An attempt to seize three Post reporters’ email records came a day before Barr left office.

The Justice Department sought the email records of 3 Washington Post reporters the time earlier William P. Barr stepped down arsenic lawyer wide successful a last-ditch effort to place who told the paper astir conversations betwixt Trump run officials and the Russian ambassador, newly unsealed tribunal documents show.

The Dec. 22 request, 1 of Mr. Barr’s past acts successful office, was portion of the Trump administration’s large escalation of a yearslong run to ace down connected leaks of classified accusation to the quality media. The Trump Justice Department besides sought New York Times reporters’ records successful that period.

The Biden Justice Department had disclosed the effort — which besides included seizing the reporters’ telephone records — past month, starring to the unsealing of the Post docket. The files shed caller airy connected what happened, including listing the time prosecutors applied for the email records bid and identifying 3 Post articles that were the taxable of a leak investigation.

Those articles, identified lone by their dates of publication, seemingly included one successful May 2017 that reported that President Donald J. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, had discussed with Russia’s ambassador, Sergey I. Kislyak, the anticipation of utilizing Russian diplomatic facilities arsenic a connection backmost transmission during the transition.