Office of Legal Counsel concludes executive privilege can cover the President's private advisers
The Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel issued a formal opinion for the Counsel to the President concluding that executive privilege can cover the President's communications with advisers outside the Executive Branch.
What happened
The opinion, dated August 10, 2026 and addressed to the Counsel to the President, concludes that presidential communications with private advisers can fall within the scope of executive privilege so long as they relate to official presidential decisionmaking, involve or reflect communications with the President or his direct advisers, and are confidential. It was signed by Assistant Attorney General T. Elliot Gaiser. A footnote defines the term 'private advisers' to include anyone the President consults outside the Executive Branch, whether members of the public, state officials, or employees of other branches of the federal government.
The opinion was published on the evening of August 10, hours after Todd Blanche was sworn in as attorney general.
Why it matters
An opinion of the Office of Legal Counsel is the position the executive branch will assert in court and to Congress until it is withdrawn or overruled, so this is a change in what the government will claim it may withhold rather than a commentary on it. The footnote is where the reach lies: it puts state officials and employees of other branches inside a category named for private citizens. This record follows it as an expansion of the ground on which oversight can be refused.