DOJ is Using Our Tax Dollars to Try to Rewrite Watergate History

I am writing as your constituent to demand immediate congressional oversight into confirmed reports that the Department of Justice’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) hosted a two-hour briefing from Geoff Shepard, a former Nixon aide, promoting the conspiracy theory that Richard Nixon was innocent and "couped out of office" by a "deep state" special prosecutor conspiracy. This is not a neutral historical exercise. It is a calculated attempt to use the Department of Justice to build a dangerous playbook: framing independent special prosecutors as inherently corrupt actors practicing "lawfare," delegitimizing federal oversight, and creating an official pretext to shield executive power from future accountability. Shepard’s presentation, titled "Watergate as Lawfare," wraps narrow, previously rejected evidentiary claims inside a discredited revisionist conspiracy theory that ignores Nixon’s own tape-recorded admissions of obstruction of justice. Yet senior DOJ officials cleared the schedule of the internal ethics body created after Watergate specifically to prevent executive interference, entertaining a revisionist effort to exonerate Nixon. This dangerous effort aligns directly with Vice President Vance’s recent public claims comparing modern federal investigations of Trump to a "deep state" plot against Nixon. Rewriting settled history at DOJ headquarters to normalize the idea that special counsels cannot be trusted is a transparent setup to undermine prosecutor independence, delegitimize court rulings, and put the executive branch above the law. If the DOJ can be commandeered to fabricate historical exonerations in support of political or ideological goals, no legal precedent or constitutional guardrail is safe. As my representative in Congress, I urge you to fulfill your Article I oversight duties: 1. Conduct Immediate Oversight: Demand the House and Senate Judiciary Committees call senior DOJ officials to explain the authorization, staff hours, and official rationale behind hosting this OPR briefing. 2. Request an IG Audit: Formally request the DOJ Inspector General investigate whether federal staff time and ethics resources are being improperly weaponized for political revisionism. 3. Enforce Budget Boundaries: Support a strict appropriations rider in upcoming budget bills prohibiting federal funds from being used to re-examine or undermine closed Watergate-era cases or special counsel precedents. Congress must not sit by while the Department of Justice is turned into a revisionist legal shield for executive abuse. Protect institutional integrity and defend the rule of law.