Althouse: "As someone who defended Mueller’s motivations against the unrelenting attacks of Trump, I found his press conference to be baffling..."

June 3, 2019

"As someone who defended Mueller’s motivations against the unrelenting attacks of Trump, I found his press conference to be baffling..."

"... and it raised serious concerns over whether some key decisions are easier to reconcile on a political rather than a legal basis. Three decisions stand out that are hard to square with Mueller’s image as an apolitical icon.... What is concerning is not that each of his three decisions clearly would undermine Trump or Barr but that his decisions ran against the grain for a special counsel. The law favored the other path in each instance. Thus, to use Mueller’s own construction, if we could rule out a political motive, we would have done so. This is why Mueller must testify and must do so publicly."

Writes lawprof Jonathan Turley.

The 3 decisions:

1. "Refusal to identify grand jury material. One of the most surprising disclosures made by Attorney General William Barr was that he and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein expressly told Mueller to submit his report with grand jury material clearly marked to facilitate the release of a public version...."

2. "Surprise letter sent to the attorney general. ...While Barr has described Mueller’s letter as 'snitty,' it was in fact a sucker punch."

3. "Refusal to reach an obstruction conclusion.... ... Mueller contradicted himself in first saying that he would have cleared Trump if he could have, but then later saying that he decided not to reach a conclusion on any crime.... If Mueller believed such conclusions are impermissible, why did he not submit the matter to the Justice Department inspector general?... It was an effort to allude to possible crimes without, in fairness to the accused, clearly and specifically stating those crimes."

104 comments:

mccullough said...: Given that Mueller hires a bunch of Hillary donors and former lawyers, it’s easy to ascribe motivations.

Mueller is an old man. A figurehead. His motives are just the motives of the Hillary donors who told the old man what to do.

If he testifies, everyone will know that Sideshow Bob is just a figurehead. He won’t testify.; 6/3/19, 7:14 AM
R C Belaire said...: We've come a long, long way from collusion. Now, we're in the weeds of legalese and politics with no easy way to end this charade.; 6/3/19, 7:16 AM
rehajm said...: It was an effort to allude to possible crimes without, in fairness to the accused, clearly and specifically stating those crimes

Could have written just this last part and stopped.; 6/3/19, 7:20 AM
Heartless Aztec said...: High drama played out at a high level. It doesn't get much better than this.; 6/3/19, 7:21 AM
narciso said...: Ask his protege avenatti, its striking what Turley is still surprised by.; 6/3/19, 7:25 AM
rehajm said...: ...with no easy way to end this charade

Sure there is. We'll just stop talking about it and move on to the next thing.

How's that #MeToo coming along now that Kavanaugh is on the court?; 6/3/19, 7:25 AM
traditionalguy said...: When you've lost Turley,then the coming Declass must be an anti-Dem bomb.; 6/3/19, 7:26 AM
Eleanor said...: The whole thing was a political hit job orchestrated by people who can't accept the results of the election. When the Hillary crowd expressed concern over whether Trump and his support would accept the results of the election if he lost, it was a window into their heads.; 6/3/19, 7:27 AM
Laslo Spatula said...: ""As someone who defended Mueller’s motivations against the unrelenting attacks of Trump..."

It's almost like Trump saw exactly what was happening from the beginning, and the so-called intelligentsia didn't.

For people who are supposedly smart they don't seem adept at recognizing basic human behaviors.

I'm sure this will make them reconsider their preconceptions.

I am Laslo.; 6/3/19, 7:27 AM
rehajm said...: How's that #MeToo coming along?; 6/3/19, 7:28 AM
David Begley said...: Mueller is the worst sort of partisan hack as he portrays himself as a neutral.; 6/3/19, 7:29 AM
tim maguire said...: I've withheld judgment on Mueller. There have been plenty of questionable things going on in his investigation but, however problematic the process, it appears to me the result--the Mueller Report--is sound.

That said, Mueller should testify. Not on the report, which, as he rightly says, should speak for itself, but on the process he used.

For instance, as the collusion investigation weighted heavily on the 2018 elections, did he already know that Trump was innocent? Were there legal rules that prevented him from giving this vital information to the American people at the moment they most needed it? If so, then the statute needs to be rewritten to take the election cycle into account.

I have no doubt there are other opportunities for Mueller to help ensure that the process is less disruptive next time a president is investigated.; 6/3/19, 7:31 AM
Shouting Thomas said...: What good would it do for Mueller to testify?

I'm flooded now with idiots playing amateur lawyer who insist that the Mueller report proves that Trump did collude with Russia.

This whole thing has reached 9/11 truther status.

First, the left refused to accept the outcome of the 2016 election. Now, the left refuses to accept the outcome of the legal process they insisted take place.

There's no good faith here. This is all a transparent attempt to get Trump by any means possible.; 6/3/19, 7:31 AM
Leland said...: I'm surprised that people didn't pick up earlier the problem of Mueller's investigation into Russian meddling, collusion, and campaign obstruction when the investigation only assumed the Trump campaign a party. There is no law that says the UK can meddle with our elections but Russia cannot. And if there was such a law, it would include Iran. Mueller looked at none of those things, which suggest it was political all along.; 6/3/19, 7:31 AM
BamaBadgOR said...: Jonathan Turley and Alan Dershowitz - two intellectually honest liberals.; 6/3/19, 7:34 AM
Laslo Spatula said...: Two groups of elite on this situation:

• those who knew it was corrupt from the beginning and played along, knowing that the perception of Mueller as apolitical was needed for cover for what they hoped to achieve;

• those who never suspected that their lofty compatriots could actually be corrupt.

As John Goodman's character said in "Barton Fink" while running down a flaming hallway with a shotgun: "I'll show you the Life of the Mind."*

(*my recollection of that scene, anyway. Haven't seen it for awhile)

I am Laslo.; 6/3/19, 7:35 AM
Amadeus 48 said...: I'm surprised that Turley is surprised.

Barr's interview with Jan Crawford is fascinating. One overlooked passage is particularly interesting, because it offers a clue as to why Mueller may have been unwilling to even analyze the "obstruction" issues. Barr has been friends with Mueller for 30 years, and he thinks Mueller completely fluffed the Special Counsel assignment through using definitions of obstructive actions that don't conform to well-established DOJ interpretations. Barr didn't say so, but I suspect that Mueller didn't complete his analysis of obstruction because he knew he was so far off base that he was going to be thrown out trying to get back to first.; 6/3/19, 7:36 AM
Kevin said...: People like Turley waking up to what’s been happening is a good sign.

Whether the left listens or excommunicates him will tell a lot.; 6/3/19, 7:43 AM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: Mueller is a hack who was pissed that Trump didn't give him the juicy job he wanted.
Hillary-Mueller.; 6/3/19, 7:45 AM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: I want Mueller to testify in front of congress. Total grilling.

