Robert Mueller, Former F.B.I. Director, Is Named Special Counsel for Russia Investigation

I think this is a possible option. It would, unfortunately, be colored as a fired Mueller seeking revenge. However, the least the Democrats could do would be to have Mueller deliver public testimony as to his findings and publicly answer questions about the investigation and any obstruction Mueller and his team faced in the course of executing their duties.

 

So much this. I've been thinking this is the obvious saber to rattle b/c it could make his findings much more public than if 45 actually keeps the dude within the FBI, doing his job and sending results up the food chain.

 

Agreed. Mueller is a textbook, Weberian bureaucrat; he won't leak, just report to his boss. Keep him in his place in the org chart, and Mueller will report up the chain of command and then you can seal away his findings (provided Rosentein is gone). As long as Mueller is working, Trump can claim Democrats are not allowed to interfere with the investigation by either compelling testimony or revealing evidence.

But, like a true civil servant, Mueller is gonna keep doing his job with sincerity: pursuing indictments, squeezing snitches, and doling out evidence and charges to the state level where Trump cannot pardon. Not an enviable set of options. I guess it is a question of where Trump draws the line in terms of how many of his people he is willing to see take the fall/get indicted, since he can probably depend on the Republican senate and Supreme Court to protect him from indictment as a sitting president.

 

...this is one of those times where TMI would definitely be a good thing...

 

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/11/07/trump-2020-elections-campaign-968942

 

Sessions is now gone. Get your popcorn ready.

 

This isn't the news though. The news is the replacement.

The guy who was a surrogate on CNN a few months ago who has spoken about on CNN, and written op eds about how to shut down the Mueller probe. You seriously cannot be this desperate if you are Donald J. Trump unless things are really really bad.

And to Mr. Whitaker..... WOW... you REALLY REALLY want to write your name in the history books like this? Think about your legacy and your name how it will be remembered. You better take a long hard look at what you want in life moving forward.

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But yes... .this a big step in shutting down the Mueller probe in the ways Trump needs to in order to stay in power.

 

Trump's Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker, who has criticized the Mueller probe, will now oversee it
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/07/tru...ke-over-mueller-probe-oversight-nbc-news.html
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It was not immediately clear how the staffing change will impact Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who is currently overseeing the Mueller probe.

Whitaker argued in an August 2017 op-ed for CNN that Mueller's investigation is "dangerously close to crossing" the so-called red line not to look into the Trump family's finances.

Less than a month earlier, Whitaker had defended Trump's son, Donald Trump Jr., for accepting a meeting at Trump Tower in June 2016 with Russian officials who had promised damaging information about Hillary Clinton during the presidential campaign.

"You would always take that meeting," Whitaker said on CNN.

Whitaker, 49, is a former U.S. attorney in Iowa who ran for political office as a Republican. The National Association of Former United States Attorneys announced in October 2017 that Whitaker had been appointed as Sessions' chief of staff.

"It does not take a lawyer or even a former federal prosecutor like myself to conclude that investigating Donald Trump's finances or his family's finances falls completely outside of the realm of his 2016 campaign and allegations that the campaign coordinated with the Russian government or anyone else," Whitaker wrote in the piece.

"That goes beyond the scope of the appointment of the special counsel."
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He will be getting big bucks from Foxnews. They love ex republicans.

 

Oh I'm sure he'll be treated as a superhero over there IF TRUMP GETS AWAY WITH SHUTTING THIS DOWN.

But I do not think over time, Trump cannot win this game, and whatever happens, Whitaker's name will be a dark cloud on our nations history. The big question regarding Whitaker isn't about what he can or cannot do in regards to a report to Congress... its about what power he has to , maybe literally in some cases, to destroy evidence, sealed indictments, and order actual court cases shut down. That includes the case against the Russians which can and certainly will list American Co-Conspirators.

Then at the same time, what happens when the information becomes public through a leak, or what have you. Whitaker will need to know that the day after that becomes public that he without cause single handily shut down court cases in this investigation, he will be called in front of the House Judiciary & the House Intelligence Committee who NOW HAVE SUBPOENA POWER, and can refer him to the next command for indictment.

I just don't know if Matt Whitaker realizes what he just signed up for. His post DOJ job at FoxNews isn't coming without some big uncomfortable milestones coming in the process.

 

No doubt this hack Whitaker will try to rein in Mueller but the investigation is already way out of Mueller's hands in a couple of ways. Various parts of it are independently being picked up by the US Atty offices, which he'd then have to manually stop - and all of these shutdown attempts are going to be subject to House oversight and subpoena power. Then there's the various state cases that he's not going to have any power over at all.

Basically, it's going to take a lot more than just hamstringing Mueller to make this "just go away" they did with Kavanaugh's rape & perjury investigations.

 

One thing that just gets me, is that Mueller is investigating no just obstruction of justice, but Russian intelligence operations connected to both influencing the outcome of the 2016 election but also infiltrating the campaign of candidate for the presidency of the United States of America, a candidate who ultimately won. And that president -- who gave Russians classified data while hosting them in the Oval Office, praises Putin (a former KGB agent), doesn't speak harshly about Putin, and who basically looked weak next to Putin in Helsinki -- is doing what he can to stop the investigation which has already yielded indictments, guilty pleas, and evidence we have yet to see. And the Republican Party, the party that was so proud of having defeated the Red Menace, and its partisans are onboard with the cover up.

This is like a Tom Clancy novel on crack.

 

trump... off the rails...

 

The impending indictments of Kushner and Don Jr. really rattling the Dotard.

 

as they should.

 

idiot in-chief simply doesn't know how government works... so much for "on the job training"...

 

Unstable trump continues to lash out and show he knows nothing about how the government works...

 

Gee susan, you think? "Restrictions"... can you get any wimpier?

 

You won't say it's wimpy after she fires off a concerned e-mail to her Senator, Angus King (I-ME).

 

GOP actually do not want democracy or rule of law unless it is on their terms.