NOT COOL

Trump Admin Had DOJ Secretly Pull CNN Correspondent’s Email and Phone Records

The DOJ says Pentagon reporter Barbara Starr was never the target of an investigation.

Earlier this month, the Justice Department alerted CNN correspondent Barbara Starr that last year, her phone and email records had been turned over to the Trump administration, CNN reports. According to the DOJ, while Starr was never the target of any investigation, last year prosecutors successfully requested her phone and email records from a two-month period during the summer of 2017.

It is unclear why the Trump administration was seeking Starr’s email and phone records, but the admission marks the latest in a series of disclosures detailing how the administration used the DOJ to go after journalists. Earlier this month, three Washington Post reporters who had covered Russiagate were told their phone records from the same year had been given to the DOJ. In 2018, the DOJ acknowledged pulling phone and email records for a reporter who had been writing about Russia. “CNN strongly condemns the secret collection of any aspect of a journalist’s correspondence,” said CNN President Jeff Zucker. “We ask for an immediate meeting with the Justice Department for an explanation.”