Separately, the Justice Department broke its own rules when it surreptitiously collected phone and text information from reporters involved in the same leak probes,
Which were connected to the FBI’s investigation into possible Trump campaign collaboration with Russia, according to the IG report that was made public on Tuesday.
The Biden Justice Department tightened its rules on the matter, which had been revised in 2014 and 2015 following earlier disclosures of covert seizures of news media records,
In response to reports of the seizure of records belonging to reporters from The New York Times, The Washington Post, and CNN.
A committee established to examine any such actions was not contacted, despite the fact that then-Attorney General Bill Barr personally authorized the news media subpoenas in 2020,
According to the report. This was against protocol. The report also said that Barr refused to participate with the IG investigation.
