rashbre central: and with a single bound

Monday 25 March 2019

and with a single bound


Ignoring any brazen, pathological mendacity from the so-called US President, I see he tweeted that he was (in capitals) exonerated from the Mueller findings. Interesting choice of word, actually.

Mueller's 22 month investigation included 19 lawyers and a team of 40 FBI agents, intelligence analysts, forensic accountants and professional staff. The team interviewed 500 witnesses, executed more than 500 search warrants, 13 requests to foreign governments, issued 2,800 subpoenas and 50 wiretaps.

Mueller brought charges against 34 people, including Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort and Trump's personal lawyer Michael Cohen.

Trump has always referred to the whole thing as a witch hunt. Recently he appointed a new friendly Attorney General, Bill Barr, ahead of Mueller completing the report.

Mueller was required to pass the report and summary to Barr, before any of it could go public.

Barr summarises it all into about three paragraphs: Yes, the Russians interfered with the elections. Yes, they hacked the Democrats. No, Mr Trump and anyone associated with him was not involved.

Barr's summary letter unilaterally reached a finding that the legal threshold for obstruction of justice would not be met even despite Mueller deciding after two years, not to do that.

Then there's a bit in the letter quoting some chapter and verse. "The relevant regulations contemplate that the Special Counsel's report will be a confidential report to the Attorney General. See Office of Special Counsel, 64 Fed. Reg. 37,038,"

I 'contemplated' the relevant section and those immediately around it. Despite the House voting 420-0 on March 14 that the report should be made public, the Attorney General could shutter the main report and close down all aspects of Mueller's investigations (64 Fed. Reg. 37,041).

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