In 2018, the Trump administration secretly seized data from two Democratic members of Congress through tech company Apple. American media report this on the basis of one of the two parliamentarians and anonymous officials who were involved. The Justice Department is said to be investigating the allegations internally.
Senior Democrats are demanding that former Attorney Generals Barr and Sessions be questioned under oath on the issue before a Senate committee. They called the allegations “grievous” and a “gross abuse of power”.
Russia investigation
The target, according to US media, were two prominent Democratic members of the House of Representatives, Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell. At the time, they were on the committee investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. The two were told last month that their metadata were requested from Apple. Swalwell confirmed that to CNN.
Apple late in a comment Reuters news agency know that it received a subpoena from the Department of Justice asking for information on 73 phone numbers and 36 email addresses. According to Apple, no photos, emails or messages were handed over. The company says it was not aware of the nature of the investigation.
It had already become known that the telephone data from several journalists have also been requested by the judiciary. The target would have been to find out who had leaked to them about international issues.
Extremely rare
With the data, the former government hoped to find out who had leaked classified information about the Russia investigation against the then president. It is extremely rare for the Justice Department to investigate leaks of state secrets by Congressmen in this way, the AP news agency writes.
Apple was subpoenaed and forced to share the data. In the end, metadata of twelve people surrounding the two Congressmen was shared with the government. It would include employees of the two politicians and family members, writes The Washington Post. One of them would have been a minor.
‘Witch Hunt’
Former President Trump and the former justice ministers have not yet commented on the allegations. Trump has always dismissed the Russia investigation against him as a witch hunt.
Special Prosecutor Mueller concluded in 2019 that there was indeed Russian interference in the 2016 elections. No evidence was found of collusion between Trump’s campaign team and the Russian authorities. Trump was neither acquitted nor found guilty of obstruction of justice.
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