CNN
—
Several senior Justice Department officials during the first Trump administration inappropriately disclosed non-public details about investigations into Covid-19 deaths in nursing homes in Democratic-led states, according to a recently released inspector general report released following a CNN Freedom of Information Act request.
The report expressed suspicions that these revelations were politically motivated because they were made days before the 2020 election. The non-public information concerned investigative actions taken by the Department of Justice in New York and New Jersey – states whose Democratic leaders were antagonists of President Donald Trump during the coronavirus pandemic.
Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s report details months of back-and-forth between political appointees and officials who typically lead such investigations over how to move forward with investigations in these and other states run by the Democrats. Much of the disagreement centered on whether and how to publicly announce certain departmental investigative measures.
The identities of the three officials accused of this misconduct have been redacted from the report.
One of the officials whose identity was redacted by the inspector general wrote in an October 17, 2020 email that a plan to disclose the investigation’s steps to the New York Post would be “our last play on them before elections, but it’s an important project.”
That disclosure, along with an official’s promotion on social media of news articles containing nonpublic details, violated the department’s privacy and media contact policy, Horowitz concluded.
“We also found that the conduct of these senior officials raised serious questions about the partisan political motivation of their actions in the vicinity of the 2020 election,” the inspector general said. His office referred the matter to the Office of Special Counsel, which investigates violations of the Hatch Act, a law that prohibits government employees from using their official positions to engage in political campaigns.
(The U.S. Office of Special Counsel is separate from special counsels, such as Jack Smith, who are appointed to conduct politically sensitive criminal investigations).
According to the report, efforts to investigate New York, New Jersey and other Democratic-led states on how state coronavirus policies were affecting Covid transmissions in residences- Services began in the summer of 2020 and were encouraged by department policymakers. .
At one point, the inspector general said, government officials with expertise in such investigations conducted an analysis that showed that the public facilities with the worst indicators were not in states run by Democrats.
Department employees also raised concerns about assertions that DOJ leaders in Washington sought to make in draft press releases announcing various department actions.
A draft press release that would have announced an investigation into two New Jersey facilities contained several statements that officials with the New Jersey U.S. attorney’s office objected to because they were misleading, speculative or lacked evidence, the report says of the inspector general.
This draft press release ultimately removed some of these statements, but was ultimately not released by the department.
Instead, a non-public letter informing state officials that the department was opening an investigation into New Jersey — as well as a separate letter requesting certain nursing home data from New Jersey officials York – were leaked to the New York Post reporter and later to other journalists.
The Post’s report was published Oct. 27, more than 30 minutes before the DOJ emailed New Jersey’s letter to the governor’s office, according to the inspector general.
CNN’s Hannah Rabinowitz contributed to this report.