The Justice Department is trying to unearth the identity of the Trump administration official who denounced the president in a New York Times opinion piece last year under the byline Anonymous, according to a letter from a senior law enforcement official Monday.
In the letter, Assistant Attorney General Joseph Hunt asked the publisher of a forthcoming book by the writer and the author's book agents for proof that the official never signed a nondisclosure agreement and had no access to classified information or, absent that, for information about where the person worked in the government, and when.
"If the author is, in fact, a current or former 'senior official' in the Trump administration, publication of the book may violate that official's legal obligations under one or more nondisclosure agreements," Hunt wrote to Carol Ross of the Hachette Book Group, which is publishing Anonymous' book, as well as to Matt Latimer and Keith Urbahn, the agents for the former self-described senior official.
President Donald Trump, people close to him said, has long been troubled by the existence of Anonymous, whose opinion piece condemned him as essentially unfit for office and described a "resistance" within the administration trying to keep the government on course, identifying as part of that group. Trump said last year that he wanted the Justice Department to investigate the essay, declaring its writing an act of treason. Prosecutors said at the time that such an inquiry would be inappropriate because it was likely that no laws were broken.
White House officials did not immediately respond to an email asking whether Trump had directed the Justice Department to act. CNN first reported on Hunt's letter.
Nondisclosure agreements are typical in the Trump administration, Hunt wrote. Previous administrations generally did not force officials to sign them, and legal experts say they are essentially unenforceable for government employees. But Trump long used them in business as well.
Officials who are allowed access to classified information must also agree to keep it secret as a condition of obtaining a security clearance to see it.
If the author's representatives could not prove that the official did not sign a nondisclosure agreement or did not have access to classified information, Hunt demanded identifying information about the person's government service.
A Justice Department official insisted that law enforcement officials were simply gathering the facts they would request any time an administration official decided to write a book about his tenure as a government employee.
The publication of the essay in September 2018 set off frenzied speculation about its author and prompted discussion within the White House at the time about using polygraph tests to determine the official's identity. Advisers dropped that idea, but the writer's identity has remained a Washington mystery. The author's name is known to editors in the Opinion section of The Times, but not in the newsroom, which is separate.
The idea for a book grew out of the opinion piece, and it is scheduled to be published this month. The writer plans to publish under the byline Anonymous again.
Hachette said in a statement that it was declining Hunt's requests for information. Hachette has "made a commitment of confidentiality to Anonymous and we intend to honor that commitment," the statement said.
Javelin, the firm that employs Latimer and Urbahn, backed up Hachette and described Hunt's letter as a warning. "Our author knows that the president is determined to unmask whistleblowers who may be in his midst," Javelin said in a statement.
A Section on 11/05/2019