What - is he above the law too? Just like his pal Hillary?; 6/3/19, 7:46 AM
daskol said...: McCarthy, Dershowitz, Turley. These brilliant minds have been slow to recognize what's obvious to many less learned. Are they plodding in their dotage, or is it an emotional plodding, unwillingness to abandon their idealized views of institutions and personages along held in high estrem?; 6/3/19, 7:47 AM
Phil 314 said...: I assume a lot of this “end of the investigation “ mess is to appease/muffle an unruly team. In that vein I assume Mueller just wants to be done with the whole thing and high tail it towards the sunset.; 6/3/19, 7:49 AM
Jersey Fled said...: Mueller began his investigation with the full expectation that if he looked hard enough, bullied enough witnesses, and dragged his feet long enough that Trump would do something stupid, he would get enough to file an indictment.

Imagine his surprise when it didn't work.

All he was left with were inuendo and poor legal reasoning.

The sad thing is the lives he ruined along the way.; 6/3/19, 7:49 AM
stevew said...: Shouting Thomas said...
What good would it do for Mueller to testify?

It would force Mueller to say, under oath, why he refused to reach a decision or conclusion on the obstruction allegations. If he does not testify then all we are left with are the contradictions between the report, the letter to Barr, and his public statement last week. Democrats and Trump opponents are and will continue to use those contradictions to assert Trump committed obstruction; just as they continue to peddle the lie about Trump's comments on the Charlottesville episode.

Put him in on the record to explain precisely why he punted on the question of obstruction.; 6/3/19, 7:53 AM
Laslo Spatula said...: As someone who defended Mueller’s motivations against the unrelenting attacks of Trump, you won't believe what happens next...

I am laslo.; 6/3/19, 7:55 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 6/3/19, 7:56 AM
Shouting Thomas said...: @stevew

The belief that a full explanation from Mueller would bring about domestic peace or convince anybody is false, I'm afraid.

This has been a constant exercise in moving the goalposts. First, Trump was a Putin stooge. That was to be taken for granted. Then, the left insisted on a special counsel and swore that that would settle things. Now, they won't accept the findings of the special counsel. In each case, their hero who was definitely going to bring down Trump became a villain once he failed.

Hold hearings and make Mueller testify, and the goalposts will be moved again. Mueller will just become the next liar and scapegoat.; 6/3/19, 7:59 AM
GRW3 said...: I kind of like Bill O'Reilly's take, that this was Mueller's effort to get back on the cocktail party circuit. LOL. That may be too simple but it is probably part. Also, I think a key part was his attempt to stake down the "I don't need to testify" position. I'm sure Nadler will agree but I don't think Lindsey Graham 2.0 will. There are important questions...

#1, with a bullet: When did you know there was no collusion with Russia?
#2: Why did you staff up with partisan Democrat hacks? (Seems like that would be a good spot for recently retired JAG officers)
#3: Why didn't you pursue the obvious connection of the Clinton campaign to Russian sources?
#4: What exactly is your legal theory that someone who resists a lie, and pushes back hard against it, is obstructing justice.; 6/3/19, 7:59 AM
Darrell said...: Shitcanning Comey is facilitation of justice, not obstruction.; 6/3/19, 8:02 AM
narayanan said...: Laslo Spatula said...
Two groups of elite on this situation:
• those who knew it was corrupt from the beginning and played along, knowing that the perception of Mueller as apolitical was needed for cover for what they hoped to achieve;

daskol said...
McCarthy, Dershowitz, Turley. These brilliant minds have been slow to recognize what's obvious to many less learned.

Embrace the power of AND - Venn diagram is self explanatory + invitations to cocktails; 6/3/19, 8:02 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: The thing that you need to remember here is that Mueller didn’t pick his team of prosecutors, but rather they were picked first (by McCabe, Strzok, etc), and then they picked Mueller. Officially, he reported to DAG Rosenstein and they to him, but they were the ones it seems actually giving him orders. AG Barr has commented obliquely a couple times on this. What appears at first glance to be Mueller lying to his boss’s boss, Barr, is probably better explained by Barr giving orders, and then Weissman and his cronies telling him, “no, that isn’t what we are going to do”.

Keep in mind the real reasons for the Mueller special counsel investigation. It really had nothing to do with determining whether there had been Russian collusion. The people who put the Mueller investigation together knew that Trump hadn’t conspired with the Russians, since they were the ones who had put the hoax together in the first place, and in the FBI were the ones who had met with Bruce Ohr, ignored his warnings about Steele, and let Steele use him as their go between, after having fired him for unreliability. Indeed, lead Mueller prosecutor Weissman had been at some of those meetings between Ohr and the FBI. Mueller may not have known that the collusion investigation was a hoax, but his prosecutors did, and in at least Weissman’s case, helped to initiate it.

Rather, it’s first goal was to freeze, hopefully until Trump was out of office, the investigations into the intelligence abuses ( including both FISA Title VII and Title I abuse) by the Obama Administration working closely with the top tier of the DoJ, FBI, CIA, etc. The trail of corruption looks more and more like it leads not just to the Obama White House, but maybe even to Obama himself. Right now we are probably talking going back to at least 2012. This is hanging level corruption, and if Crooked Hillary had won, it would have just been ignored, and probably institutionalized even more. The second goal was to build an impeachment case against Trump and pass it along to the Dem House committees that were at the time being purchased.

The Mueller prosecutors had seemingly made themselves all but unfireable with their legal theory essentially that attempting to terminate a criminal investigation was Obstruction of Justice, even if done by the President. But this only worked with DAG Rosenstein compromised and AG Sessions recused. Barr was confirmed by the Senate before the Mueller prosecutors could transfer their mountain of evidence, much probably illegally obtained, to the newly installed Dem House committee chairs (the Dem majority bought specifically for impeachment). Mueller couldn’t tell Barr “no” when he was essentially ordered to shut down the investigation, not having found any collusion, but his prosecutors could try to sabotage Barr (and Trump) on their way out the door, as they did.

Bottom line is that the person to put under oath to testify is not Mueller but Weissman.; 6/3/19, 8:03 AM
Darrell said...: I bet Mueller broke a lot of laws about keeping his office impartial.; 6/3/19, 8:04 AM
Howard said...: Yes. Release the Mueller for grilling. I agree with Bleached Bits Bimbo; 6/3/19, 8:11 AM
Amadeus 48 said...: I have very little confidence that Republican representatives or senators can effectively "grill" anyone, let alone Mueller. They haven't yet. Why would they start now? They yap, but they never bite.

Mueller ain't gonna testify in public. He won't show. He'll cite the traditions and the positions of the DOJ with respect to prosecutors testifying about cases in which they are involved. He was an employee of the Executive Branch, and he'll hide behind Barr. Barr will testify, but not Mueller.; 6/3/19, 8:13 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: stevew said...

If he does not testify then all we are left with are the contradictions between the report, the letter to Barr, and his public statement last week.

