The Epoch Times A federal judge on Wednesday ordered the State Department to begin producing within 30 days documents related to the Trump administration’s dealings with Ukraine, saying the records were of obvious public interest.
The documents were sought under a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request by American Oversight, an ethics watchdog that investigates the administration.
“These records concern a matter of immense public importance,” Daniel McGrath, a lawyer for American Oversight, said during arguments in Washington’s federal court. U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper said he agreed.
Cooper encouraged the organization to work with the government to identify which documents can be released because they are not classified or otherwise exempt from disclosure. That could potentially include any correspondence with Rudy Giuliani, the president’s personal lawyer and a key participant in a backchannel diplomacy effort with Ukraine, since he is not an administration official.
“His emails, text messages—which he showed on TV—are going to be subject to public disclosure with limited redactions,” Austin Evers, the organization’s executive director, told reporters after the hearing. “It’s possible that this administration will jump through some legal hoops to try to withhold them, but we have the court today urging the parties to focus on those communications as top priority.”
Among the records the group asked for are documents related to interactions between Giuliani and Ukraine, as well as documents about the recall of Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch.