Justice Department secretly obtained Project Veritas journalist’s email information

The U.S. Justice Department issued a secret order to Microsoft on March 9, 2021, to obtain email information from a Project Veritas journalist as part of its investigation of a diary stolen from President Joe Biden’s daughter, Ashley Biden.

The name of the employee whose emails were targeted was redacted in the order, but in a later court filing, attorneys for Project Veritas identified the person as a journalist.

The order was one of five issued to the technology company for communications of eight journalists from Project Veritas, which is known for hidden-camera sting operations of liberal politicians and nonprofits. As a result, the government collected nearly 200,000 emails and other files, attorneys for Project Veritas said in a court filing.

In the other secret warrants, federal agents sought emails and contacts from Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe, Project Veritas journalists Eric Cochran and Spencer Meads, and four additional unidentified Project Veritas journalists.

Project Veritas, which identifies itself as a nonprofit investigative outlet, purchased the Biden diary in September 2020 from two people who later pleaded guilty to conspiring to transport stolen materials, a felony. Project Veritas never published the diary and gave it to police on Nov. 8, 2020.

The Department of Justice, however, opened an investigation into the outlet and its journalists concerning alleged conspiracy to transport stolen property across state lines, conspiracy to possess stolen goods, interstate transportation of stolen property and possession of stolen goods.

The secret order sought the journalist’s email header information, including timestamps, names, usernames or IP addresses of senders or recipients of communications from Sept. 1, 2020, until Dec. 1, 2020. A U.S. District Court ordered that the March 9 order be sealed for one year.

After the warrants and order became public, Project Veritas lawyers filed a request for preliminary relief from U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres. It does not appear from court records that the court ruled on this request.

Separately, search warrants were carried out at the homes of O’Keefe, Cochran and Meads in November 2021, alarming free speech advocates, including Freedom of the Press Foundation, of which the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is a project. A special master was appointed to determine what seized information could be shared with prosecutors.