Let's just hope Mueller has a good contingency plan for this inevitable fuckery.
You're talking about a guy who got a witness out of prison to go on the record with testimony, then snuck back into that prison, without anyone knowing until well after the fact.
Does he have any actual authority to tell a special counsel what the scope of their investigation is or how to run it?
Yes, he has complete control over the investigation. All indictments have to have approval, as do subpoenas and new avenues of investigation. Whittaker is obviously just going to bring that to a complete halt. I would be very surprised if Roger Stone is indicted now.
I don't know how the particulars work, but even if an indictment for Stone was approved by Rosenstein and Mueller was just waiting until the election was over for it, Whittaker could probably retroactively deny that indictment before it happened.
I assume McConnel's stance will continue to be something like "We could take action to protect the special counsel, but I don't see any indication that the investigation is under threat".
Of course not, he's still the Special Counsel, he's still doing his job, we've just made a few adjustments for budgetary concerns!
Does he have any actual authority to tell a special counsel what the scope of their investigation is or how to run it?
Yes, he has complete control over the investigation. All indictments have to have approval, as do subpoenas and new avenues of investigation. Whittaker is obviously just going to bring that to a complete halt. I would be very surprised if Roger Stone is indicted now.
I don't know how the particulars work, but even if an indictment for Stone was approved by Rosenstein and Mueller was just waiting until the election was over for it, Whittaker could probably retroactively deny that indictment before it happened.
If the House subpeonas the reports though I do 't think he can stop them releasing them.
I can’t imagjne the investigation team didn’t have a plan in place for this NOT AT ALL telegraphed moment, but I’ve been wrong before once or twice in my life.
Does he have any actual authority to tell a special counsel what the scope of their investigation is or how to run it?
Yes, he has complete control over the investigation. All indictments have to have approval, as do subpoenas and new avenues of investigation. Whittaker is obviously just going to bring that to a complete halt. I would be very surprised if Roger Stone is indicted now.
I don't know how the particulars work, but even if an indictment for Stone was approved by Rosenstein and Mueller was just waiting until the election was over for it, Whittaker could probably retroactively deny that indictment before it happened.
If the House subpeonas the reports though I do 't think he can stop them releasing them.
He can. Worst case scenario for Whittaker it goes to the supreme court.
So, rather than fire Mueller, they might just hobble the shit out him financially?
I wonder how many of the people he hired are willing to work pro bono for the protection of American democracy.
They all took massive pay cuts basically already.
And if, somehow, everyone working on the investigation agrees to work for free, they'll just fire them then, or deny all their requests for literally anything down to new pencils.
What is the legal mechanism for Whittaker to "deny" an indictment when a grand jury has been presented evidence and affirmatively voted and indicted someone? Help me out here
The House of Reps flipped blue meaning that Trump is no longer protected on that front as Nunes cannot stall that Intelligence Committee any further. Furthermore, there's be lots of talk about subpoenaing Trump's tax returns since that's something the House can do without also having it checked by the Senate. But any of those potential actions is still a couple of months away since the new Congress doesn't get sworn in or seated until early January.
In response, right now, for no apparently rational reason, Jeff Sessions gets fired resigns. This is after setting up and maintaining a successful voter suppression campaign that seems to have made all the difference in at least Florida, Georgia, Texas, and North Dakota. While also having ran full interference for the administration in the courts to middling results. With this "resignation" we get a supposed Trump puppet (evidence not yet apparent of the degree of toadying) as acting AG while the deputy AG remains the deputy and largely keeps up the appearance, if not actual function, of an independent office. The worry being this new puppet would scrap that appearance at any moment by firing said deputy AG, thus creating a direct line to also fire or interfere with the special prosecutor's investigation that has a high probability (based on court records) of having Trump being an unnamed co-conspirator.
Are we certain that Sessions didn't actually want out? I'm not saying that the above isn't or can't be true. But it sure is complicated.
