WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) — A hearing in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit brought by conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch and CatholicVote Civic Action against the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI over records on the targeting of traditional Catholics under the Biden administration is scheduled for Thursday.
In a March 17 statement, Judicial Watch announced that a March 19 hearing has been scheduled, as it, along with CatholicVote Civic Action, continue to seek all the DOJ and FBI’s records related to their targeting of so-called “radical traditionalist Catholics” as part of their lawsuit. The government agencies appear to be dragging their feet in providing the records, sending heavily redacted files on multiple occasions.
Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton questioned why President Donald Trump’s DOJ and FBI won’t reveal all records of this “notorious abuse of power” under Biden’s watch.
“Why won’t this DOJ and FBI reveal the full record on one of the most notorious abuses of power under Biden — the FBI’s targeting of Catholics for their Christian religious beliefs?” Fitton said. “This concerns the First Amendment, and the Biden Justice Department’s flagrant abuse may be criminal.”
“Why won’t this DOJ and FBI reveal the full record on one of the most notorious abuses of power under Biden—the FBI’s targeting of Catholics for their Christian religious beliefs,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said. https://t.co/5AlgBOv7IM
— John-Henry Westen (@JhWesten) March 18, 2026
As reported extensively by LifeSiteNews, in 2023, a leaked memo revealed that the FBI’s Richmond Field Office under Stanley M. Meador targeted “radical traditionalist Catholics” who prefer to attend the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM), allegedly because of concerns that many of these faithful are “violent extremists” and “white nationalists.”
READ: FBI official who oversaw memo targeting traditional Catholics testifies before Congress
The eight-page memo was leaked by former FBI agent-turned-whistleblower Kyle Seraphin in 2023. It showed that Meador’s Richmond Field Office had identified “Radical Traditionalist Catholic Ideology” as a magnet for “violent extremists” and alleged that “white nationalists” were increasingly making common cause online with attendees of the Latin Mass. It specifically targeted traditional Catholics.
The leaked memo, written by a Richmond FBI analyst, directly cites a defamatory study conducted by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) on the subject “Radical Traditional Catholicism.” The SPLC had long been rejected as a legitimate resource for the FBI, Seraphin said, but in this instance, it was relied upon as a primary source to justify its efforts. The document also references three anti-Catholic smear articles (here, here, and here) published by left-wing website Salon and The Atlantic to defend its monitoring.
The memo further asserted that “increasingly observed interest of Racially or Ethnically Motivated Violent Extremists (RMVE) in Radical Traditionalist Catholic (RTC) Ideology almost certainly presents new opportunities for threat mitigation” via “tripwire and source development.”
Here, the document called for spying on and infiltrating traditional Roman Catholic groups, in particular, churches served by the Society of St. Pius X.
The memo’s leak prompted a widespread outcry from both Catholics and Protestants across the country, who said the document violated the First Amendment by targeting Americans as “threats” due to particular religious beliefs. The outrage prompted the FBI to quickly retract the memo and pledge to investigate why it was written.
Just months after the memo leak, Judicial Watch and CatholicVote filed a FOIA request seeking access to the FBI and DOJ’s records pertaining to Catholics and other topics related to the memo. After the agencies failed to respond within 30 business days, the organizations sued the agencies for access to these records.
In November 2023, Judicial Watch and CatholicVote received 131 heavily redacted files showing the FBI scurrying to issue a response to the leaked memo. A month later, they received 98 more largely redacted files showing the Bureau’s Office of General Counsel reviewed and was involved in handling the controversial internal memo from the FBI’s Richmond, Virginia, field office that targeted traditional Catholics.
In January 2024, Josh Mercer, vice president of CatholicVote, told LifeSite that the FBI appears more concerned with its reputation than with uncovering the truth.
“From what we could read, the FBI was much more concerned about their public image than uncovering the truth about what they were doing to Catholics,” Mercer said.
“It really looks like they’re trying to bog this process down and take their time and bury us in these heavily redacted documents,” he added.
READ: New FOIA doc suggests FBI is dragging its feet on turning over facts about surveilling Catholics
Almost two years later, in September 2025, the FBI and DOJ were ordered to produce a Vaughn index, a log describing requested records that had been withheld by the government and their legal justifications for withholding them.
However, Judicial Watch noted that the FBI’s index lacked any detailed explanations and was even partially illegible. The watchdog emphasized that the Bureau had declined to provide a clearer version or revise the provided index.
The leak also prompted an investigation by the Republican-controlled House Judiciary Committee, which revealed that the FBI’s Richmond field office coordinated with two other offices across the country to spy on traditional Catholics.
During a September 2025 Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, FBI Director Kash Patel assured Senator Josh Hawley that the bureau officials who were involved in the targeting of traditional Catholics had been fired.
READ: Kash Patel says FBI officials have been fired for role in targeting Latin Mass Catholics
