The NSC signed off on the manuscript at the end of April, though Bolton’s successor as national security advisor, Robert O’Brien, argued that “the manuscript described sensitive information about ongoing foreign policy issues”, according to a letter dated 16th June. The following day, the Department of Justice sought an emergency injunction, arguing that the manuscript “still contains classified information”.
Today, that injunction was rejected by the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Judge Royce Lamberth wrote that “Bolton has gambled with the national security of the United States”, though he also concluded that the DoJ “has failed to establish that an injunction will prevent irreparable harm.”
The publisher plans to contest the Trump administration’s objections, and publication is scheduled for 23rd June. The Room Where It Happened is currently Amazon’s highest-selling book, based on pre-orders, and Trump’s attempts to suppress it seem highly counter-productive. This is a repeat of the controversy surrounding Michael Wolff’s book Fire and Fury, which also became a bestseller following Trump’s legal threats against it.
Like Fire and Fury, Fear, and A Very Stable Genius, The Room Where It Happened includes highly damaging allegations. Bolton writes that, at a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Trump “turned the conversation to the coming US presidential election... pleading with Xi to ensure he’d win”. Trump’s exact words were redacted by the NSC — Bolton originally quoted Trump, “but the government’s prepublication review process has decided otherwise” — though Vanity Fair revealed that Trump told Xi: “Buy a lot of soybeans and wheat and make sure we win.”
