Justice Department Officials Appealed To White House To Halt Release Of Memo

Top Justice Department officials made a last-ditch plea Monday to White House Chief of Staff John Kelly about the dangers of publicly releasing a memo alleging abuses by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, according to people briefed on the meeting.

Shortly before the House Intelligence Committee voted to make the document public, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein warned Kelly that the four-page memo prepared by House Republicans could jeopardize classified information and implored the president to reconsider his support for making it public, those people said.

In response, Kelly told Rosenstein and Wray that the president was still inclined to release the memo but the White House would go through a review led by the National Security Council and the White House Counsel’s Office, a senior administration official said. That review is expected to take at least several days, a senior White House official said.

Trump has not yet seen the memo, according to a White House spokesman.

(c) 2018, The Washington Post · Josh Dawsey, Devlin Barrett  

{Matzav.com}