The Daily Fuckup

The Supreme Court on Jan. 19, 2022, denied Donald Trump’s emergency request to block release of White House records connected to the House Jan. 6 investigation. The order left in place a lower-court ruling that had cleared the way for the National Archives to turn over the material. ([supremecourt.gov](https://www.supremecourt.gov/Search.aspx?FileName=%2Fdocket%2Fdocketfiles%2Fhtml%2Fpublic%5C21a272.html&utm_source=openai))

The justices did not decide the broader executive-privilege fight on the merits. In the docket entry, the Court said the dispute raised “unprecedented” questions about whether a former president can stop disclosure of records after an incumbent president has declined to assert privilege, but said the appeals court had already rejected Trump’s claims under the tests he proposed. That meant Trump lost the emergency round without getting the Court to take up the larger constitutional issue. ([supremecourt.gov](https://www.supremecourt.gov/Search.aspx?FileName=%2Fdocket%2Fdocketfiles%2Fhtml%2Fpublic%5C21a272.html&utm_source=openai))

The records at issue were part of the House Select Committee’s effort to reconstruct the days before, during and after the Capitol attack. Trump had asked the Court to stop the documents from being turned over while he pressed his claim that they remained covered by executive privilege. Biden had already declined to assert privilege over the materials, a fact that narrowed Trump’s case and figured prominently in the Court’s denial. ([supremecourt.gov](https://www.supremecourt.gov/Search.aspx?FileName=%2Fdocket%2Fdocketfiles%2Fhtml%2Fpublic%5C21a272.html&utm_source=openai))

The result gave investigators access to another tranche of White House records as they continued to piece together the pressure campaign around the 2020 election and the administration’s response to the violence on Jan. 6. It did not settle every records fight tied to the attack, but it did remove one immediate obstacle to disclosure. ([supremecourt.gov](https://www.supremecourt.gov/Search.aspx?FileName=%2Fdocket%2Fdocketfiles%2Fhtml%2Fpublic%5C21a272.html&utm_source=openai))