Top Justice Department officials derisively dismissed a series of last-ditch efforts by then-President Donald Trump’s aides and emissaries to get DOJ lawyers and the FBI to investigate outlandish election fraud claims in the waning weeks of Trump’s presidency, newly-released emails show.
The emails — made public by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee — detail the Justice Department’s response to attempts by Trump’s chief of staff Mark Meadows to get investigators to look at bizarre allegations in a YouTube video where a former intelligence officer named Brad Johnson asserted that individuals in Italy were manipulating votes in the U.S. through satellites.
“Pure insanity,” then-acting Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue wrote in response to one New Year’s Day email from Meadows relaying the Italy theory.
That exchange appeared to put then-acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen into a defensive mode, recording events in writing for posterity and the very kinds of investigations congressional committees are now pursuing.
“Yes,” Rosen replied. “After this message, I was asked to have FBI meet with Brad Johnson, and I responded that Brad Johnson could call or walk into FBI’s Washington Field Office with any evidence he purports to have.”
Rosen goes on to relate that Johnson was collaborating with Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani. The acting attorney general seems to revel in his refusal to engage with Giuliani.
“On a follow up call, I learned that Johnson is working with Rudy Giuliani, who regarded my comments as ‘an insult.’ Asked if I would reconsider, I flatly refused, said I would not be giving any special treatment to Giuliani or any of his ‘witnesses’, and re-affirmed yet again that I will not talk to Giuliani about any of this,” Rosen wrote.
In another email, Meadows asked Rosen to have the acting Civil Division chief Jeffrey Clark “immediately” look into “allegations of signature match anomalies" in Fulton County, Ga.
“Can you believe this? I am not going to respond to message below,” Rosen wrote to Donoghue.
Donoghue replied: “At least it’s better than the last one, but that doesn’t say much.”
