Mollie Hemingway of the Federalist explores mixed signals from the U.S. Justice Department.
U.S. law enforcement and intelligence officials have leaked extremely sensitive information about a top secret source three times in the last week while claiming that confidentially sharing information about the source with congressional investigators could greatly impact U.S. national security and potentially risk the source’s life.
The officials have leaked specific information that could directly identify the source on three separate occasions to reporters at the Washington Post and New York Times. This raises even more questions about whether current top intelligence and law enforcement officials can be trusted to obey the law and to adequately protect the nation’s intelligence secrets.
The latest leak came via a Washington Post article in which the very same officials blame Congress for the leaks solely because a U.S. congressional committee subpoenaed the Justice Department for information about irregularities with methods used in the unprecedented investigation targeting the campaign of Donald Trump for president.
Before the leaks occurred, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein said, of the demand for information by Congress as part of its oversight duties, that the Justice Department would not be “extorted.” Then the leaks began spilling out.
