The Mueller Report on a Mar-a-Lago Case with Corcoran: Probing the Presidency with a White House Counsel
The sealed case revealed Wednesday is intended to force more details about the conversations between Trump and his defense attorney Evan Corcoran where the Justice Department claims they may have been part of a crime connected to the Mar-a-Lago document boxes.
The outcome of these disputes could have far-reaching implications, as they revolve around a 2024 presidential candidate and could lead courts to shape the law around the presidency, separation of powers and attorney-client confidentiality in ways they’ve never done before.
The grand jury saw several witnesses use the Fifth Amendment or other legal privileges to undermine their testimony, such as Trump’s White House chief of staff.
Criminal law experts say investigations into government officials are often sealed because grand jury witnesses are more likely to assert privileges in order to force more answers from judges.
About half a dozen cases are still ongoing in court, either before Chief Judge Beryl Howell or in the appeals court above her, the DC Circuit. The majority of the cases arise from grand jury investigations where the court can be used to enforce subpoenas.
More challenges from witnesses will likely be filed in the coming days, including those from former Vice President Mike Pence. Some novel questions may be raised about the protections around the vice presidency.
I think we are in the midst of an extraordinary time. Neil Eggleston was a White House counsel who argued for executive privilege during the Clinton administration and was part of the team that tried to block the Whitewater investigation.
The courts in DC ruled that privilege claims wouldn’t hold up when a federal grand jury needed information, so witnesses shied away from testifying. Witness aligned to the Trump investigations still want to know if he still has confidentiality protections.
Greg Jacob and his boss, the chief of staff, did not have to answer questions about their interaction with the President around January 6 as a result of the appeal. Both went to the grand jury in DC on the same Friday last July and refused to give some answers because of Trump’s attempted claims of confidentiality around the presidency. Court orders prompted them to testify a second time, seeking out more testimony from them in October last year, CNN previously confirmed. They both appeared a second time at the grand jury. The Trump team still has filed an appeal of Howell’s decisions.
Lawyers for the congressman challenged the DOJ’s ability to view data from the cell phone because of a clause in the speach or debate clause. The DOJ was not able to see the records so far due to a panel blocking them, according to the court record. The case will be argued on February 23 at the appeals court in Washington. The circuit court also has a request from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press to unseal documents in the case.
Howell has released redacted versions of two attorney confidentiality decisions she made last year giving prosecutors access to emails between Perry and three lawyers – John Eastman, Jeffrey Clark and Ken Klukowski – before January 6, 2021.
Howell separately denied Clark’s attempt to keep from investigators a draft of his autobiography that discussed his efforts at the Justice Department on behalf of Trump before January 6. Clark had tried to mark the draft outline about his life as an attorney work product.
The Justice Department secured a court order for Trump adviser Kash Patel to answer questions under oath in the Mar-a-Lago investigation. The Fifth Amendment protection against self- incrimination was one of the reasons why he initially declined to answer questions. Then prosecutors fought for more answers by immunizing his testimony from prosecution, CNN previously reported.
The findings of the grand jury will not be made public until later in the year. Some of the people in the recommendations may not have participated in the grand jury proceedings.
But the Justice Department is against making disclosures related to the grand jury investigations – and won’t even admit the proceedings are taking place.
They argued to the court on Monday that the public should be aware of more information in the future, since the public interest is so high.
Lawyers from the DOJ said that it may be needed for court to decline to release judicial opinions related to grand jury investigations that are the subject of intense press attention as opposed to matter that has attracted little public attention.
Clark Cunningham is the Chair in Law and Ethics at Georgia State and said it was possible that there was criminal conduct in the Trump campaign in Georgia.
On Thursday, the report’s introduction and conclusion, as well as concerns the panel had about witnesses lying under oath, will be made public. McBurney mentioned that some information may be redacted.
There is a big question over whether the portions will include any new information about what happened two years ago or if the grand jury concluded that the former president committed any crimes.
The Georgia investigation has long been seen as one of Trump’s biggest unsettled legal vulnerabilities, though any prosecution of him would be ripe for constitutional challenges and would face more scrutiny than perhaps any previous case initiated by a local prosecutor.
In 2020, Trump lost to Biden in Georgia by over 12,000 votes. The former president has denied that there was anything wrong with his campaign activities.
CNN’s special grand jury report on the 2021 phone call from Trump to the Georgia secretary of state: “It was a perfect phone call, not a crime”
Cunningham added to CNN that “there is no doubt that whatever (the report is) referring to is either conduct that was done directly by Donald Trump or done on his behalf.”
“That would tell us that this cross section of citizens, having spent nine months working hard at this, has concluded that at least some of what was done on behalf of the former president to overturn the election results was a crime,” he said. I believe that is significant.
The Georgia probe was set off nearly two years ago by an hourlong January 2021 phone call from Trump to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger asking him to “find” the votes necessary for Trump to win the Peach State. Trump has referred to it as a “perfect” phone call.
The final report from the grand jury made it clear that there should be perjury charges against some witnesses. Kohrs earlier on Tuesday also told The New York Times that the grand jury recommended multiple indictments, though she didn’t provide names.
The panel’s final report will likely include a summary of its investigative work, as well as the recommendations for indictments and the conduct that led to the panel’s conclusions.
No one has been charged in the case yet, and another grand jury in Fulton County would make those decisions now that the special grand jury has presented its findings to Willis.
During the hearing last month on whether or not to make the report public, the Democrat indicated that her decision to bring charges is imminent and said the special grand jury had recommended multiple indictments.
One thing that ties it all together is that all three are being presented to a grand jury.
Emily Kohrs told CNN that it would be impossible for her to do this for eight months and not produce a full list of recommended indictments. “It’s not a short list. It’s not.”
