President Donald Trump’s top Justice Department official, Emil Bove, was nominated for a judgeship on the Court of Appeals, which prompted a whistleblower to come forward about his experience hearing Bove urge the administration to ignore the rulings of a court judge.
And on Monday, a third whistleblower came forward, following a second who came forward last week. The first was Erez Reuveni, who came forward ahead of the Bove confirmation hearing with both an affidavit and several pages of text messages and emails to verify his claims.
The Washington Post reported that the third person contradicts Bove’s claims under oath to the Senate Judiciary Committee about a DOJ prosecution.
“The Washington Post reviewed the evidence and agreed to withhold details to protect the identity of the whistleblower, whose lawyers spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the whistleblower’s fear of retribution,” said the report.
Two other whistleblowers confirmed accounts that Bove said to a group in a March meeting to ignore the court orders or they “would hamper Trump’s efforts to deport millions of undocumented immigrants.”
The new whistleblower has a different account of Bove’s behavior than the first two, the report stated.
Judiciary Chairman Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) named a fake rule that made everything Bove has said at the DOJ fall under some kind of privilege. Democrats hammered Grassley on it, but it went ignored.
My understanding is that Congress has never accepted the constitutional validity of either such privilege,” said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) at the time.
He called it a “stunning breach” of duty.
When it came time to vote on the committee’s nomination, Democrats were so furious that they walked out, refusing to vote.