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ChaosHatHop, hop, hop, HA!Trick of the lightRegistered Userregular
I honestly don't know why reporting shit during the fall before election day is a taboo thing. If there's something the public should know, we should know it before voting. My problem with Comey isn't that he said what he said about Hillary Clinton, it's that he didn't give context for it and that he didn't also mention the Republican candidate was also under investigation.
What is the legal mechanism for Whittaker to "deny" an indictment when a grand jury has been presented evidence and affirmatively voted and indicted someone? Help me out here
"Because"
Like, he's the AG, he doesn't need to do anything he doesn't want to. Who's gonna stop him?
The House of Reps flipped blue meaning that Trump is no longer protected on that front as Nunes cannot stall that Intelligence Committee any further. Furthermore, there's be lots of talk about subpoenaing Trump's tax returns since that's something the House can do without also having it checked by the Senate. But any of those potential actions is still a couple of months away since the new Congress doesn't get sworn in or seated until early January.
In response, right now, for no apparently rational reason, Jeff Sessions gets fired resigns. This is after setting up and maintaining a successful voter suppression campaign that seems to have made all the difference in at least Florida, Georgia, Texas, and North Dakota. While also having ran full interference for the administration in the courts to middling results. With this "resignation" we get a supposed Trump puppet (evidence not yet apparent of the degree of toadying) as acting AG while the deputy AG remains the deputy and largely keeps up the appearance, if not actual function, of an independent office. The worry being this new puppet would scrap that appearance at any moment by firing said deputy AG, thus creating a direct line to also fire or interfere with the special prosecutor's investigation that has a high probability (based on court records) of having Trump being an unnamed co-conspirator.
Are we certain that Sessions didn't actually want out? I'm not saying that the above isn't or can't be true. But it sure is complicated.
As a rule, I assume that when you start a resignation letter with "At your request," you didn't wanna go.
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Fuck Joe Manchin
Mueller won't be fired, he'll just be ordered to end the investigation in a timely fashion and the new AG will find themselves oddly uninterested in pursuing any criminal charges against any Trump officials. Congress can request the reports, but I assume there will be all kinds of fuckery attempted to reduce the value of any Mueller findings that get out. Congress will be left with the choice to attempt to impeach based solely on leaks and weakened material that the new AG allowed to get out.
If I'm the Democrats, I might just wait until October of 2020 and oh surprise, Mueller is going to testify in front of Congress about the investigation and release his 'personal notes'.
What is the legal mechanism for Whittaker to "deny" an indictment when a grand jury has been presented evidence and affirmatively voted and indicted someone? Help me out here
It seems he could deny Mueller the authority to bring an indictment before the grand jury
arguments in what is very possibly an appeal to the DC court's ruling that the President must respond to a subpoena are happening soon. All the documents have to be filed by next Wednesday and oral arguments are set for Dec 14th!!
DOing this now may mean that the DoJ stops pursuing this line and prevents Mueller from forcing the President to give testimony before a grand jury.
I honestly don't know why reporting shit during the fall before election day is a taboo thing. If there's something the public should know, we should know it before voting. My problem with Comey isn't that he said what he said about Hillary Clinton, it's that he didn't give context for it and that he didn't also mention the Republican candidate was also under investigation.
What is the legal mechanism for Whittaker to "deny" an indictment when a grand jury has been presented evidence and affirmatively voted and indicted someone? Help me out here
"Because"
Like, he's the AG, he doesn't need to do anything he doesn't want to. Who's gonna stop him?
Can he literally stop things being filled in court? If we're talking things that Mueller has already given to a grand jury and they've indicted on, I don't see how (practically or legally) Whittaker can bury that
There's also that Mueller is already sharing information with all the state AGs, I imagine it would be trivial for him to dump everything to them an allow them to prosecute. Also imagine that he would be able to file an injunction to hold his firing in the event that does happen and make the doj demonstrate cause through a lengthy court process
What is the legal mechanism for Whittaker to "deny" an indictment when a grand jury has been presented evidence and affirmatively voted and indicted someone? Help me out here
It seems he could deny Mueller the authority to bring an indictment before the grand jury
I was responding to viskod saying even already done indictments could be "denied"
arguments in what is very possibly an appeal to the DC court's ruling that the President must respond to a subpoena are happening soon. All the documents have to be filed by next Wednesday and oral arguments are set for Dec 14th!!