What contradiction? He stated that, due to the OLC no-indict policy, he did not reach a determination on obstruction. Nothing he has said in any way contradicted that statement.; 6/3/19, 8:14 AM
Richard said...: Although they are only about half a dozen years apart in age, William Barr still seems quite sharp but Robert Mueller appears to be well past his prime. Mueller doesn't seem up to the task that was assigned to him, while Barr clearly does. What follows? A panel composed of Mueller and Barr testifying to Senator Lindsey Graham's Judiciary Committee would be worthwhile but I doubt the Dems would let that happen. It would reveal much too much.; 6/3/19, 8:20 AM
Fernandinande said...: Refusal to reach an obstruction conclusion..

Recusal refusal breach reaches reduction of obstruction deduction and conclusion of collusion delusion.; 6/3/19, 8:20 AM
Amadeus 48 said...: Ignorance--

Barr said that Mueller said three times in the March 5 meeting (with witnesses) that he was not relying on the OLC opinion in his decision not to analyze and conclude on the obstruction issues. Mueller said it again last week in the joint statement with the DOJ after his press conference. Whatever else is true, Mueller did not say that due to the OLC no-indict policy, he did not reach a determination on obstruction. He said that was one of the considerations.; 6/3/19, 8:22 AM
iowantwo said...: Shouting Thomas said...
What good would it do for Mueller to testify?

It would force Mueller to say, under oath,

All of the Mueller work to this point will NEVER be tested. 2+ years and $30 million, and not a single bit of that work will be tested, challenged, examined in a legal, results driven test. No one can point to a single bit of the report that is a verifiable conclusion. The either start or end with supposition.

I would like Graham 2.0 to force Mueller to testify under oath, but even the new version of Graham is not willing to risk, no matter how small the risk, the political capital to accomplish the task at hand.; 6/3/19, 8:22 AM
iowantwo said...: What contradiction? He stated that, due to the OLC no-indict policy, he did not reach a determination on obstruction.

It is a semantically small point, but the Joint Memo signed by Barr and Muller states that the special counsel never investigated the charges of obstruction, because of the OLC ruling. Not that the actions were examined, law applied, conclusion reached, but for the OLC rule, the conclusion was not presented as an indictment.

This allows Mueller to walk back his presser statements, and allows Barr to support his earlier statement that Mueller answered 3 different times his reason for not indicting was the OLC ruling. If Mueller did not sign onto the memo, Barr would have produced transcripts of his meeting with Muller, with Mueller stating the OLC ruling did not enter into his decision not to indict.; 6/3/19, 8:35 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: Amadeus 48 said...

Barr said that Mueller said three times in the March 5 meeting (with witnesses) that he was not relying on the OLC opinion in his decision not to analyze and conclude on the obstruction issues.

Do you have exact quotes for what Barr says Mueller told him? If you find the exact quotes, the contradiction goes away. Here is a quote, and while it is from the joint clarification, rather than Barr's testimony, it tracks what was said in Barr's testimony:

"The Attorney General has previously stated that the Special Counsel repeatedly affirmed that he was not saying that, but for the [Office of Legal Counsel] opinion, he would have found the President obstructed justice," said Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec and special counsel spokesman Peter Carr in a statement issued Wednesday evening.

Note the distinction between saying that, because of the OLC policy, Mueller did not make a determination, vs saying that, were it not for the OLC policy, they would have charged Trump with obstruction. Without the OLC policy, they would have made a determination. That determination might have been to not charge. We will never know, because the determination was never made.; 6/3/19, 8:40 AM
Michael K said...: unwillingness to abandon their idealized views of institutions and personages along held in high estrem?

In spite of their experience in DC, they had never seen this level of corruption perhaps.

I agree that a Weissmann subpoena would be interesting but this should all come out after the DOJ IG report and indictments from it are filed. Gina Haspel might be one of those.; 6/3/19, 8:47 AM
Amadeus 48 said...: I agree. The determination was never made. My understanding is that the OLC letter was a consideration, but not determinative in Mueller's mind on the question of whether he should analyze and conclude on possible obstruction issues. Mueller presented what he thought were the relevant facts and laid out what he thought were the proper legal considerations, but he didn't reach any conclusions. In fact, he declined to perform an analysis.

Look at this from Barr's interview with Jan Crawford:

JAN CRAWFORD: Do you feel because he didn't do that, did he fulfill his responsibility as special counsel? If you look at regulations, it seems to anticipate that you would get a confidential report explaining why he made a decision to either prosecute or decline to prosecute. He didn't do that, seems to me.

WILLIAM BARR: Right but on the other hand he did provide us a report and what he viewed to be the relevant facts. And that allowed us as the, as the leaders of the department to make that decision.

JAN CRAWFORD: What is the fundamental difference? Why...I mean, he said he couldn't exonerate the president. That he had looked at the evil there - these 11 instances of possible obstruction. He couldn't exonerate the president, if he could he would've stated so. You looked at that evidence and you did. I mean, what is the fundamental difference between your view and his?

WILLIAM BARR: Well, I think Bob said that he was not going to engage in the analysis. He was, he was not going to make a determination one way or the other. And he also said that he could not say that the president was clearly did not violate the law, which of course is not the standard we use at the department. We have to determine whether there is clear violation of the law and so we applied the standards we would normally apply. We analyzed the law and the facts and a group of us spent a lot of time doing that and determined that both as a matter of law, many of the instances would not amount to obstruction.

JAN CRAWFORD: As a matter of law?

WILLIAM BARR: As a matter of law. In other words, we didn't agree with the legal analysis- a lot of the legal analysis in the report. It did not reflect the views of the department. It was the views of a particular lawyer or lawyers and so we applied what we thought was the right law but then we didn't rely on that. We also looked at all the facts, tried to determine whether the government could establish all the elements and as to each of those episodes we felt that the evidence was deficient.; 6/3/19, 8:57 AM
Amadeus 48 said...: Ignorance--Here's Barr's answer at the April 18 press conference:

Reporter: "Mr. Attorney General, we don't have the report in hand. So could you explain for us the special counsel's articulated reason for not reaching a decision on obstruction of justice and if it had anything to do with the department's long-standing guidance on not indicting a sitting president? And you say you disagree with some of his legal theories. What did you disagree with and why?"

Barr: "I would leave it to his description in the report, the special counsel's own articulation of why he did not want to make a determination as to whether or not there was an obstruction offense. But I will say that when we met with him, Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein and I met with him, along with Ed O'Callaghan, who is the principal associate deputy, on March 5th. We specifically asked him about the OLC opinion and whether or not he was taking a position that he would have found a crime but for the existence of the OLC opinion. And he made it very clear several times that that was not his position. He was not saying that but for the OLC opinion, he would have found a crime. He made it clear that he had not made the determination that there was a crime."; 6/3/19, 9:03 AM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: Gee, that sounds an awful lot like what many of us have been saying for a while now--nice centrist people and Bulwarky TrueConservatives keep insisting that all these people (Comey, Strzok, Page Ohr, Yates, Mueller) are career professionals whose probity and commitment to applying the law in an unbiased fashion is beyond question. Meanwhile the rest of us have been pointing out that their actual actions show that not to be the case, time and time again.

