[Bytor Peltor]

John Bolton
April 2018 - becomes National Security Advisor (highest level of classified clearance)
September 2019 - removed as National Security Advisor
June 2020 - wants to release a book

The DOJ’s lawsuit filing
”This is a civil action by the United States to prevent Defendant John R. Bolton, a former National Security Advisor, from compromising national security by publishing a book containing classified information—in clear breach of agreements he signed as a condition of his employment and as a condition of gaining access to highly classified information and in clear breach of the trust placed within him by the United States Government.“



“our intent is not to censor the publication or to squelch any First Amendment rights that Ambassador Bolton may have in talking about things but to make sure in a pre-publication review, which is ongoing and which he wants to short circuit, to make sure that top-secret information, sensitive intelligence information that he and maybe only he has gotten is not disseminated to the detriment of the United States.”


William Barr
“We don’t believe that Bolton went through that process — hasn’t completed the process — and, therefore, is in violation of that agreement,” Barr said. The Trump administration is “trying to get them to complete the process — go through the process — and make the necessary deletions of classified information,” Barr said.”