President Trump's outside advisers — individuals who are not employed by the federal government — may now be protected from future congressional and legal investigations, according to a new opinion from the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel. The new opinion says that executive privilege can apply to private advisers of the president if the communications "relate to official presidential decisionmaking," are confidential, and involve conversations between the president and his direct team of advisers. Executive privilege is often asserted by the president in conversations with executive branch staff, like lawyers who work for the White House, but the new step could protect Mr. Trump's outside legal counsel and other advisers from divulging information in future congressional investigations or legal proceedings. "At bottom, the purpose of executive privilege is to protect the government's decisionmaking processes," the opinion said. This is not the first OLC opinion by Mr. Trump's Justice Department that has broken with historical precedent.