A U.S. federal judge ruled Saturday that former U.S. national security adviser John Bolton’s book about the Trump Administration can be published, despite an emergency request from the Justice Department to block it.
The tell-all book by the president’s former aide, set to go on sale Tuesday, is critical of President Donald Trump’s foreign policy decision-making during the year-and-a-half Bolton worked in the White House.
The Justice Department maintained that classified information could be exposed if the book is published, but U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth said Bolton could move forward with its publication, declaring that thousands of copies already have been shipped to vendors.
“A single dedicated individual with a book in hand could publish its contents far and wide from his local coffee shop,” Lamberth wrote. “With hundreds of thousands of copies around the globe — many in newsrooms — the damage is done. There is no restoring the status quo.”
Judge Lamberth concluded that Bolton “gambled” with U.S. national security and “exposed his country to harm and himself to civil [and potentially criminal] liability.”
Trump tweeted Judge Lamberth’s ruling is a “BIG COURT WIN against Bolton” and cited Lamberth’s “strong & powerful statements” about Bolton.
Bolton has denied the book contains classified information and has maintained that a career White House official approved the manuscript in April.
