Intelligence Surveillance & Privacy

Justice Department Releases Its Review of FISA Applications Examined by Inspector General

Jacob Schulz
Monday, August 3, 2020, 9:00 PM

Published by The Lawfare Institute
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The Justice Department's National Security Division released a review of 29 applications for Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants. The 29 applications had been previously examined by the Justice Department's Office of Inspector General (OIG), which shared its findings in a March report. The OIG report had found factual inaccuracies throughout the applications and noted that four of the 29 were missing files used to ensure the factual accuracy of the applications.

The Justice Department's review of the same 29 applications identified only one material misstatement and one material omission. In the Justice Department's assessment, neither error merits invalidation of the warrant authorizations granted by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

The new findings can be found here and below.


Jacob Schulz is the former managing editor of Lawfare. He previously served as deputy managing editor and associate editor. He hails from Pennylvania and attended Amherst College.

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