Trump's highly dangerous document release - Part 2

We knew he was going to get more desperate and, therefore, more dangerous.

President Donald Trump has moved to immediately release a tranche of former FBI Director James Comey's text messages and declassify 20 pages of a surveillance application that targeted former campaign adviser Carter Page, his latest offensive against a Russia investigation that has ensnared associates and has consumed Trump's attention for much of his presidency.

[...]

Neither DOJ nor the FBI has any idea how the redaction process for this announcement is being handled, and they think it’s possible that the White House is just doing it on its own and could release this material as early as Monday night, according to a source familiar with the process.

[...]

While the White House statement indicated that the text messages were to be released in an unredacted form, it was not immediately clear whether Trump had directed that the other materials be released in their entirety or whether some redactions for privacy and to comply with other laws might be permitted.

  Politico

The text messages may very well have information that would be a national security risk if released.

A White House spokesman had no immediate comment, but a Justice Department spokesman suggested that Trump was solely setting in motion a process and not ordering the immediate declassification of anything.

“When the President issues such an order, it triggers a declassification review process that is conducted by various agencies within the intelligence community, in conjunction with the White House Counsel, to seek to ensure the safety of America's national security interests,” the spokesman said. “The Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation are already working with the Director of National Intelligence to comply with the President's order.”

I think they're reading into it what they know needs to be done, because it's my understanding that the President is free to declassify anything he wants. That was the excuse they used when he spilled the beans on classified intel to the Russian ambassador and foreign minister anyway.

Legal experts said some of the actions Trump ordered had the potential to violate the Privacy Act, a federal law protecting against disclosure of personal information in government files.

I hadn't even considered that issue.

“There could very likely be Privacy Act implications,” former Justice Department attorney Scott Hodes said.

However, Hodes said officials might be able to work around those legal obstacles by turning over the records to Congress, which could make them public. “If they have a legitimate reason to give them to Congress, Congress is not covered by the law, so it’s not a Privacy Act violation.”

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaat? Why the Hell not? That's insane.

The move, long foreshadowed by calls from Trump's top allies in Congress, dramatically heightens the confrontation between Trump and his own intelligence community, while Mueller also pursues allegations that Trump attempted to obstruct the Russia probe from the outset.

This surely fits the bill on the obstruction charges.

“Trump has ordered the release of sensitive information into an ongoing investigation of himself and his friends--information that his own Justice Department did not want released because it would jeopardize ongoing investigations,” said former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti. “That is corrupt, plain and simple.”

Amen, brother Renato.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:



We shouldn't have secret courts in the first place.  That's the beginning of authoritarian corruption and abuses.