.2
In one instance, the Department subpoenaed Google for all telephone connection records and text message logs for the Chief Investigative Counsel to the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee during the very time period that this staffer directed oversight into Department misconduct. Further records indicate that the personal records of a House staffer employed by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (“HPSCI”) were additionally targeted as part of this vendetta campaign. Notably, in January 2018, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein threatened to subpoena HPSCI staff personal records during a confrontation over the Justice Department’s failure to comply with that committee’s compulsory process.3 But even so, the targets of the Department and the FBI were not limited to Republican staffers. Democrats in Congress have called for investigations into the targeting of their private communications as well, targeting which reportedly included subpoenas to Apple for information about HPSCI aides and their families, including even one account belonging to a child.4
All of this reinforces the assertion that we are spiraling toward a police state with the FBI leading the way as America’s Gestapo.