Inexplicable!; 6/3/19, 9:03 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: Come on guys. Mueller wasn’t calling the shots. Never was. On paper, the prosecutors worked for him, and he worked for DAG Rosenstein. The reality is that he worked for his prosecutors, at least until AG Barr was confirmed by the Senate.

Weissman and maybe one or two others were brought in by the cabal starting in maybe August of 2016, and when Comey was fired, they were ready to fire up their special counsel investigation. At least the core was already in place. Maybe most, or even all, of the prosecutors were ready to go. What they needed was a frontman, and they found him in Mueller, who had similar morals to theirs, had his own shady past, looked good on paper, and had just bee turned down by Trump to run the FBI again.

AG Barr talked about the problems that arise when a Praetorian Guard decide to protect a country from its legitimate rulers. And that very much is what happened here. We know that at least Comey and Strzok believed themselves to be honorable, courageous, and loyal Americans in their #Resistance. No doubt so did Yates, Weissman, his Clinton and Obama supporting fellow prosecutors, etc. They believed that they were in the right, protecting the country from Trump. The problem is that in our Constitutional republic, their power is completely derivative of the duly elected President, and any attempt to harm him, using that power, is an attack on our Republic, since his power is by consent of the governed, and theirs is not. Theirs is usurped.; 6/3/19, 9:08 AM
JAORE said...: " Were there legal rules that prevented him from giving this vital information to the American people at the moment they most needed it? If so, then the statute needs to be rewritten to take the election cycle into account."

You seem to presume the information will be fair. Meanwhile, in the real world.....

Heaven forbid we get a one sided report from a (political) investigator about incomplete findings based on unrevealed information that will be "vital" to an upcoming election.

Just imagine the "vital" information of we found 10 instances of possible collusion..., we are unable to clear the candidate of ...

Yikes.; 6/3/19, 9:13 AM
bleh said...: Mueller under oath would be a disaster for some people, but it’s not clear who. Could be Trump and the Republicans. Could be the Democrats. Could be Mueller himself.

My sense is he’s just a tired old man whose main contribution to the investigation was his good name and reputation. Somehow I doubt he was chasing leads, going over trial strategy, grilling witnesses, preparing subpoenas and legal memoranda, etc. Did he even personally hire his staff?

Maybe he had an off day, who knows. But it was almost sad watching him looking scared and stuttering and stumbling through his prepared remarks. This man was FBI Director for more than a decade and did countless press conferences and testimonies before Congress. That’s now the man we saw last week.

If he testifies it’s going to take a ton of preparation for him. He can’t wing it. Maybe he’ll let slip that he didn’t really pay much attention to what was going on in his investigation. Maybe he’ll mischaracterize this or that. I think it’s just too risky for him.; 6/3/19, 9:14 AM
Ray - SoCal said...: Turley admittance means the Overton window is changing on Spygate / this gives me hope.; 6/3/19, 9:18 AM
Derek Kite said...: Mueller did the same thing Comey did with Hillary.

Trump's crime was to fire the head of the FBI. That was unacceptable and Mueller and the FBI will never stop trying to make him pay for it.

Unless Trump fires Wray. At Barr's suggestion, for insubordination.; 6/3/19, 9:21 AM
Michael K said...: What they needed was a frontman, and they found him in Mueller, who had similar morals to theirs, had his own shady past, looked good on paper, and had just bee turned down by Trump to run the FBI again.

Yup. Weissmann is a well known fanatic who destroys lives with no concern. Enron and Arthur Anderson taught us that.; 6/3/19, 9:27 AM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: The leftwing corrupt cult of Adam Schit. Adam Schit speaks.; 6/3/19, 9:27 AM
rcocean said...: Great comments BUT..

Its now official. I've become bored with Mueller and his report. As trump says: Case closed. Lets move on. The only interesting thing now, is the Barr Investigation into how this hoax got started and the IG Report.; 6/3/19, 9:29 AM
Mike Sylwester said...: In a Senate trial of President Trump, the first witness questioned, on national television, should be Robert "The FBI Whitewasher" Mueller. The questions should begin along these lines:

* When you and Rod Rosenstein met with President Trump on May 16, 2017, were you aware that Rosenestein had offered to secretly record his conversations with President Trump?

* Do you know whether Rosenstein secretly recorded that particular conversation?

* Did you yourself secretly record that conversation?

* Andrew McCabe wrote in his recent book that you left your cell phone in the room when you departed from that meeting. Is that true?

* Did that cell phone have extraordinary capabilities?

* Tell how you retrieved your cell phone afterwards.

* Is that cell phone on your person right now?

* If so, then surrender it right now for forensic analysis.; 6/3/19, 9:36 AM
Mike Sylwester said...: If the House impeaches on the ground that Trump obstructed justice, then the Senate should question, on national television, each FBI official who participated in the Crossfire Hurricane investigation and each staff lawyer who participated in the Special Counsel investigation. Each such official should be asked:

* Exactly how were you yourself obstructed by President Trump?

* Did you document those occasions?

* When you were obstructed, were you eventually able to overcome Trump's obstruction to your own part of the investigation?

* If you were not able to overcome the obstruction, then provide the relevant details so that the Senate can summon the obstructed witnesses and obtain the obstructed documents now for this Senate trial.

* When did you yourself arrive at a personal opinion that there had been no collusion with Russia? Did you tell any fellow investigators that you had arrived at such an opinion?

* Do you yourself personally think that President Trump should be removed from office for obstruction of justice? If you were a US Senator, how would you vote on this issue?

* What was your opinion about the impeachment of President Clinton? If you had been a US Senator at that time, would you have voted to remove him from office?

* What was your opinion of the Obama Administration's refusal to give Congress information about the Fast and Furious matter? Was that refusal an obstruction of justice that should have been impeached?; 6/3/19, 9:39 AM
Mike Sylwester said...: One prominent obstruction-of-justice accusation against President Trump is that he proposed that Robert "The FBI Whitewasher" Mueller be removed from the Special Counsel position because Mueller had significant conflicts of interest. If such accusations are included in the impeachment charges, then the Senate should question whether Mueller indeed had such conflicts. On national television, Mueller should be asked:

* Describe your own and your family's personal relationships with James Comey and his family.

* Describe your professional relationship with Comey. When were you his supervisor? When did you write or endorse his performance reports?

* List all the FBI investigations in which you and Comey collaborated.

* List all occasions when you interacted with Comey while you and/or he were working outside the FBI.

* List all the occasions when your law firm and Comey's law firm collaborated in any cases or deals.

* When Rod Rosenstein offered you the Special Counsel position, were you aware that the situation might involve FBI misdeeds?

* After you began to act as Special Counsel, did you become aware of any apparent FBI misdeeds?

