Jeff Danziger lives in New York City. He is represented by CWS Syndicate and the Washington Post Writers Group. He is the recipient of the Herblock Prize and the Thomas Nast (Landau) Prize. He served in the US Army in Vietnam and was awarded the Bronze Star and the Air Medal. He has published eleven books of cartoons and one novel. Visit him at DanzigerCartoons.com.
Reprinted with permission from Alternet.
Officials in the Justice Department have had “numerous” conversations with President Donald Trump’s lawyers in the White House about the forthcoming report from Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, a new report from the New York Times revealed Wednesday.
With this information about the report that is still sealed from public view, Trump’s lawyers have already begun crafting a response to the report, the Times found.
A redacted version of Mueller’s report is expected to come out Thursday morning.
Attorney General Bill Barr has already been widely criticized for his handling the end of the Mueller investigation, creating more questions and controversies than he has resolved.
“The discussions between Justice Department officials and White House lawyers have also added to questions about the propriety of the decisions by Attorney General William P. Barr since he received the Mr. Mueller’s findings late last month,” the Times noted.
“They are just violating every cardinal rule for what DOJ will discuss with the WH,” said former Justice Department spokesman Matthew Miller of the Times’ report. “Barr is actually behaving with less integrity than Jeff Sessions.”
In principle, the Justice Department and the FBI, in particular, are supposed to operate at arms-length from the president, to preserve the distance between the political branch of the government and those in charge of maintaining the rule of law. However, since taking office, Trump has repeatedly worked to control investigations that encircle him and to encourage investigations of his enemies.
Trump’s effort to quash the Russia investigation was what compelled the appointment of a special counsel in the first place — and the fact that Barr is permitting an overly cozy relationship between the Justice Department and White House further casts doubt on the attorney general’s credibility.
Jeff Danziger lives in New York City. He is represented by CWS Syndicate and the Washington Post Writers Group. He is the recipient of the Herblock Prize and the Thomas Nast (Landau) Prize. He served in the US Army in Vietnam and was awarded the Bronze Star and the Air Medal. He has published eleven books of cartoons and one novel. Visit him at DanzigerCartoons.com.
Reprinted with permission from Shareblue.com.
Is this what happens when the White House is reduced to hiring the C-team for legal defense?
Rocked by the resignation of his lead criminal defense attorney, Trump recently spent weeks being rejected by would-be legal hires who wanted nothing to do with having Trump as a client.
Trump finally got Rudy Giuliani to come aboard, even though he’s never been a defense attorney and hasn’t practiced courtroom law in decades.
In what some are suggesting may be one of Giuliani’s first acts on Trump’s behalf, dozens of questions that special counsel Robert Mueller allegedly wants to ask Trump in person were leaked to the New York Times.
The questions, which focus on the Russia investigation and potential obstructions of justice, paint a devastating portrait in terms of the legal jeopardy Trump faces on so many fronts.
“This is obviously a very extensive obstruction of justice investigation,” noted CNN analyst Jeffrey Toobin about the leaked questions on Tuesday.
But making them public may have only added to the White House’s woes.
John Dean, Richard Nixon’s former White House counsel, told CNN he thought the move represented an obstruction of justice as an attempt to “try to disrupt the flow of information” or tip off a witness.
“The very fact that the questions are out there, my first reaction, suggesting it could be an act of obstruction to just have released these questions,” Dean said.
There’s a growing consensus that Trump’s side leaked the questions. They may have done it to try to create an image of an investigation that was out of control, allowing Trump to rail against it — which of course he did.
Or it may have been leaked to send a public signal to Trump that the investigation is deadly serious and that he faces enormous legal peril if he agrees to sit down with Mueller.
Publicly, Trump has bragged he has nothing to hide. But most legal analysts think Trump agreeing to answer Mueller’s questions for hours on end would be madness, since Trump has a well-earned reputation as a unstable liar.
Trump’s former defense attorney, John Down, reportedly opposed any effort by Trump to meet with Mueller. Dowd abruptly resigned in March, upset that Trump would not listen to his legal advice.
The Times reports that Dowd quit one week after seeing Mueller’s now-leaked laundry list of questions.
Smart move.
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