Fitton: Judicial Watch Seeks Docs on Obama White House Spying Scandal

With the news last week of the unprecedented spying on Americans by the National Security Agency under President Obama’s direction, it has become even more critical that we get to the truth about any Obama administration surveillance of Donald Trump and his campaign and the subsequent illegal leaking of classified information in an effort to undermine the Trump administration.

We filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Justice and the National Security Agency (NSA) for information about Obama National Security Advisor Susan Rice’s communications with the two agencies concerning the alleged Russian involvement in the 2016 presidential election, the hacking of DNC computers, the suspected communications between Russia and Trump campaign/transition officials, and the unmasking of the identities of any U.S. citizens associated with the Trump presidential campaign or transition team who were identified pursuant to intelligence collection activities (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Justice and National Security Administration (No. 1:17-cv-01002)).

You can see our FOIA request forms the basis for the new lawsuit and is comprehensive:

1. Any and all requests for information, analyses, summaries, assessments, transcripts, or similar records submitted to the Department of Justice (National Security Agency) or any official, employee, or representative thereof by former National Security Advisor Susan Rice regarding, concerning, or related to the following:

• Any actual or suspected effort by the Russian government or any individual acting on behalf of the Russian government to influence or otherwise interfere with the 2016 presidential election;
• The alleged hacking of computer systems utilized by the Democratic National Committee and/or the Clinton presidential campaign;
• Any or actual or suspected communication between any member of the Trump presidential campaign or transition team and any official or employee of the Russian government or any individual acting on behalf of the Russian government; or
• The identities of U.S. citizens associated with the Trump presidential campaign or transition team who were identified pursuant to intelligence collection activities.

2. Any and all records created and/or produced in response to any request described in part 1 of this request; and

3. Any and all records of communication between any official, employee, or representative of the Department of Justice (National Security Agency) and any member, employee, staff member, or representative of the National Security Council regarding, concerning, or related to any request described in Part 1 of this request.

The timeframe for this request is January 1, 2016, to the present.

This is the fifth Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit (see here, here, here and here) related to the surveillance, unmasking, and illegal leaking targeting President Trump and his associates.  I am confident our investigation is more comprehensive than anything out of Congress, or from the new “special counsel” (see below) in the Justice Department.

We want to know about the Obama White House involvement in the unprecedented spying on Donald Trump and other political opponents.  This intelligence operation may have led to the illegal “unmasking” of Americans and the leaking of intelligence information to foment the story of Russian hacking of the DNC and the allegedly sinister Russian influence on Trump and his associates.  The Trump administration has an opportunity to expose what the Obama White House was up to – let’s hope it follows the law and starts turning records over to JW quickly in response to our outstanding FOIA requests.