* Did you consider refusing the appointment or resigning from the appointment because your previous tenure as FBI Director might create an appearance of conflict of interest?

* If a President proposes to remove a Special Counsel because of conflicts of interest and to replace him with another Special Counsel, then do you consider that to be an obstruction of justice that should be impeached?

* When you selected your staff, did you consider that the staff's partisan composition created a perception of partisan conflict of interest.

* Did you ever become aware that there was considerable public criticism of your staff's apparent partisan composition? If so, did you think to remedy that conflict-of-interest perception by hiring a few non-partisan staff members?; 6/3/19, 9:40 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: “WILLIAM BARR: As a matter of law. In other words, we didn't agree with the legal analysis- a lot of the legal analysis in the report. It did not reflect the views of the department. It was the views of a particular lawyer or lawyers and so we applied what we thought was the right law but then we didn't rely on that. We also looked at all the facts, tried to determine whether the government could establish all the elements and as to each of those episodes we felt that the evidence was deficient.”

Keep that in mind. What AG Barr is saying is that one (Weissman) or more (the other Mueller prosecutors) lawyers have gone rogue. The praetorian guard he talked about. Under DoJ interpretations of Obstruction statutes, there was no Obstruction of Justice. Somehow these prosecutors feel empowered to redefine this crime so that it covers actions taken by President Trump executing his Article II duties and exercising its powers. All on their own. Their power and their discretion is derivative of the President’s, through the AG and the DoJ that he runs. They believe themselves above the law. The one person in the DoJ authorized to set policy like this is the AG, and they had known since his letter a year ago (six months before he was confirmed as AG) what that his policy would be (which was in conformance with what it already was). The standard for Obstruction being propounded in the Mueller Report is directly contrary to DoJ interpretation, as well as that of their boss, the duly nominated and confirmed AG. Instead, it is the LawFare influenced opinion of a bunch of Clinton and Obama donors, including a former Clinton Foundation attorney, led by an attorney loyal enough to have attended Clinton’s aborted private victory party. This is an indication that Barr knows where the power was, and why calling Mueller to testify would be fruitless.; 6/3/19, 9:42 AM
Mike Sylwester said...: The purpose of appointing a Special Counsel is to assure the public that the investigation is conducted in a fair, nonpartisan manner.

Neither Rod Rosenstein nor Robert "The FBI Whitewasher" Mueller gave a rat's ass about that purpose.; 6/3/19, 9:46 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: Blogger Mike Sylwester said...
“The purpose of appointing a Special Counsel is to assure the public that the investigation is conducted in a fair, nonpartisan manner.”

You would think that. But the staffing of the Mueller investigation gave a lie to that.; 6/3/19, 10:12 AM
William said...: Why can't Mueller say in a simple declarative sentence that, based on his report, he believes the President should or should not be impeached. His post report pronouncements are Delphic and confusing.; 6/3/19, 10:13 AM
narciso said...: Because hes a cheat and a liar, paraphrasing Robert Jordan in red October, like his gang colleague Comey.; 6/3/19, 10:21 AM
Skeptical Voter said...: Sneaky back stabbing marble faced marble headed front man--who am I talking about? Robert Mueller. But you have to be smarter than Mueller if you want to rumble with Barr.; 6/3/19, 10:38 AM
TJM said...: the FBI needs to arrive at Mueller's home at 4 am, kick the doors in and drag him off to jail. That's the only way this shit will stop, when the left starts paying the price for the crimes they actually commit, rather than the imagined ones Trump is accused of committing. Mueller is a dirty prosecutor, with the evidence in plain sight, if anyone cares to look at it. Think Boston!; 6/3/19, 10:40 AM
Beasts of England said...: 'AG Barr talked about the problems that arise when a Praetorian Guard decide to protect a country from its legitimate rulers.'

Makes you wonder if Barr wants to play the role of Constantine...; 6/3/19, 10:40 AM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: The Mueller-CNN staged gun point arrest of Roger Stone was the height of East German Leftwing criminality.; 6/3/19, 10:45 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: BARR: And look, I think if we — we are worried about foreign influence in the campaign? We should be because the heart of our system is the peaceful transfer of power through elections and what gives the government legitimacy is that process. And if foreign elements can come in and affect it, that’s bad for the republic. But by the same token, it’s just as, it’s just as dangerous to the continuation of self-government and our republican system, republic that we not allow government power, law enforcement or intelligence power, to play a role in politics, to intrude into politics, and affect elections.

JAN CRAWFORD: So it’s just as dangerous- So when we talk about foreign interference versus say a government abuse of power, which is more troubling?

WILLIAM BARR: Well they’re both, they’re both troubling.

JAN CRAWFORD: Equally?

WILLIAM BARR: In my mind, they are, sure. I mean, republics have fallen because of Praetorian Guard mentality where government officials get very arrogant, they identify the national interest with their own political preferences and they feel that anyone who has a different opinion, you know, is somehow an enemy of the state. And you know, there is that tendency that they know better and that, you know, they’re there to protect as guardians of the people. That can easily translate into essentially supervening the will of the majority and getting your own way as a government official.

JAN CRAWFORD: And you are concerned that that may have happened in 2016?

WILLIAM BARR: Well, I just think it has to be carefully look at because the use of foreign intelligence capabilities and counterintelligence capabilities against an American political campaign to me is unprecedented and it’s a serious red line that’s been crossed.

JAN CRAWFORD: Did that happen?

WILLIAM BARR: There were counterintelligence activities undertaken against the Trump Campaign. And I’m not saying there was not a basis for it, that it was legitimate, but I want to see what that basis was and make sure it was legitimate.

JAN CRAWFORD: So–

WILLIAM BARR: That’s one of the, you know, one of the key responsibilities of the Attorney General, core responsibilities of the Attorney General is to make sure that government power is not abused and that the right of Americans are not transgressed by abusive government power. That’s the responsibility of the Attorney General.; 6/3/19, 10:54 AM
Earnest Prole said...: Mueller’s actions are entirely consistent with being an independent prosecutor who sees Congress as his boss and not as a special prosecutor who works for Barr and Trump.; 6/3/19, 10:56 AM
AlbertAnonymous said...: Hopefully Barr, who seems to be the first adult in the room for a long time, will get the right answers in this "origins" investigation, and hopefully the guilty/dirty agents and lawyers will pay a real price. Not really holding my breath though.

One thing I hate hearing is the Dems repeating that "Trump is not above the law." Its a great phrase and I think it should be true for everyone (including Hillary - that corrupt so and so). But what no one ever says or asks is this "Is Trump below the law"?

Imagine any one of you, maybe even the good Professor, the full weight of the US Government brought to bear against you, your family and your friends and associates, some of whom literally had their offices and homes raided (at gun point in the case of Roger Stone), and after two years and a shitload of money spent, the prosecutor makes a public report saying "If we could have exonerated Professor Althouse, we would have." And then later, he makes a public statement at a press conference reiterating "If we could have exonerated the Professor, we would have."