DOing this now may mean that the DoJ stops pursuing this line and prevents Mueller from forcing the President to give testimony before a grand jury.
If the ruling being appealed is that POTUS does have to answer a subpeona, then they don't have an out like that - the court would presumably appoint someone to defend the lower ruling.
Like, seriously there is some secret and highly irregular stuff happening with the grand jury right now and it all comes to a head in the next 5 weeks. Someone with the weight to make the court move VERY FAST and expect all parties to do likewise is fighting a subpoena before an appellate court right now and this may win that mystery person a reprieve.
Edit: would they, Polarite?
And will the Court be able to appoint someone who actually can argue the case based on facts? They can't see any of Mueller's evidence and if the DoJ won't defend the ruling, who else possibly could?
Every legal expert I have ever heard comment on this matter have all agreed that Mueller needs permission to indict someone. That's just been a given no matter how this investigation has been discussed. Where along the line of the process of a normal indictment approval from the immediate supervisor of Mueller lies I am not sure.
Perhaps its before they are considered by the Grand Jury?
Perhaps its after the Grand Jury vote and the AG or DAG has to approve before it goes into action?
What is the legal mechanism for Whittaker to "deny" an indictment when a grand jury has been presented evidence and affirmatively voted and indicted someone? Help me out here
"Because"
Like, he's the AG, he doesn't need to do anything he doesn't want to. Who's gonna stop him?
Can he literally stop things being filled in court? If we're talking things that Mueller has already given to a grand jury and they've indicted on, I don't see how (practically or legally) Whittaker can bury that
He could just say the indictment is beyond the scope of the Special council
Reading the order that created the office it sounds like that scope is completely determined by the AG(or DAG when it was Rosenstein)
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silence1186Character shields down!As a wingmanRegistered Userregular
What is the legal mechanism for Whittaker to "deny" an indictment when a grand jury has been presented evidence and affirmatively voted and indicted someone? Help me out here
"Because"
Like, he's the AG, he doesn't need to do anything he doesn't want to. Who's gonna stop him?
Can he literally stop things being filled in court? If we're talking things that Mueller has already given to a grand jury and they've indicted on, I don't see how (practically or legally) Whittaker can bury that
My guess is Mueller told Rosenstein who to indict, but Rosenstein technically has to file the paperwork with the court.
Every legal expert I have ever heard comment on this matter have all agreed that Mueller needs permission to indict someone. That's just been a given no matter how this investigation has been discussed. Where along the line of the process of a normal indictment approval from the immediate supervisor of Mueller lies I am not sure.
Perhaps its before they are considered by the Grand Jury?
Perhaps its after the Grand Jury vote and the AG or DAG has to approve before it goes into action?
The Grand Jury has the power of indictment - they don't need anybody's approval iirc? It would be approval to present to the Grand Jury. Once the indictment comes from them, that's formal charges, isn't it?
Like, seriously there is some secret and highly irregular stuff happening with the grand jury right now and it all comes to a head in the next 5 weeks. Someone with the weight to make the court move VERY FAST and expect all parties to do likewise is fighting a subpoena before an appellate court right now and this may win that mystery person a reprieve.
Edit: would they, Polarite?
And will the Court be able to appoint someone who actually can argue the case based on facts? They can't see any of Mueller's evidence and if the DoJ won't defend the ruling, who else possibly could?
It could be because this mystery person is Don Jr or Kushner and this is the nuclear reaction that you'd expect Trump to have if the investigation got that close to him.
Or it could be that they've always planned to do this because doing it right after the election regardless of its outcome means you have two years to ride out the fallout from such an action and bury all the facts in lies and half truths, misdirection, and projection.
For what its worth there was story recently about Don Jr expecting to be indicted but not from a known reliable source.
I guess the question is: why? What can the house do that would impact this
Mueller went on hold basically from September to not interfere with the election. Firing Mueller before the election would have been politically unpopular. