Charlie Savage

With the NYT, I have filed a FOIA lawsuit seeking disclosure of the volume of Jack Smith's report about Trump's classified documents case.
static01.nyt.com/newsgraphics...

Updated story: the judge convened a videoconference hearing and granted the order within an hour of the filing - during the Super Bowl. Not sure I have ever heard of a court moving that fast.

Charlie Savage @charliesavage.bsky.social

Venezuelan Migrants Ask Court to Block U.S. from Sending Them to Guantánamo The three men, who are detained in New Mexico, say they “fit the profile” of the type of migrants the Trump administration has started sending to the Navy base. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/09/u...

Venezuelan Migrants Ask Court to Block U.S. from Sending Them to Guantánamo

The three men, who are detained in New Mexico, say they “fit the profile” of the type of migrants the Trump administration has started sending to the Navy base.

My colleague Adam Goldman, who abandoned Twitter/X but has not to date joined Bluesky, has posted on LinkedIn this memo from Attorney General Pam Bondi personally barring DOJ buildings from procuring paper straws www.linkedin.com/posts/activi...

The Trump admin says ICE has custody of migrants sent to Guantanamo, but it's DOD guards in Camp 6, a war-on-terror prison. It won't say who is being held incommunicado there, but we are publishing a list of 53 men in Camp 6.
w/ @carolrosenbergnyt.bsky.social
www.nytimes.com/2025/02/12/u...

Some Migrants Sent by Trump to Guantánamo Are Being Held by Military Guards

The Times has obtained a list of 53 Venezuelan men the Trump administration has put in a wartime prison built to hold Al Qaeda suspects.

‘Clinton Plan’ Emails Were Likely Made by Russian Spies, Declassified Report Shows

An annex to the Durham special counsel report was the latest in a series of disclosures about the Russia inquiry, as the Trump team seeks to distract from the Epstein files

gift link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/07/31/u...

‘Clinton Plan’ Emails Were Likely Made by Russian Spies, New Documents Show

I experienced this last week & refused, saying I had never before been asked to provide the names of any analysts I was planning to quote to get a comment. Spox replied that maybe they were D donors. (In that case, it was 3 retired top military JAG officers.) I guess that was not a weird oneoff.

In response to @freedom.press FOIA request, ODNI declassified & released an intel memo contradicting a key claim Trump made to invoke the Alien Enemies Act

Confirms reporting the Trump admin characterized as false & used to justify weakening limits on leak inquiries

www.nytimes.com/2025/05/05/u...

Spy Agencies Do Not Think Venezuela Directs Gang, Declassified Memo Shows

The release of the memo further undercuts the Trump administration’s rationale for using the Alien Enemies Act to deport scores of Venezuelans to a prison in El Salvador.

Knight Institute asks Judge Cannon to make public Jack Smith's report on the Trump classified documents case, saying it is a judicial record so there is a 1st Amendment right of access. (American Oversight & the NYT are separately pursuing FOIA lawsuits for it.)

www.nytimes.com/2025/02/24/u...

Institute Asks Judge in Trump Documents Case to Disclose Special Counsel Report

The report is the second volume of a report Jack Smith wrote after dropping the federal criminal cases he brought against Donald J. Trump because of his 2024 election victory.

Lawyers for Justice Dept. employees threaten to sue, saying dismissals violate the law.

www.nytimes.com/live/2025/02...

Trump White House told the three Democratic-selected members of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board to resign by tomorrow or be fired. Ousting them would paralyze the independent, bipartisan watchdog agency.
www.nytimes.com/2025/01/22/u...

Trump Seeks to Paralyze Independent Privacy and Civil Liberties Watchdog

The Trump White House has told three Democratic-selected members of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board to resign or be fired, which would stop the independent agency from functioning.

8 Inspectors General Fired by Trump File Lawsuit Seeking Reinstatement

The case is the latest to challenge a wave of actions by President Trump that brazenly violated legal limits on his power.

www.nytimes.com/2025/02/12/u...

