A U.S. federal judge ruled on Monday that a tweet from President Donald Trump did not inadvertently disclose the Central Intelligence Agency's top-secret program to help rebel groups in Syria. The lawsuit, filed by the New York Times, centered on reports published in 2017 by Reuters, The Washington Post and others, claiming that the US president had shut down a vast CIA program providing assistance to rebel forces engaged in the Syrian civil war. . The program was initiated by US President Barack Obama, who in 2015 tasked the CIA with assisting armed groups operating under the aegis of the Free Syrian Army. In addition to training, CIA assistance included the provision of light and heavy ammunition, such as anti-tank missiles, mines and grenades.
But President Trump would end the $ 1 billion program shortly after his inauguration. Last July, the president openly contested an account by Greg Jaffe and Adam Entous of the Washington Post that Trump had ended the program by concession to Russia. In a tweet, Trump said, "The Washington Post made up the facts about the end of my massive, dangerous and expensive payments to Syrian rebels fighting Assad." Soon after, another newspaper, The New York Times, filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, claiming that the president's tweets had indeed revealed the existence of the CIA's secret program. But the CIA rejected The New York Times accusation and, at that point. the case moved to court.
On Monday, US District Court Judge Andrew Carter Jr. dismissed the newspaper's allegation. In a 20-page resolution, published online by the news site Politico, Judge Carter said President Trump's tweet was too vague and ambiguous to be considered declassifying the CIA's secret program. The judge said that, at no time did the president of the United States "make an unambiguous statement, or any statement about it, indicating that he was declassifying the information." Furthermore, Trump's tweet as well as other public statements about it did not undermine the legal authority of the US government to continue to monitor the details of the CIA program.
Meanwhile, the New York Times said it would try to appeal to Judge Carter's decision.