I'm sorry, any one of you would be pissed, and rightly so. Make the case or shut up. Its a binary choice. That statements by Mueller (and his team) are totally improper. And because they made such statements (twice), they essentially put Trump "below the law". The law protects all of us from such garbage prosecutorial statements/actions (or at least its supposed to). No one is above the law but no one should be below it either.; 6/3/19, 11:05 AM
hstad said...: "... and it raised serious concerns over whether some key decisions are easier to reconcile on a political rather than a legal basis..." Only a Professor like Turley could write such a silly set of comments. If you don't think this entire episode is nothing but "Political" then I have no hope for your sanity. But as a previous contributor here suggested, "case closed" Mueller's time in the limelight is gone and so is his reputation. We are going to be treated to another set of political memes, this time by Barr in his gotcha investigation. Which we probably cannot avoid, given the Democrats self-destructive behavior on the impeachment meme.; 6/3/19, 11:18 AM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: Trump is not above the law.

Hillary and her vast left-wing network of Strzkey corruptocrats, are.; 6/3/19, 11:22 AM
iowantwo said...: * Do you know whether Rosenstein secretly recorded that particular conversation?

Each of these questions then could be concluded with. "So I can assume that since you have no evidence the meeting wasn't recorded we can assume it was? And since it was, we can prosecute?"; 6/3/19, 11:39 AM
James L. Salmon said...: Durham has been tasked with getting to the bottom of the coup attempt. Mueller and others involved in creating the Weissman Report will testify before a federal grand jury not before an impotent Senate committee. As Hayden stated in an earlier post the Russian hoax was an elaborate smoke screen intended to obscure the Obama administration's successful efforts to weaponize the investigative power of the FBI, IRS, CIA, NSA and other federal agencies and institutions. The abuse of FISA by the Obama administration was detailed by the Chief Judge of the FISA Court in a 99 page opinion published in April of 2017. Admiral Rogers and the Chief Justice of the FISA Court uncovered the abuse long before that opinion was published. DJT election as POTUS threatened to expose the entire scheme - Flynn was onto them - so the rats involved in the abuse have been scrambling to scrub their tracks. The insurance plan worked as intended until Barr was appointed. No the jig is up.; 6/3/19, 11:50 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: “One thing I hate hearing is the Dems repeating that "Trump is not above the law." Its a great phrase and I think it should be true for everyone (including Hillary - that corrupt so and so). But what no one ever says or asks is this "Is Trump below the law"?”

This bothers me. A lot. Not so much that Crooked Hillary could believe that she was above the law. She obviously was. But at least she was operating as a Presidentially nominated, Senate confirmed principal officer. These are almost entirely (excepting Comey, Yates, Brennan, Clapper, etc) inferior officers. Not even Presidential appointments. Civil servants, who took the law into their hands and tried to effect regime change in this country.; 6/3/19, 11:53 AM
Yancey Ward said...: When Mueller staff his legal team with pretty much nothing but open Clinton/Obama supporters and campaign donors, it probably should have been obvious to everyone that a fair even-handed investigation wasn't the goal. Seriously, what possible reason could you have to not staff the team evenly with both Democrats and Republicans? The only explanation I could come up with that didn't invoke nefarious motives was that Mueller already knew early on that the Collusion stuff was utter bullshit and was worried that such a conclusion would be easier for the country to accept if the team were heavily staffed with anti-Trump partisans- I made this point a couple times here in this forum, though I never really very convinced it was the right explanation. I finally had to abandon this theory in late 2017 as it was obvious that Mueller was squeezing process crime pleas out of the staff, and really fucking ridiculous ones at that. We also learned at about the same time that the Steele dossier was bought and paid for by the Clinton Campaign- a fact that was hidden for almost 1 year even though most of the media outlets already knew this, but refused to publicize it.

Andy McCarthy, this past weekend, basically explained Volume 2 of the report- the why and how it was written. Mueller and his team knew that DoJ regulations and policy made it abundantly clear that the actions cited were not obstructive in nature, but they wanted the House to impeach Trump, they couldn't use those department policies- they would have to create entirely new definitions of what constitutes obstruction. They also knew that if they used these new definitions to try to charge Trump, or to recommend charging Trump, Barr would simply tell them that the new definitions were bullshit and against department policy and send them back to the drawing board. So Mueller and his team tried an end-run around Barr by not making a recommendation of any kind, and they apparently lied to Barr repeatedly in the weeks leading up to the finishing of the report and its turning over to the DoJ. Their hope was that by not making a determination, Barr would have his hands tied and would not gainsay their obstruction theories in Volume 2. Barr didn't play that game, though- he and Rosenstein publicly shot those theories down before the report was released.

Turley is right to question the refusal to identify the GJ material- this was deliberate on the part of the Mueller and his team. What they had planned to do was use the two weeks it took to properly redact the report to leak out that Trump was guilty of obstruction, but that their hands were tied by DoJ policy, but Barr had shut this door down by making the determination for them- the one they were unwilling to defend themselves- even to the point of refusing to appear in Congress to testify. This is why Mueller wrote that snitty letter and held that press conference- it was all his team had left after Barr had outplayed them in their coup attempt.; 6/3/19, 12:00 PM
Jaq said...: All of the Mueller work to this point will NEVER be tested. 2+ years and $30 million, and not a single bit of that work will be tested, challenged, examined in a legal, results driven test.

You mean like the way he got Cohen to plead that Trump was guilty of a crime that legal experts differ. on whether it was really illegal?; 6/3/19, 12:01 PM
Michael K said...: eachBit-and-Hammers said...
The Mueller-CNN staged gun point arrest of Roger Stone was the height of East German Leftwing criminality.

That was about the only way anyone could make Stone a sympathetic character. It was the height of arrogance and I hope whoever authorized that pays for it.

It resembles the arrogance and lawlessness of that Wisconsin DA who attacked Walker and his supporters.; 6/3/19, 12:01 PM
Jaq said...: Bottom line is that nothing they have found is anything like anything that the Senate would remove him for, even if you accept Mueller’s aggressive reasoning on obstruction.

So, like Clinton, Trump can be impeached and his support, like Clinton’s, will go up.; 6/3/19, 12:03 PM
Jaq said...: I think raiding Trump’s lawyer’s office and taking all of his files was a pretty rotten precedent too. There used to be atty client privilege.; 6/3/19, 12:04 PM
Yancey Ward said...: Ignorance is Bliss,

I know we went through this the other day. Yes, a strict parsing of words shows there is no contradiction. However, I think it perfectly reasonable to draw an inference on Mueller was doing on March 5th and last week. In particular, at the March 5th meeting, it does appear that Mueller was trying to make Barr think that Mueller himself had no actual opinion about whether or not Trump committed a crime of obstruction- as Barr describes it, Mueller was emphatically denying that, but for the OLC opinion, he would have made a recommendation for charging Trump.

