Trump and his team have sought to use government power to go after Bolton since his first term

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Peter Baker @peterbakernyt 3h
Trump and his team have sought to use government power to go after Bolton since his first term even when it meant ignoring normal standards, so much so that his own assistant attorney general quietly resigned rather than go along any more, as disclosed in "THE DIVIDER"
w/@sbg1





Trump’s First Administration's DOJ Went After Bolton’s Memoir

The week before John R. Bolton’s 2020 memoir, “The Room Where It Happened,” was set to be released, President Trump’s first administration filed a federal lawsuit claiming the book was filled with classified information.

The suit by the Trump administration claimed that Mr. Bolton did not wait for the national security review of his manuscript, over which he worked closely with government officials, before allowing his book to be sent to printers. But the judge in the case sided with Mr. Bolton over the Trump administration’s efforts to stop the book’s publication.

Later, Ellen Knight, the career government official who led the review of the manuscript, described a process she called deeply politicized. She wrote in a letter to the court in connection with the administration’s lawsuit that she had cleared the book for publication at the end of April 2020 after working with Mr. Bolton, who had been Mr. Trump’s national security adviser, to remove classified material.

But she said White House political appointees overruled her, deciding that the book still contained classified information. The book, according to one former senior administration official familiar with what happened who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly, ultimately contained no classified material, and the matter was settled.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/22/us/politics/trump-bolton-memoir-room-where-it-happened.html


...when President Biden came into office, his DOJ dropped the 2020 lawsuit, dismissing it “with prejudice,” meaning it cannot be revived.

However, that action didn't actually clear Bolton. The Trump admin suit claimed 'irreparable harm,' asking that the book be pulled from the shelves; and although the judge in the case ruled that it was too late to reverse any harm, he nonetheless scolded Bolton for "exposing the country to harm and himself to civil and (potentially) criminal liability.

...in a 10-page opinion, Judge Lamberth also suggested that Mr. Bolton may be in jeopardy of forfeiting his $2 million advance, as the Justice Department has separately requested — and that he could be prosecuted for allowing the book to be published before receiving final notice that a prepublication review to scrub out classified information was complete.

“Bolton has gambled with the national security of the United States,” Judge Lamberth wrote. “He has exposed his country to harm and himself to civil (and potentially criminal) liability. But these facts do not control the motion before the court. The government has failed to establish that an injunction will prevent irreparable harm.”

The main elements of the book, “The Room Where It Happened,” an unflattering account of Mr. Trump’s conduct in office, have already been widely reported.

Mr. Trump has accused Mr. Bolton of lying — and false information is not classified. But he has also made clear that he wants the Justice Department to prosecute his former aide for spilling secrets, a position he reiterated on Saturday.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/20/us/politics/john-bolton-book-ruling.html