For over a year, the DOJ and FBI obstructed the House Intelligence Committee's investigation into obtaining the application for a FISA warrant involving ex-Trump campaign aide Carter Page and went so far as to ignore a subpoena.  After the committee finally saw the application and uncovered irregularities, the DOJ and FBI flatly refused to furnish requested unredacted documents regarding provenance and quality of the information used to obtain the FISA warrant and the June 2017 FISA warrant application renewal signed by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.

With no resolution in sight, President Trump recently issued an order for the DOJ and FBI to release twenty-one unredacted pages of the warrant application, as well as all FBI reports of interviews with Bruce Ohr, in addition to all unredacted text messages relating to the Russia investigation, of James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Bruce Ohr.

All this may sound like good news for Lady Justice and finally allowing the American people to see the origin of the never-ending Russian collusion investigation.  Then one remembers the ultimate fate of recently requested evidence concerning investigations involving Hillary Clinton's illegal private server and the IRS's illegal targeting of conservative groups.  

In those cases, months of investigations and hearings on the part of Congress painstakingly uncovered mind-blowing criminal activity by Hillary Clinton and the IRS.  The American people rightfully anticipated the hammer of justice.  But the only hammer that fell was the one used to smash all of Clinton's mobile devices, while all other requested and subpoenaed evidence involving Clinton and the IRS scandal was lost, erased, or destroyed. 

So regarding investigations of the recent past, the blatant destruction of evidence was apparently the right move because it allowed Clinton to focus on running for president and allowed IRS director of the Exempt Organizations Unit Lois Lerner to enjoy a handsome retirement package. 

Enter the declassification of unredacted documents ordered by President Trump, which has the potential to make the Clinton and IRS scandals appear anemic in comparison.  The lessons learned by the swamp regarding the obvious benefits achieved by brazenly destroying laptops and mobile devices and erasing subpoenaed emails and backup tapes will be hard for the DOJ and FBI to ignore and may be the only move left to keep their members out of jail.

Hypothetically speaking, the consequences of handing over the newly declassified, unredacted documents are earth-shattering and could spell the end of many careers, not to mention the trust of millions of Americans regarding the Intelligence Community.  On the other hand, doing what Clinton and the IRS did, and destroying those documents, or simply continuing to refuse to hand them over with the reason of "national security," might prove to be no more of a problem than that faced by Clinton or the IRS and just be remembered as a blemish on the history of the DOJ and FBI.

Image: EFF Photos via Flickr.