Natalie Mayflower Sours Edwards was once a senior advisor in the Department of Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. During the Trump administration, from October 2017 until her arrest in October 2018, Ms. Mayflower Sours Edwards leaked SARs (suspicious activity reports) to that crackerjack news operation, BuzzFeed.
The SARs included information about former Trump campaign aides, Paul Manafort and Richard Gates. Ms. Mayflower Sours Edwards entered a guilty plea in January 2021 to conspiring to unlawfully disclose confidential financial reports. Ms. Mayflower Sours Edwards was sentenced to six months in prison on June 3, 2021.
No matter how a federal employee feels politically about the commander in chief or his aides, confidential means confidential. SARs are confidential with good reason. Suspicious activity reports (SARs) are just that: suspicious. It is a fundamental deprivation of due process to leak such reports before an investigation, and perhaps most importantly, before those named have the opportunity to respond. If you have ever wired money in excess of $10,000, well, you might have had a SARs.
You don’t leak suspicions, no matter how your politics lean or how long your last name. Rationalizing your personal exceptions to laws and policy are the roots of corruption. Corruption undermines markets, republics, and the law itself. See the Wild West.