The problem with not making this inference is that not doing so makes last week's presser much harder to understand, especially the part about noting that Congress is the body that has to act. It also makes it impossible to understand why they created new theories about obstruction in Volume 2- if your real position is that the OLC position makes it improper to make a determination, you don't need a new theory of obstruction- you can just use the regular DoJ policies for this purpose. You only create new definition of obstruction if the old ones don't suffice in implying guilt- that is why I am forced to make the inference I do, and why I think it is the only logical way to understand Mueller's actions.; 6/3/19, 12:24 PM
Milwaukie guy said...: It should be called the Mueller/Weissman Report.; 6/3/19, 12:38 PM
StephenFearby said...: There are a number of variables for partisans on each side of the aisle to consider about calling for Mueller's testimony before Congress.

"I was disappointed ... to see such a profound reluctance to testify," [Adam Schiff] said on ABC's "This Week" on Sunday. "I think he has one last service to perform. It's not enough merely to speak for 10 minutes and say, 'I'm not going to answer questions for Congress and the American people.' There are a great many things that are not in the report."

'House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler said Friday he will call special counsel Robert Mueller to testify before Congress, explaining that television viewers need to see it, as most Americans didn’t read the full Mueller report on his Russia probe.'

“If they allow [GOP Reps.] Meadows and Jordan and few of the others there, they’ll eviscerate him more than they did Michael Cohen,” said Rudy Giuliani, President Trump’s personal attorney during and after the Mueller probe. Giuliani said it would be “emotionally satisfying to have” Mueller testify and that “in terms of the politics of it, I would love to have him testify. I think he’s afraid to.”

As Richard posted above, "...Although they are only about half a dozen years apart in age, William Barr still seems quite sharp but Robert Mueller appears to be well past his prime."

Bleh usefully adds: "...But it was almost sad watching him looking scared and stuttering and stumbling through his prepared remarks. This man was FBI Director for more than a decade and did countless press conferences and testimonies before Congress. That’s [not] the man we saw last week."

I agree. The danger to the Left would be if Mueller were exposed as "the corpse of El Cid...fitted with his armour and set on his horse Babieca, to bolster the morale of his troops."

If Mueller (who turns 75 on August 7) happens to have the memory problems of pre-Alzheimer's Mild Cognitive Impairment, an effective cross-examination by Republican members would be a disaster for the Left.

If Nadler and Schiff are smart, they'll walk back their remarks to avoid this outcome. But their desire to get Mueller to testify may be too great to resist.; 6/3/19, 12:50 PM
Yancey Ward said...: Stephen,

They have no intention of calling Mueller with a subpoena- those statements are basically Nadler and Schiff lying to public purposes. Now, if the House changes the rules and doesn't allow the opposition to question the witnesses, then maybe Mueller will appear.; 6/3/19, 1:02 PM
steve uhr said...: Barr said he and Rosenstein were surprised when they found out that Mueller reached no conclusion on obstruction. But Rosenstein was actively supervising the investigation from day 1. Surely they discussed this critical issue?; 6/3/19, 1:12 PM
Original Mike said...: Nadler and Schiff are lying. Mueller testifies when pigs fly.; 6/3/19, 1:47 PM
narciso said...: he would need a jetpack, like the falcon,

https://thefederalist.com/2019/05/31/lawsuit-exposes-media-deep-state-hatched-russiagate-hoax/; 6/3/19, 2:09 PM
Matt said...: By pressing Barr to initially release only the summary sections from the report, and force a delay on releasing the underlying report via not redacting grand jury material, we would have gotten the narrative twisting outcome people have tried to blame Barr for.

I don't think that's coincidental, and I'm pretty sure Barr gets that too.; 6/3/19, 2:10 PM
Yancey Ward said...: "Barr said he and Rosenstein were surprised when they found out that Mueller reached no conclusion on obstruction. But Rosenstein was actively supervising the investigation from day 1. Surely they discussed this critical issue?"

It is an interesting point. I think until the late Summer of 2018, Mueller and his team had Rosenstein in agreement that Trump could and would be charged. After McCabe outed Rosenstein's offer to wear a wire, that changed in a dramatic way. I think Rosenstein told Mueller that they would have to find an underlying crime in the collusion investigation that Trump was guilty of, or he, Rosenstein, would not be able to support an obstruction charge. It is also possible that Barr's memo is what convinced Rosenstein of this position, too, or it was both events. In the end, it doesn't really matter- either way, Mueller wasn't going to be able to even recommend an indictment under the normal DoJ definition of obstruction. This is why they created the new definition, and why they decided to not make a determination.

I don't expect you to do it, Steve, but you could take a look at this essay by Andrew McCarthy- he lays it all out for you in better detail than I can give. It explains the blindside you find questionable- basically, they had to wait until the last moment to reveal this plan to make it most effective.; 6/3/19, 2:11 PM
Danno said...: In looking at the Powerline week in pictures found across the internet, I saw a picture of Mueller with the caption, "While we recognize that the suspect did not actually steal any horses, he is obviously guilty of trying to resist being hanged for it."

Sums it up very well!; 6/3/19, 2:35 PM
Anonymous said...: I think Bruce Hayden is probably the most accurate when he pins the entire report on Weissman and his merry band. Weissman's track record of mis-interpreting /bending the law is almost as stark as Mueller's. They really made quite a pair of lawless lawyers.; 6/3/19, 2:39 PM
Greg P said...: As someone who isn't a delusional nut, I find it baffling that Turley can't figure out what's going on with Mueller.

Mueller knew in 2017 that there was no collusion between the Trump campaign and Putin's gov't in order to throw the 2016 election to Trump.

Mueller knew in 2017 that the Clinton campaign DID collude with Putin, by pushing the "Steele Dossier", which was nothing but Putin gov't manufactured anti-Trump lies.

Mueller kept on "investigating" Trump until 2019. in particular, he refused to let the voting public know in 2018 that the "Trump Russia collusion" stores were all lies.

Mueller is a Democrat hack, desperate to harm Trump, and willing to do just about anything, no matter how unethical and / or unprofessional, to achieve his goals.

If you can't see that, it's because you're willfully blind; 6/3/19, 3:05 PM
Greg P said...: Blogger tim maguire said...

For instance, as the collusion investigation weighted heavily on the 2018 elections, did he already know that Trump was innocent?

Yes, he knew that before the end of 2017

Were there legal rules that prevented him from giving this vital information to the American people at the moment they most needed it?

No there were not. He could, and should, have shut down the investigation once he knew there was no Trump-Russia collusion.

He didn't, because he wanted the false flag of "collusion" to affect the 2018 elections.

Blogger Shouting Thomas said...
What good would it do for Mueller to testify?

We could put Mueller under oath, and force him to say when he realized there was no collusion, And then force him to say why he didn't announce that fact; 6/3/19, 3:10 PM
Greg P said...: Bruce Hayden said...
Come on guys. Mueller wasn’t calling the shots. Never was. On paper, the prosecutors worked for him, and he worked for DAG Rosenstein. The reality is that he worked for his prosecutors, at least until AG Barr was confirmed by the Senate.

