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New Jersey Republican gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli said Democrats are trying to distract voters from Democrat nominee Rep. Mikie Sherrill’s involvement in the 1994 U.S. Naval Academy cheating scandal by pointing the finger at the Trump administration for a National Archives breach that unsealed her entire military record.
While Democrats railed against the Trump administration following the National Archives data breach, Republicans have raised questions about a New Jersey Globe report revealing Sherrill was barred from walking at her U.S. Naval Academy class graduation for refusing to report classmates involved in a massive cheating scandal.
“This is an illegal and dangerous weaponization of the federal government,” Sherrill said in a statement Thursday as she criticized Ciattarelli and the Trump administration for “breaking the law and exposing private records for political gain.”
But the Ciattarelli campaign told Fox News Digital that documents detailing Sherrill’s involvement in the cheating scandal were not included in the National Archives breach and that Sherrill implicated herself in the cheating scandal when she confirmed the New Jersey Globe’s report.
NEW JERSEY GOVERNOR HOPEFUL BLOCKED FROM NAVAL ACADEMY GRADUATION OVER CHEATING SCANDAL
The Ciattarelli campaign said Nicholas De Gregorio, a friend who is not directly involved in the campaign, “submitted a lawful FOIA request” about Sherrill’s military background of his own accord.
A spokesperson for the National Archives and Records Administration said the technician who responded to De Gregorio’s request about Sherrill’s military record “should NOT have released the entire record,” which included private information like her Social Security number.
The Ciattarelli campaign is refusing to destroy those documents that were inadvertently sent to De Gregorio and later shared with the campaign.
The National Archives apologized for the breach of privacy and has committed to holding their staff accountable for the blunder.
TOP GUBERNATORIAL RACE ROCKED BY ALLEGATIONS OF LEAKS AND DIRTY TRICKS AMID IMPROPER MILITARY RECORDS RELEASE
While investigating Sherrill’s suspected involvement in the 1994 cheating scandal, Ciattarelli’s campaign also submitted its own FOIA request, which confirmed her name was not on the U.S. Naval Academy graduation program that year.
“I didn’t turn in some of my classmates, so I didn’t walk but graduated and was commissioned as an officer in the U.S. Navy, serving for nearly ten years with the highest level of distinction and honor,” Sherrill told The Globe when confronted with the commencement program, as she defended not releasing any disciplinary records from her time at the academy.
“Contrary to your client’s baseless claims, no one leaked anything to the campaign to try to smear [Sherrill],” a lawyer representing the Ciattarelli campaign said in the letter. “Had they done so, we would not be waiting for her to release the records of her involvement in the cheating scandal at the United States Naval Academy that resulted in her being barred from walking at her graduation.”
The letter sent to Sherrill’s lawyers said that any claim that Ciattarelli for Governor (CFG) was “part of a conspiracy to smear [Sherrill] with ill-gotten documents is completely false. In fact, it is defamatory and if [Sherrill] and her campaign continue to push this false narrative and allege that CFG and/or [campaign strategist Chris] Russell acted illegally, we will pursue defamation claims.”
Democrats, however, were quick to blame the data breach on President Donald Trump.
“The Trump administration’s breach of privacy is a slap in the face to our nation’s brave servicemembers. It’s shameful,” former Rep. Abigail Spanberger, Virginia’s Democratic gubernatorial nominee, said Thursday.
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) has condemned the Trump administration for what they claimed was a “decision” to release the documents, despite a National Archives official confirming it was a low-level St. Louis branch employee responsible for “failing to follow proper administrative procedures.”
“The Trump administration’s decision to release her unredacted military personnel files to her opponent’s campaign, including her Social Security number, is yet another example of Donald Trump and the Republicans illegally weaponizing the federal government for political purposes,” DNC Chair Ken Martin said, while calling the breach a “shameful scandal that shows how little Donald Trump and Jack Ciattarelli think of the American military.”
House Minority Leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries said he would “support a criminal investigation into the unauthorized and illegal release of Mikie Sherrill’s records.”
California Rep. Robert Garcia, ranking member on the House Oversight Committee, and House Democrats from New Jersey’s congressional delegation have also called for a formal investigation.
“This illegal doxxing of Mikie Sherrill is yet another case of the blatant corruption all too common in this s— show of an administration,” DNC vice chair and Pennsylvania state Rep. Malcom Kenyatta said on X.
Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., accused Trump of “illegally releasing veterans’ personal records from government files for partisan reasons.”
Navy combat veteran Rep. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., agreed the administration is “corrupt and incompetent.”
“The Trump administration has ILLEGALLY released the private military records,” Gov. Gavin Newsom, D-Calif., who is widely considered to harbor presidential aspirations and has emerged as one of Trump’s staunchest critics, charged.
Sherrill campaign communications director Sean Higgins on Thursday accused the Trump administration of “targeting political opponents with an absolute disregard for the law, this time in concert with the Ciattarelli campaign.”
The White House did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request to comment on the Democrat’s accusations.
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