US District Judge James Boasberg in Washington ordered the FBI to turn over Comey’s ‘Trump memos’ — both clean and redacted versions by April 1st as he weighs releasing them to the public.
Conservative watch dog group Judicial Watch, CNN and other news outlets filed a FOIA lawsuit in an effort to make Comey’s Trump memos public.
The FBI pushed back on March 1st and wrote to Judge Boasberg, an Obama appointee, saying that the memos were still redacted and classified and should remain under seal to avoid interfering with Mueller’s inquisition — Mueller’s witch hunt ended a week ago so the judge is weighing the release of Comey’s memos.
Judge Boasberg did not give a time frame when he’d decide whether to release the memos.
Then-FBI Director James Comey penned 7 memos stemming from 9 conversations he had with President Trump.
4 out of 7 of the memos were considered to be classified, however, experts argued that all 7 of Comey’s memos are classified.
Immediately after James Comey was fired by President Trump as FBI Director on May 9th, 2017, he gave portions of his memos to a friend to leak to the New York Times in order to prompt a special counsel investigation into President Trump.
Comey penned in one of his memos that President Trump requested the FBI drop the investigation into his then-National Security Advisor General Mike Flynn — raising an argument that Trump may have obstructed justice when he fired Comey.
Robert Mueller was subsequently appointed as special counsel to investigate whether Trump’s campaign conspired with the Kremlin in order to win the 2016 election.
On Sunday, Attorney General Bill Barr released a summary report of Mueller’s main findings and revealed that there was no evidence that Trump’s camp conspired with Russia, nor did the President obstruct justice when he fired Comey.