Government watchdog Judicial Watch wants to know more about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's behavior and actions on January 8, 2021, when she called General Mark Milley in an attempt to take away then President Trump's military authority. The group has issued a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the Department of Defense for details of the call.
The lawsuit demands "any and all records regarding, concerning, or related to the telephone call between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and General Mark Milley on or about January 8, 2021," and "any and all transcripts, recordings, and/or summaries of the call, as well as any other records produced in preparation for, during, and/or pursuant to the call." Judicial Watch is also looking for "any and all additional records of communication between Gen. Milley and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi between November 1, 2020, and the present."
At the time, the Wall Street Journal called the speaker's behavior "A Coup of Pelosi's Own."
We scoured the U.S. Constitution Friday afternoon and it’s definitely not there: the provision allowing the Speaker of the House of Representatives to intervene in the military chain of command to protect the world from President Trump.
Mrs. Pelosi told her Democratic colleagues that she spoke Friday morning to Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, “to discuss available precautions for preventing an unstable president from initiating military hostilities or accessing the launch codes and ordering a nuclear strike.” She posted the “Dear colleague” letter on her website to make sure the world got the message. A spokesman for Gen. Milley told reporters the chairman “answered her questions.”
Mrs. Pelosi’s call to Gen. Milley is itself a violation of the separation of powers by seeking to inject herself into an executive-branch military decision. She can offer advice all she wants, but this call at this time has the sound of an order. It might even be construed by some as its own little coup—conniving with the military to relieve of command the person who remains the elected President.
"If Speaker Pelosi's description of her conversation with General Milley is true, it sets a dangerous precedent that could undermine the president’s role as commander in chief and the separation of powers," Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said about the lawsuit. "Our new lawsuit aims to uncover the truth about the call."
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