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The request comes as Democratic members of the House Intelligence Committee held a briefing chaired by Chairman Adam Schiff. A source said the members were “excited” in trying to find out who in the Justice Department and the Trump administration was behind the effort to seize their records.
The activity follows the surprising revelation that attorneys general in the Trump administration’s Department of Justice subpoenaed Apple to obtain data from the accounts of Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee along with their employees and family members as part of an investigation into the leak.
Prosecutors were searching for the sources behind news stories about contacts between Russia and Trump associates.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin have called on former Attorney General William Barr and Jeff Sessions to testify on the matter.
“If they refuse, they will be subpoenaed and forced to testify under oath,” the Democrats said in a statement.
“This should not be a partisan matter; under the Constitution, Congress is an equal branch of government and must be protected from executive overreach, and we expect our Republican colleagues to join us in getting to the heart of this serious matter,” Schumer and Durbin said.
For Democrats to ask Apple to determine if additional members are being targeted by the Department of Justice
Democrats on the Intelligence Committee plan to ask Apple to consider whether Trump’s Justice Department has targeted additional members, according to a source familiar with the matter.
Members provide employees with all their different numbers and accounts and employees will ask Apple to provide information again about whether they are the subject of a Department of Justice subpoena.
The source said there were public “notices” from Apple sent to members whose records were confiscated on May 5. But members are concerned that public emails can be ignored, deleted or erased in their spam folders.
Barr says Trump didn’t direct him to target lawmakers
Barr told Politico in a phone interview Friday that he did not remember receiving a briefing that Justice Department prosecutors had subpoenaed Apple before he took office.
According to Politico, Barr said that while he was the attorney general, he was unaware of any members of Congress’ records being sought in a leak case, during the time he was the attorney general, and said that former President Donald Trump never directed him to target lawmakers because of an investigation.
Barr told Politico that Trump “didn’t know who we were looking at in any of the issues.” “I didn’t discuss the leak issues with Trump. He didn’t really ask me any details”
White House calls reports ‘appalling’
In the Biden administration’s first reaction to the camera on Friday, White House Communications Director Kate Bedingfield called the reports “appalling.”
“Reports about the conduct of the attorney general under Donald Trump are appalling,” Bedingfield said during an MSNBC appearance from Cornwall, England.
Bedingfield suggested that President Joe Biden has a “totally different relationship” with the Department of Justice than his predecessor, calling on the Trump administration to “abuse power” with the department, adding that the Biden administration’s Department of Justice “operates very, very differently.”
Bedingfield said Biden “respects the independence of the Department of Justice, which is a very important part of how he governs.”
Swalwell says Trump made the DOJ a ‘weapon’
California Democratic Representative Eric Swalwell, whose data was seized by the Trump administration, said Trump “has turned the Department of Justice into a weapon” to mine private communications.
“It’s about ordinary Americans who don’t want to see their government use law enforcement as a weapon against them because of their political beliefs,” Swalwell told CNN’s Newsroom.
Asked Friday by Sciutto whether he leaked classified information related to the investigations, Swalwell replied, “No, never.”
This story has been updated with comments from Barr.
CNN’s Betsy Klein contributed to this report.
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