She continued, “There may be some names on that list that you wouldn’t expect. I don’t think you will be surprised by the name that everyone keeps asking me about.
The CNN Insider Report on the Investigative Investigation by the Special Grand Jury for the Foreperson of a Georgia State Senator, Robert Kohrs
Kohrs declined later Tuesday to disclose exactly how many indictments the special grand jury recommended be brought as part of the investigation, saying only that she believes it is more than 12.
Asked by CNN’s Kate Bolduan on “Erin Burnett OutFront” whether the number of people was “more than a dozen,” Kohrs replied: “I believe so. That’s probably a good assumption.”
She said she heard the president on the phone many times. CNN previously reported that at least one additional call by Trump to a Georgia state official was part of the investigation.
Despite Trump’s claims that the prosecutors are liberal zealots on a “witch hunt,” Kohrs said she believed Willis and her team acted in a non-partisan fashion and tried to keep the proceedings fair.
“I don’t believe there was bias on the part of the DA’s team,” she told CNN in the phone interview. “I know for a fact that they were always very worried about accidentally coloring our opinions one way or the other … They didn’t want their opinions to affect us or our knowledge, so they told us that.
She should take most of the decisive action that she can, to actually do something. “There are too many times in recent history that seem to me like someone has gotten called out for something that people had a problem with, and nothing ever happens.”
Do you know how often something actually happens? I want to see something happen. He said not to make him take back his faith in the system. “The only thing I would be disappointed in, at this point, is if this whole thing just disappears. That’s the only thing that would make me sad.”
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/21/politics/fulton-county-trump-grand-jury-foreperson-ebof/index.html
The Foreperson and Special Counsel of the House Committee on the January 6, 2021, US Capitol Affair: Michael Flynn & the House Investigation of the Capitol Attack
The foreperson also told CNN that she was “pleasantly surprised” by the friendliness of some witnesses, including key Trump insiders like former White House national security adviser Michael Flynn, even though he invoked privilege and declined to answer some questions.
The people who were willing to have a conversation, after they were there, fought not to be there. It was very nice of Flynn to be in person. He was a very nice man. He was definitely interesting. I didn’t recall him saying something earth-shattering.
The top investigator on the House committee that probed the January 6, 2021, US Capitol attack said Wednesday it is “likely” that the Georgia and federal investigations into efforts to subvert the 2020 presidential election will produce indictments.
They were present for significant events. The special counsel wants to know what happened on January 6 and about the president’s understanding of the election results. He said that they both had direct communications with him about the events preceding the Capitol riot.
Untouchable: How to Train a Grand Juror to Defend a Premeditated Indictment? A Conversation with Elie Honig
“He will not stop because of a family relationship, because of purported executive privilege,” Heaphy said of Smith. He thinks he is entitled to the information and he is determined to get it.
Ivanka Trump and Kushner previously testified to the House select committee, which expired in January after Republicans took control of the House. The committee referred the former president to the Justice Department on four criminal charges, but they said that the referrals were used as a way to document their views even though Congress can’t bring charges.
It is worth pondering how the legal system is being applied to Donald Trump, while the country anticipates that there will be the first-ever indictment of a former president.
You can recall that the fore person for the special grand jury in Georgia spoke to CNN and other news outlets. Legal watchers criticized her for talking publicly about the broad outlines of evidence but making sure that the regular jurors in a grand jury agree that there is probable cause to bring a case.
It has been attributed to a former judge of New York’s court of appeals, Sol Wachtler. Someone will repeat the phrase when you watch the coverage of a possible Trump indictment.
I reached out to Elie Honig, a CNN legal analyst, former federal prosecutor and author of the new book, “Untouchable: How Powerful People Get Away With It,” for a refresher on how grand juries and indictments work. The conversation was conducted by phone.
A trial jury is more divided than a grand jury, and the prosecutor needs the votes of the majority of the jury.
In some instances, including New York, there’s a limited right of a potential defendant to present some evidence, but no defense lawyers are allowed in the room.
Where do the grand juries go? The case of the Fulton County District Attorney, Attorney General Garland, and the US Attorney’s office
TheWOLF: We have three grand juries looking at election interference in Georgia, declassified documents in the federal government and the Manhattan District Attorney’s office. How much variation is there in grand juries between city, county and federal?
A variation in New York State but not in the federal system means for DOJ. The defendant does have some limited right to be notified and given a chance to testify or present defense evidence, which we saw play out over the last week with Trump and then him asking Robert Costello to testify.
All of these cases have been going on for quite some time. It could be that they are coming to a head at the same time. That is going to feed the “witch hunt” narrative that Trump pushes.
All three investigations have been pending for a long time. January 6 is for two-and-change years. The building is going on for two years. The county is two years long and the money is six-and-a-half years.
I think the argument will be, when you have three or four different investigations, all of which have been outstanding for multiple years – if they all culminate within a fairly brief stretch as we head into the 2024 election, as multiple people, including Donald Trump, have declared their candidacies.
HONIG: I have been critical of all three investigations for moving too slowly. I don’t assume the worst. I don’t assume that that’s being done intentionally to get it as close to the election as possible.
They are moving too slowly and that is the more likely scenario. They are too bureaucratic when it comes to their approach. I have said that publicly about Attorney General Garland and the Fulton County District Attorney.
HONIG: It is not a formal deadline. But it is a widely observed practice that you don’t want to take an overt dramatic step like drop an indictment or hold a trial close to an election.
Sometimes it is understood as a 90-day rule with the DOJ. I think it’s unlikely that a judge would force Donald Trump and/or prosecutors to try a case, let’s say in the summer of 2024, with the presidential election just around the corner.