How the Justice Department swept up records of two congressional Democrats and Trump's lawyer

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By Evan Perez, Pamela Brown, Katelyn Polantz and Jeremy Herb, CNN

Updated 6:43 PM ET, Sun June 20, 2021

Inside the DOJ's controversial data sweep

(CNN) -- The subpoena that swept up the records of two Democratic congressmen, their staff and family members in 2018 appears to have been the result of a leak investigation that initially included scrutinizing a senior aide on the House Intelligence Committee, and not the lawmakers themselves, sources told CNN.

The Justice Department's original secret subpoena to Apple, sources say, was an effort to identify people connected with the staffer. Apple provided names connected to the accounts the company had records for, including then-House Intelligence ranking member Adam Schiff and Rep. Eric Swalwell, two vocal political enemies of former President Donald Trump. This was potentially the first instance federal investigators knew they had records of the two California Democrats, according to the sources.

The revelation that the Justice Department obtained records of two congressmen and Trump's former White House counsel Don McGahn, in addition to pursuing secret subpoenas targeting Trump's perceived enemies -- reporters at CNN, the New York Times and the Washington Post -- has caused a political firestorm.

McGahn's records appear to have been swept up in a separate investigation by federal investigators in a similar manner to Schiff's and Swalwell's, according to a source familiar with the matter. When the Justice Department issued the subpoena to Apple it did not know McGahn's were among the records it was seeking, and the investigation wasn't initially scrutinizing McGahn, the source said. It's not clear what happened after Apple returned the records to DOJ identifying McGahn.

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https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/20/politics/justice-department-subpoenas-congressional-democrats-trump/index.html