By Jan Wolfe
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A U.S. House of Representatives committee on Thursday requested documents from the Justice Department related to the Trump administration’s seizure of phone records from lawmakers, journalists and the then-White House counsel as part of its investigations into leaks of classified information.
The House Democrats, led by Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland requesting a wide range of documents before July 1.
The documents included any communications between the Justice Department and former President Donald Trump or White House staff relating to the opening of the leaks investigations.
The letter represented the first major public step in an investigation that Nadler announced on Monday.
“The Committee is now engaged in an investigation of the Trump Administration’s surveillance of Members of Congress, the news media, and others,” Nadler said in a statement on Thursday. “We must determine if the Department sought these sensitive records for improper political purposes.”
The department’s internal watchdog, Inspector General Michael Horowitz, last week said his office was also launching a review into whether “improper considerations” drove the leaks investigations.
(Reporting by Jan Wolfel Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
