A nonprofit government watchdog wants a federal judge to pull back the curtain on illegal surveillance of Capitol Hill staffers.
The group previously submitted five Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for DOJ records concerning the surveillance that began in 2016.
The DOJ acknowledged the requests but never provided the documents. A spokesman for the DOJ did not respond to a request for comment.
The surveillance was accomplished via government demands on Google and other internet service providers for copies of correspondence and related documents by multiple congressional investigators. The court filing includes copies of subpoenas issued by the DOJ to Google and other service providers, seeking a broad range of records related to their accounts.
The Empower Oversight group, which filed the lawsuit, is a nonprofit foundation formed and now led by two veteran congressional investigators, Tristan Leavitt and Jason Foster. Mr. Leavitt was senior counsel for the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability and deputy special counsel for the U.S. Office of Special Counsel. Mr. Foster