DAMN!

From the NYT just now:

Attorney General Merrick B. Garland appointed a special counsel on Friday to take over two major criminal investigations involving former President Donald J. Trump, including his role in events leading up to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and his handling of sensitive government documents.

John L. Smith, the former head of the Justice Department’s public integrity section, will oversee the investigation into Mr. Trump’s retention of sensitive government documents at his home in Florida, and “key” aspects of the separate inquiry into the former president’s actions before the Jan. 6 attack, Mr. Garland said in a news conference.

“The announcement came after Mr. Trump said on Tuesday that he planned to run for president again, a decision some have claimed was made to make it more difficult for prosecutors to pursue criminal cases against him.

“Based on recent developments, including the former president announcement that he is a candidate for president in the next election and the sitting president’s stated intention to be a candidate as well, I have concluded it is in the public interest to appoint a special counsel,” Mr. Garland said. “Such an appointment underscores the department’s commitment to both independence and accountability in particularly sensitive matters.”

The appointment of a special counsel was a way for the Justice Department to insulate its investigations against Mr. Trump from political considerations. While special counsels can be fired from their positions, the process is much more arduous than removing ordinary prosecutors from a case.

Special counsels are semi-independent prosecutors who by Justice Department regulations can be appointed for high-level investigations when there can be a conflict of interest or the appearance of it. They exercise greater day-to-day autonomy than regular United States attorneys but are ultimately still subject to the control of the attorney general.

Already, Mr. Trump’s supporters have accused the Justice Department under the Biden administration of investigating Mr. Trump for political reasons, and some Republicans have floated the idea of impeaching Mr. Garland if he pursues charges against him. That tension is almost certain to become more pronounced now that Mr. Trump has formally announced his third bid for the presidency.

The department has “a true conflict of interest, real or perceived,” said Claire Finkelstein, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania and the founder of the Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law. She added, “It would be difficult to put measures in place that would reassure people that the Justice Department was acting with independence on the Trump investigation.”

The best one can say about this is that it’s the least bad of a lot of possible bad decisions.

However, unless there is some way to “piggyback” all the investigation to date over to the Special Counsel, this decision leads to great delay.

The office of the Special Counsel now has to be set up, starting from scratch, and none of the investigators or attorneys who have been working the cases can be transferred directly over. There will be a hiring process that - hopefully! - will not be too prolonged.

This delays any action against Trump at least six months.

On the other side, this does remove a reason (as if they actually needed one) for the Goon Platoon running the House to begin investigating Garland and possibly impeaching him. But they’ve never let reality or rules get in their way before, so it’s a guess only that this will protect Garland and the DOJ.

It also makes it harder for the Goons to claim it’s a political hit by the administration, but I have no doubt they’ll shout that from the rooftops anyway.

I’ve read the Pros Memo released yesterday by Joyce Vance and Andrew Weissman and others, and it certainly seems to this non-lawyer that they lay out a clear case. Lawyers I know say they also think it does that, so perhaps with this as a guide, the Office of Special Counsel can get to work faster than such operations have in the past.

We can be assured that if nothing has happened by January 20, 2025, and Trump has won, that it will be shut down and none of the Goons will care what the public image of so doing looks like.

For now, my only response is DAMN!

You can support That’s Another Fine Mess with a paid subscription for only $7/month or $70/year, saving you $14.

Comments are for paid subscribers.