A federal judge appointed a special master to the East Potomac Park case to investigate whether Justice Department or Interior Department attorneys committed ethical violations during the legal proceedings.
On Saturday, U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes tapped former U.S. Attorney Jessie K. Liu to helm the court’s formal investigation into whether government officials had misled Reyes and kept her in the dark about plans to redevelop the 18-hole public golf course.
Liu was U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia from 2017 to 2020; she previously was assistant U.S. attorney in the same office.
She resigned from the Trump administration in 2020 after the president withdrew her nomination for a top job at the Treasury Department. She’s currently a partner at the Washington, D.C.-based law firm Liu Shur Kravis LLP.
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The government or other parties involved in the case must submit any concerns in writing by Friday, the order says.
Reyes announced the investigation during a hearing on Oct. 30 after learning of plans to develop the site from one of President Donald Trump’s Truth Social posts from earlier in the week in which he said the park would be closed in mid-November to “renovate and rebuild” the site “as scheduled.”
Reyes called the Oct. 30 hearing to determine whether the government had disregarded her order requiring officials to give the court notice before further construction work took place.
During the hearing, Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward, the No. 3 official at the DOJ, said renovation plans for East Potomac Golf Links had been developing for weeks — contradicting statements from earlier in October in which he said there were no plans to close the course for renovations in November. The admission was one reason Reyes launched an investigation.
Reyes has repeatedly expressed frustration with government attorneys in the case. Last month, the DOJ requested she recuse herself from the case, arguing she couldn’t be impartial in the matter. Reyes denied the request.
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