Federal Records Act

Yes, when I first became special counsel I did not have a government phone or government computer and so in the initial days when I was appointed and I was still living in the Netherlands I did use a personal device and email to communicate with folks in the Justice Department.

What I did when I got government accounts is made sure, to the best of my ability, that that information was forwarded to government accounts so it would be within the Federal Records Act.

Okay, so we're going to stop right there because I got to admit, the reason I let that play a little further than I intended was there's a part of that that I had never heard before.

I was unaware that before he became special counsel, Mr. Jack Smith, which is a CIA legend name if I've ever heard one, was living abroad in the Netherlands at the time.

Did they break the law? I'm not a lawyer.

But you administer the Federal Records Act.

I do.

If they didn't follow it, can we safely assume they broke the law? They did not follow the law.

And, um, and they claim, uh, to be, uh, in compliance.

And, uh, wh- when I say in compliance, I'm talking about, um, sort of the high level is the na- uh, the Federal Records Act, which is the, the act that requires you to, to, to preserve this, this information, um, protect it, um, put a, give it a retention period, all that stuff.

That's the Federal Records Act.

But, but, um, there are, there are a good 10 or 20 other laws, uh, that, um, you have to, the agencies have to apply to that, that deal with records management.

Um, FOIA, as you mentioned, is one of them.

Privacy Act, uh, as you mentioned [laughs] is one.

Um, and I, I'm, I'm fighting to, to get the, uh, Federal Records Act, um, uh, uh, complied with, but, um, I've never seen a f- uh, a Privacy Act, uh, uh, complaint ever processed.

Never.

No, that is not right.

There are some EOP components that are covered by FOIA, the Federal Records Act.

So it is not

everything...

Because I have to know where this argument's going for the next case.

Are those other records covered constitutionally?

We are not contesting the application of the Federal Records Act to those components.

You're

And Judge Millett replied, not, now two words.

Because the Freedom of Information Act and the Federal Records Act sit right behind this law, they're the next dominoes.

and everyone in the room could see them here's what surprised our researchers this wasn't a slip in a brief it's a deliberate campaign this week on multiple fronts at once a judge in brooklyn threw out the sanctuary city lawsuit the government had no valid basis to sue a judge in manhattan blocked enforcement of the icc sanctions saying they can't survive first amendment scrutiny And a court dismissed the last challenge to Tennessee's congressional map, which cracks Memphis, the largest majority black city in America, into three districts.

Nine states redrew their maps mid-decade this year, moving roughly 1 in 10 voters.

What we know is, from Jack Smith's previous testimony, that he and his team were issued government phones for communications related to the investigation.

If they also used those phones to discuss personal matters, those texts could have been retained alongside official communications preserved under the Federal Records Act.

According to reporting from MS Now, it was the Justice Department who provided the text messages to the Senate Judiciary Committee.

That's not necessarily especially unusual.

And so in the initial days when I was, uh, appointed, and I was still living in the Netherlands, uh, I did use, uh, a personal device and email to communicate with folks in the Justice Department.

What I did when I got government accounts is made sure, uh, to the best of my ability that those, uh, that information was forwarded to government accounts, so it would be, would be within the Federal Records Act.

Um, I sought at all times to comply with the Federal Records Act as I expected, uh, my attorneys to do as well.

Following up on my opening statement for the classified document case, where did you store the classified material? Decide-- Describe the SCIF arrangements for both DOJ and FBI personnel during and after the court sessions.

Uh, I can't speak to FBI facilities.