Here’s Why Trump Can’t Declassify The Bombshell FISA Memo On His Own

#ReleaseTheMemo should be trending. It’s not. People are preoccupied with the government shutdown and the big championship games today. All of that will subside in the coming days, and everyone will refocus. After all, it’s a big deal. The FISA memo supposedly shows evidence of abuse of government surveillance.

The classified report compiled by House Intelligence is deeply troubling and raises serious questions about the upper echelon of the Obama DOJ and Comey FBI as it relates to the so-called collusion investigation.

— Ron DeSantis (@RepDeSantis) January 18, 2018

While the report is classified as Top Secret, I believe the select committee should, pursuant to House rules, vote to make the report publicly available as soon as possible. This is a matter of national significance and the American people deserve the truth.

— Ron DeSantis (@RepDeSantis) January 18, 2018

Interestingly enough, Mr. Transparency himself– Rep. Adam Schiff– doesn’t seem as eager to get this out to the public.

Schiff on FISA memo: The documents that supposedly inform these talking points are highly classified. And they will not be made public, making it impossible for the few Members who have seen the documents to explain the flaws and misstatements contained within the talking points

— Chad Pergram (@ChadPergram) January 19, 2018

Here’s the thing: There’s a process to this. They can’t just release the memo willy-nilly. And no. President Trump can’t make that call right this second either. Here’s why, via The Conservative Treehouse:

Once the House Intelligence Committee votes to declassify the four-page memo, the White House, National Security Adviser (H.R. McMaster) and National Security Council will have five days to review the content. The White House will likely have a brief review by the NSC and the Office of Legal Counsel of the content, and then issue approval for the release.

There are poorly informed voices who claim President Trump can arbitrarily declassify the Nunes memo. That is false. The White House (the executive branch) does not own the document. The Nunes memo is owned by the Legislative Branch, and specifically by the House Intelligence Committee. The Executive Branch can request the memo, but they cannot demand it without following a process. Therefore, without submission, the executive branch cannot declassify it. There is an inherent constitutional separation of power.

It’s a bit more complicated.

Secondly, while it might seem like a good idea for President Trump to declassify the Nunes memo, if given by the Intel Committee, it would not be prudent to do so. Within this classified document Donald Trump is the subject of adverse action outlined therein.

The President was the target of the unlawful action by the DOJ and FBI as reportedly outlined within the Nunes memo. Because the memo contains details of FBI and DOJ surveillance, Donald Trump (now POTUS) is both the victim and the head of law enforcement in charge of investigation the illegal action that created the victim.

In addition to being both the victim and charged with the legal authority over the FBI and DOJ, there are downstream ramifications due to Special Counsel Robert Mueller investigating President Trump for “Obstruction of Justice”.

White House lawyer Don McGahn would clearly instruct Trump (victim) to stay the hell away from this investigation. There is an inherent conflict. Any exceptional action taken by POTUS could be construed as interference, including violations of the separation of powers.

Therefore the best route as constructed by Nunes and Goodlatte would be for the House to vote to declassify, pass on to the Executive for review, then President Trump grants approval for the request of the House (legislative branch).

You follow?

The National Security Council and any impacted offices of the intelligence information (CIA, NSA, FBI, DOJ, U.S. DoS, DOD, etc.) review, provide opinion, and sign off prior to executive approval and release.

It is not just this declassification that goes through this process, all declassification goes through this process. In this example, presumably, the President has no adverse reason to block the declassification request and it is likely all approvals will happen quite quickly.

After the White House approves of the HPSCI request, the Memo then becomes public.

That’s when Democrats will attack the memo as being authored and misrepresented by Chairman Devin Nunes. This is the politics.

There are more nitty-gritty details, but that’s the gist.

That being said, it looks like they’re continuing to work toward the goal of releasing the memo.

Great news! Our efforts to #ReleaseTheMemo have been effective and the HPSIC plans to begin the process to release the FBI/FISA/Russia memo. This may take up to 19+ Congressional work days but Americans deserve to know the truth.

— Dave Joyce (@RepDaveJoyce) January 20, 2018

To be continued…

h/t The Conservative Treehouse