Dox Box

DOJ just filed a lawsuit against John Bolton to prevent publication of his book.

They also uhmmm appear to have put Bolton's home address in the lawsuit caption, which I'm not sure how to handle.... so I took down the link to the complaint.

— southpaw (@nycsouthpaw) June 16, 2020

The black box under Bolton's name is his home address.  I have seen DOJ lawyers includes an address on the signature page. I have NEVER seen a pleading like this, with the defendant's address on the first page in the heading.  The name, yes; the address?  No.  I don't recall even putting a defendant's address anywhere in the Complaint (the formal name of this type of document in Federal Court).

This is grounds for an ethics action, it seems to me.  I'm not up on ethical rules in the D.C. Circuit, but I can't imagine a complaint about this would be met coldly by a sitting judge.

This suit is not what censorship looks like.  This is what gross abuse of power looks like.

Has there ever been a lower moment in the history of the American presidency?

— George Conway (@gtconway3d) June 1, 2020

Somehow, someway, they keep refreshing that tweet, and going lower and lower.

I'll just keep adding on, 'mkay?

NEW: Jody Hunt, the head of DOJ's Civil Division, announced to employees this evening that he's stepping down, effective July 3. I reviewed the email to Civil Division staff, which doesn't say why he's leaving now, just that he'd advised Trump today of his decision.

— Zoe Tillman (@ZoeTillman) June 16, 2020

Yeah, I think we've found the reason why Mr. Hunt is seeking other opportunities.  Although I'd think better of him had he quit before signing this abuse of process and power.
And please note the narrative is stuck on the idea that the DOJ wants to block publication of Bolton's book, which they resolutely don't ("Enjoin" seems to be the closest the petition comes to seeking any kind of injunctive relief, and yet even that paragraph doesn't allege "irreperable harm" if relief is not granted, the threshold for getting injunctive relief in court.).  As I said before, the narrative was the Texas Supreme Court declared Texas voters use fear of infection as grounds for seeking a mail-in ballot as a "disability, under penalty of....nothing.  The Court's opinion explicitly said nothing would be done to anyone who checked the box "disability" on the form if all they had was the disabling fear of getting covid-19.  So I'm curious just how long it will take the narrative to realize the DOJ is really just shooting blanks here.

And pretty much the only reason to do this (which is why Trump used government lawyers instead of his own) is to dox Bolton.