Congress May 18, 2021

Trump’s DOJ Used Subpoena To Try And Unmask The Person Behind Twitter Account Mocking Devin Nunes

WASHINGTON, DC - NOVEMBER 21: Representative Devin Nunes, a Republican from California and ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, speaks during an impeachment inquiry hearingon Capitol Hill November 21, 2019 in Washington, DC. The committee heard testimony during the fifth day of open hearings in the impeachment inquiry against U.S. President Donald Trump, whom House Democrats say held back U.S. military aid for Ukraine while demanding it investigate his political rivals. (Photo by Andrew Harrer-Pool/Getty Images)

Freshly-unsealed court documents reveal that then-Attorney General Bill Barr’s Justice Department took extraordinary steps to try and learn the identity of the person behind the twitter parody account that exists strictly to make fun of famously thin-skinned California Rep. Devin Nunes.

DOJ lawyers secretly obtained a subpoena from a grand jury last year in an attempt to identify the person behind the Twitter account, @NunesAlt, which is dedicated to mocking Nunes. Nunes became a national punchline after he filed several lawsuits against Twitter and the users behind parody accounts such as @DevinCow and @DevinNunesmom.

According to the New York Times, Twitter fought the subpoena, as well as an associated gag order barring the company from discussing it publicly. Twitter executives raised concerns that the Justice Department might be abusing federal criminal law-enforcement power and violating the First Amendment by trying to retaliate against a critic of Nunes, a Republican who was one of then-President Trump’s most vocal allies. Nunes was instrumental in pushing the “Deep State” conspiracy theories that Trump constantly brought up.

How the Justice Department was convinced to help Nunes in this latest fight with the social media platform is not clear, but it ultimately wasn’t any more successful than the earlier lawsuits. Sources say the issue was put to bed this spring, when the DOJ withdrew the subpoena after President Biden took office.

The Justice Department under Trump secretly obtained a grand-jury subpoena last year in an attempt to identify the person behind a Twitter account dedicated to mocking Devin Nunes. https://t.co/MG3YUZyjLk
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) May 18, 2021

Several pointed out that there should be consequences for whoever authorized the waste of government resources for something like this.

.@TheJusticeDept & Capitol Police should identify & remove anyone still employed who was involved in using a Grand Jury to unmask a Devin Nunes critic on @Twitter.

An inquiry should also determine whether this was AG Barr’s pattern of practice. https://t.co/BQ3gv2JRpe
— Christopher Constantine (@ChrisAlbertoLaw) May 18, 2021

CNN legal analyst Asha Rangappa also pointed out how strange it is that a veteran politician like Nunes can’t seem to handle criticism that comes with the territory of holding public office.

What is the deal with @DevinNunes not being able to handle parody accounts?? If you’re a public official in a free society, some people are going to criticize and make fun of you. Deal with it. It just seems so bizarre and mentally unbalanced
— Asha Rangappa (@AshaRangappa_) May 18, 2021

The Nunes parody account, which certainly picked up additional followers after this news, also weighed in on the news.

It pointed out the hypocrisy of the congressman pushing to unmask someone’s real identity. Nunes after all, was the one who made a very public accusation against the Obama White House, claiming they unmasked the identities of members of Trump’s then-presidential transition team.