Author: Charlie Savage

Two Sussmann-Durham Case Pre-Trial Threads

Another development for in-the-weeds enthusiasts of the Durham-Sussmann case: the defense has a new filing with a bunch of handwritten notes of a March 6, 2017, FBI meeting attended by Baker at which there was knowledge that Sussmann had a client. /1 https://pacer-documents.s3.amazonaws.com/36/235637/04519212888.pdf The defense appears to be planning to use this to suggest that […]

Today’s Pre-Trial Hearing in the Durham-Sussmann Case

I attended a pre-trial hearing in the Durham-Sussmann case this afternoon at which a litany of evidentiary issues were discussed, many without resolution. It was far too weedy/incremental for a general-reader news article, but here’s my impression of takeaways for enthusiasts. /1 Team Durham (lead prosecutor Andrew DeFilippis) will call Perkins Coie’s managing partner to […]

RIP Walter Dellinger

I am saddened to hear that @walterdellinger has died. We nerded out over legal issues many times over the years. A running joke was that I was the only one who was more impressed about the fact that he had led the Office of Legal Counsel than served as acting solicitor general. I looked up […]

Two new FOIA lawsuits: Any DIA purchases of DNS or netflow logs from data brokers, and FBI shooting incident reports

With The New York Times — and in one case, with my colleague Mark Mazzetti — I filed two new Freedom of Information Act cases this week. I thank the Times’ newsroom lawyer, David McCraw, and our annual First Amendment fellow, Jess Hui, for their representation in this litigation. The case with Mark is asking […]

Durbin Chastises Biden Administration for Snubbing His Guantanamo Closure Hearing

I live-blogged on Twitter the Senate Judiciary Committee’s hearing on closing Guantanamo today. The biggest takeaway was what didn’t happen: the Biden administration didn’t send any government witness, in keeping with its low-key (and not particularly active) approach to its nominal policy goal of closing the prison. Although the revitalized Periodic Review Board has been […]

I am suing CentCom for aerial footage from the botched Aug. 29 drone strike in Kabul.

With the New York Times, I have filed a new lawsuit against the United States Central Command seeking public disclosure of surveillance footage related to the tragically botched Aug. 29 drone strike in Kabul. Specifically, the lawsuit — filed under the Freedom of Information Act — seeks aerial footage starting five minutes before the drone […]

Marcy Wheeler is Confused about the Charges Against Assange for Journalistic-Style Activities

I posted the below thread in response to this tweet from Marcy Wheeler (@emptywheel) promoting a blog post that mainly critiqued an article that has gotten supporters of WikiLeaks and Julian Assange excited. Her post included an aside about “propaganda” from “Pulitzer Prize winning NYT reporters” that turned out to link to this June 16 […]

Prosecutors Could Not Have Gotten the Type of Metadata People are Most Worried About With Subpoenas to Apple

Here is a short guide to the complex issue of what kinds of communications-related metadata that prosecutors could have seized from Apple with grand jury subpoenas, including about Schiff, Swalwell and McGahn: /1 These are some types of metadata that can be subpoenaed: when one used apps like Facetime & iMessage, & one’s IP addresses […]