If true, that, alone, justifies calling him to testify, and utterly humiliating him on the stand.

Perhaps the Senate Judiciary committee should have both him and Barr there to testify, at the same time, as a check on any stories Mueller wants to tell.

Mueller could have taken charge, with the threat that he would publicly quit, and say why he was quitting, if he didn't get charge.

He didn't.

So, at the absolute minimum, he agreed to be a front and tool for Weissman et. al. If we want any form of honest gov't back, providing cover for the crooks has to be an expensive and painful action for the people providing cover.; 6/3/19, 3:36 PM
Bay Area Guy said...: Mueller has, sadly, become a stooge. He got coopted by Weismann and these other DOJ/FBI weasels.

So, since Mueller wasted all his time trying to prosecute a case that he says can't be prosecuted, we turn to impeachment.

Problem for Nancy: If she allows a silly impeachment, the Senate will promptly acquit. And, thus the issue is over.

But there's a preliminary problem for Nancy.

31 Dem House seats are in districts that voted likely support Trump.

Dem Cuellar is NO on Impeachment.

There are several Dems that are NO on impeachment.

At this point in time, impeachment will FAIL in the House.

And, thus, game is over.; 6/3/19, 4:04 PM
Sebastian said...: "it raised serious concerns over whether some key decisions are easier to reconcile on a political rather than a legal basis"

Turley, like other establishment commentators, is late to the party.

The Althouse commentariat, Hayden especially, was way ahead of them.

Which raises the question whether their naiveté is easier to reconcile with political myopia or plain stupidity.; 6/3/19, 4:38 PM
walter said...: "The reality is that he worked for his prosecutors"
Didn't he choose them?; 6/3/19, 5:05 PM
Birkel said...: No, he did not choose the team of prosecutors. The team was assembled by Comey, Yates, Rosenstein, Boente, and others before Comey was even fired.; 6/3/19, 6:32 PM
walter said...: Ah...but he has history with Waissmann; 6/3/19, 6:37 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: “Didn't he choose them?”

At least his lead prosecutor, Andrew Weissman, was involved well over a year before Mueller was selected. He was at several meetings, starting in maybe August, 2016, months before the election, between AAG Bruce Ohr and the FBI, starting with DD McCabe and DAD Strzok. Ohr appears to have been Weissman’s supervisor at some level in Organized Crime, which is why it was a bit odd that Weissman was brought into these meetings that involved the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division. At these early meetings, Ohr told the FBI about Steele’s biases against Trump (his wife, Nellie, was a Russia expert working with Steele for Fusion GPS), and later served as a conduit between Steele and someone working for Strzok at the FBI. Need to go back and read the Strzok/Page text messages, but I seem to remember texts between them concerning staffing of a special counsel investigation some time before it was fired off. McCabe, Strzok, etc, had it all ready to fire, and then Comey was fired, McCabe was now acting FBI Dir, and they pulled the trigger, taking it to DAG Rosenstein for authorization. Strzok and Page, in their text messages, appeared quite giddy at the time.

When the smoke finally clears, I very much expect that it is going to turn out that Andrew Weissman was in close communications with at least McCabe, and probably Strzok too, throughout fall of 2016 and winter of 2017, and that the special counsel investigation was built around him, and he was the one who ultimately selected the prosecutors on his team. Strzok was supposed to head the FBI side of the investigation, but he got outed with those infamous text messages apparently right after Gen Flynn was forced out as Trump’s NSA. He moved back to FBI HQ, but apparently was receiving frequent updates from his previous subordinate who took over for him.

Normally, special counsels are selected, and they then pick their staff, which can take weeks, if not months, to become fully operational. This investigation looks much more like when Mueller walked in the door, he was met by his team of prosecutors, who had already wrapped up their other assignments and were ready and raring to go.; 6/3/19, 6:48 PM
walter said...: Just being "efficient", donchaknow; 6/3/19, 7:20 PM
Achilles said...: Bay Area Guy said...
Mueller has, sadly, become a stooge. He got coopted by Weismann and these other DOJ/FBI weasels.

So, since Mueller wasted all his time trying to prosecute a case that he says can't be prosecuted, we turn to impeachment.

Mueller was always a figurehead.

The democrats on that team chose him for two reasons.

1. LLR means credibility.

2. They have all the documents on Mueller who was in charge of departments during the Whitey Bulger scandal and most likely Uranium One.

For people wondering why Mueller doesn't seem to have his heart in this it is because he doesn't have his heart in this. He is clearly being forced to take every step. He hasn't been in the "investigation" for over a year. Mueller wanted to disappear quietly.

If the leftists were smart they would have let Trump do his thing for 8 years and do what they did after Reagan left. But they didn't.

The FBI has been massively corrupt for decades.

Jail is too good for Mueller and he knows it. His cohorts drug him in to this and it will be all of their ends. Now all the dirty laundry is going to air out.

Lamposts need to be decorated.; 6/3/19, 7:36 PM
Gk1 said...: I keep bringing this up because it's something Alan Dershowitz telegraphed months ago although it would not in a million years have be implemented. He suggested that the DOJ had not only an obligation but a duty to create a counter document challenging the Mueller report because as we witnessed the Mueller report would go into the record unchallenged and the anti-trump coalition could act that it was the gospel truth (even though they have ignored the ultimae collusion conclusion) In this link he says Trump should have rebutted. When I saw him on Fox in April he suggest the AG was making a mistake releasing the Mueller report without it being challenged by a DOJ document pointing out all the problems with it. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/alan-dershowitz-essential-for-doj-to-withhold-mueller-report-until-trump-can-rebut-it; 6/3/19, 9:48 PM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: GK1 - I'm keeping your post for future use.; 6/4/19, 9:06 AM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: We are working towards a system where the lairs in the D party and their D-pary press will never be challenged.; 6/4/19, 9:07 AM
RigelDog said...: Turley is right to question the refusal to identify the GJ material- this was deliberate on the part of the Mueller and his team. What they had planned to do was use the two weeks it took to properly redact the report to leak out that Trump was guilty of obstruction, but that their hands were tied by DoJ policy>>>

I LOVE the fact that Turley led his points with this fact. It's astonishing---absolutely fall-down, smacked upside the head astonishing---that Barr (Mueller's boss) ordered Mueller and team to immediately prepare a redacted version of the report. And they just didn't freakin' do it. Kept telling Barr that it was being done but then somehow just.didn't.do.it.
You try refusing to carry out a simple, direct order from the head of your company, and then lying about whether or not you were really working on getting it done. Then Mueller had the chutzpah to manufacture a letter for public release, bitching about Barr releasing a summary of his report when the only reason Barr had to release a summary was because YOU were the one who made it impossible to just release a properly redacted report.; 6/4/19, 10:06 AM