8 Inspectors General Fired by Trump File Lawsuit Seeking Reinstatement

The case is the latest to challenge a wave of actions by President Trump that brazenly violated legal limits on his power.

a kicker about Trump firing Bill Burck as lawyer for Trump Org bc Burck is representing Harvard in its fight against the Trump admin is that this whole time, Burck's law firm, Quinn Emanuel, has also been pro bono representing Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, the guy mistakenly deported to El Salvador

Kash Patel Has Plan to Remake the FBI Into a Tool of Trump

President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the FBI has called for firing the agency’s top officials, shutting down its Washington headquarters and prosecuting journalists.

w/ Elizabeth Williamson
www.nytimes.com/2024/12/02/u...

Kash Patel Has Plan to Remake the F.B.I. Into a Tool of Trump

President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the F.B.I. has called for firing the agency’s top officials, shutting down its Washington headquarters and prosecuting leakers and journalists.

exclusive:

Intelligence Assessment Said to Contradict Trump on Venezuelan Gang

To invoke wartime deportation powers, Trump asserted that Venezuela’s government controls a gang. U.S. intelligence analysts think that is not true.

w/ @julianbarnes.bsky.social

www.nytimes.com/2025/03/20/u...

New from Julian Barnes, Maggie Haberman and me:

Trump Appointee Pressed Analyst to Redo Intelligence on Venezuelan Gang

The move followed a disclosure that intelligence agencies disagree with a key factual claim Trump made to invoke a wartime deportation law.

www.nytimes.com/2025/05/16/u...

Trump Appointee Pressed Analyst to Redo Intelligence on Venezuelan Gang

President Trump to Chief Justice Roberts, author of the presidential immunity decision: “Thank you again. I won’t forget.” Slaps him on the shoulder.

Gift link

The Peril of a White House That Flaunts Its Indifference to the Law

The White House has made no legal argument explaining its bald claim that the president has wartime power to summarily kill people suspected of smuggling drugs.

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/24/u...

The Peril of a White House That Flaunts Its Indifference to the Law

Roll Call: The WH has taken down a public spending "apportionments" database showing when/where $ goes after Congress appropriates it. A 2022 law - a reform stemming from Trump's withholding military assistance from Ukraine - requires making the data public. rollcall.com/2025/03/24/w...

White House scraps public spending database - Roll Call

The White House budget office has taken down a website where approvals of funding provided in appropriations laws are required to be posted.

Joe Kent, top aide to DNI Tulsi Gabbard, ordered rewriting to an intel analysis re Venezuela & TDA so the doc could not be "used against" Trump, adding to concerns about politicizing intel. More emails also emerging.

@julianbarnes.bsky.social Maggie Haberman & me.

www.nytimes.com/2025/05/20/u...

Official Pushed to Rewrite Intelligence So It Could Not Be ‘Used Against’ Trump

A federal judge has blocked President Trump from deploying members of the California National Guard to Los Angeles and ordered the administration to return control of the forces to Gov. Gavin Newsom.
storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Guardian caps are inarguably goofy looking but every time I see an NFL player wearing one, I still think “that guy is clearly a lot smarter and more confident than everyone around him.”

Trump Claims the Power to Summarily Kill Suspected Drug Smugglers

The move to treat criminals as if they were wartime combatants escalated an administration pattern of using military force for law enforcement tasks at home and abroad.

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/04/u...

Trump Claims the Power to Summarily Kill Suspected Drug Smugglers

Appeals Court keeps restraining order in place that for now is preventing the Trump admin from carrying out more summary deportations under the Alien Enemies Act

www.nytimes.com/2025/03/26/u...

Appeals Court Maintains Block on Trump’s Deportation Flights Under Wartime Power

The panel said that while further argument was needed, lawyers for the migrants would likely succeed in their claims that the Venezuelans had been denied due process.

New memo by Trump's 36-year-old OLC chief, Elliot Gaiser, says Congress's Constitutional power to make laws necessary and proper to regulate how the U.S. government works is actually just a power to "assist" the president--so laws are valid if they increase Trump's power but not if they restrict it.