DOJ escalates probe into claims Obama officials conspired in 2016 election

The Justice Department moved forward with its investigation into whether the Obama administration broke federal laws while investigating Russia’s involvement in the 2016 presidential election, demanding archived intelligence assessments from the nearly decade-old race, according to a letter obtained by The Washington Post.

Attorney General Pam Bondi also separately ordered a grand jury to potentially hear evidence in the case, according to a person familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing probe.

Together, the developments mark an escalation of the investigation into one of President Donald Trump’s long-standing grievances — that President Barack Obama and his top officials tried to connect Trump with Russian efforts to influence his first run for the White House. They also suggest that the Justice Department plans to at least attempt to move the investigation from a nascent probe to one that has sufficient evidence to present to the courts.

The Justice Department declined to comment on the investigation, and it remained unclear whether prosecutors had settled on specific targets or crimes they believe occurred.

The letter to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) — which preserves government records — asks for three different intelligence community assessments about Russian activity in U.S. elections and cyberthreats to the 2016 presidential election. The letter is probably one of many sent to various parties across the federal government as the Justice Department seeks as much documentation as possible to build a case to present to a grand jury.

“I anticipate further requests for information will follow this request,” reads the letter from the Justice Department to NARA’s general counsel. “We would appreciate a timely and expedient response to our request and appreciate your cooperation with our investigation.”

The Justice Department did not say where the grand jury would be impaneled, and the letter to NARA obtained by The Post had the name of the federal prosecutor who sent the request redacted.

For years, Trump has sought to portray investigations into Russia’s involvement in the 2016 campaign as a “witch hunt” and a Democratic plot to undermine his first presidency. However, intelligence officials and multiple investigations, including the inquiry led by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, have repeatedly concluded that Russia sought to interfere with the election to benefit Trump over his rival Hillary Rodham Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee.

Mueller’s probe led to the convictions of several Trump allies, though it found no concrete proof of collusion between members of his campaign and Moscow.

The grand jury investigation, which was first reported Monday by Fox News, will allow prosecutors to subpoena documents, solicit testimony and secretly present evidence to a panel that will determine whether to return an indictment. Though the evidentiary standard for such proceedings is lower than that for a criminal trial, grand jurors have the option of rejecting cases presented by prosecutors for lack of probable cause.

The previous investigations hung over much of Trump’s first presidency. And as he returned to the White House in January, he pledged to revisit the issue, which he has repeatedly cited as an example of Democratic “weaponization” of the Justice Department.

Under Bondi, the department has already taken the unusual step of publicly acknowledging criminal probes into two key figures from those 2016 election inquiries — former FBI director James B. Comey, whom Trump fired in 2017, and former CIA director John Brennan. The Justice Department has declined to discuss details of those investigations.

Last month, National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard ramped up the administration’s conspiracy claims by releasing a batch of previously classified investigative documents that she portrayed as evidence of Obama administration officials manufacturing information to undermine Trump and plotting a “yearslong coup.” She and CIA Director John Ratcliffe have referred material to the Justice Department and the FBI for criminal investigations of former officials, including former President Barack Obama.

National security officials and Democratic lawmakers have accused Gabbard of misrepresenting the documents she released. A spokesperson for Obama dismissed her claims as “bizarre,” “ridiculous” and a “weak attempt at a distraction.”

Bondi responded by forming a “strike force” to investigate Gabbard’s claims.

“We will investigate these troubling disclosures fully and leave no stone unturned to deliver justice,” she said in a statement at the time.

Amid that renewed effort, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, released last week a recently declassified appendix to a report issued in 2023 by special counsel John Durham.

Durham was appointed during the first Trump administration to examine allegations of government misconduct during the earlier Russia investigations. Though he found flaws in the original probe, he uncovered no significant evidence undermining the basic conclusion that Moscow had sought to interfere in the 2016 election in favor of Trump.

Included in the appendix Grassley released were 2016 emails among Clinton campaign aides indicating that her team saw Trump’s ties to Russia as potential campaign fodder. Republicans have seized upon those messages as proof that Clinton approved of a plan to link Trump to Russia and use the FBI to damage his electoral chances.

While the Durham appendix showed that the FBI investigated intelligence reports that suggested as much, it contained no proof that Clinton or Obama administration officials concocted false information on ties between Trump and Russia.

Still, Trump and his allies have continued to claim otherwise. In a post to social media last week, FBI Director Kash Patel wrote that the appendix proved the “Clinton campaign plotted to frame President Trump.”

“The American people deserve the full, unfiltered truth about the Russia collusion hoax and the political abuse of our justice system it exposed,” he said in a statement.