U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) sent letters Friday to the CEOs of AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon, demanding immediate transparency and accountability after new information surfaced alleging that the former administration’s Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) tracked the private “tolling data” of eight U.S. Senators and one Member of Congress.
Senator Blackburn’s correspondence follows a briefing last week from President Trump’s Deputy Director of the FBI, Dan Bongino, who provided the senators with details on the revelation. The data, obtained through subpoenas issued by the Department of Justice (DOJ) under former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s “Arctic Frost” investigation in 2023, reportedly includes the time, recipient, duration, and general location of calls made on their devices between January 4 and January 7, 2021.
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The Tennessee Senator accused the companies of allowing an “egregious invasion of privacy” and questioned their failure to challenge the DOJ’s request.
“I write today seeking answers regarding the egregious invasion of privacy that your company… inflicted upon eight United States Senators and one Member of Congress,” Senator Blackburn wrote. She labeled the investigation a “corrupt, politically motivated Arctic Frost investigation” and a “weaponized witch hunt to target President Trump.”
A central point of her inquiry is the apparent lack of a “criminal predicate” for the subpoenas. “As noted above, we are not aware of any criminal predicate under which the FBI sought to spy on Members of Congress and infringe upon our privacy,” Blackburn stated, asking the carriers to confirm this.
The letters challenge the telecom giants on critical decision points regarding the subpoenas, including:
- The identity of the person at the company who approved the “unprecedented, targeted invasion of privacy.”
- The exact date the decision to release the data on the Republican officials was authorized.
- The rationale behind the company’s decision “to decline to move to quash these subpoenas,” a common legal maneuver companies can employ to challenge government data requests.
- What steps, if any, the companies took to protect the privacy of Members of Congress.
Senator Blackburn affirmed that while Director Kash Patel and Attorney General Pam Bondi are already investigating the matter within their agencies, the cell phone carriers must also provide immediate answers.
“We deserve transparency on this invasion of privacy, and I can assure you that accountability is coming,” she concluded.
The release of the subpoenaed data has ignited a firestorm on Capitol Hill, with Republican lawmakers characterizing the disclosure as a gross abuse of power and political weaponization of federal law enforcement.
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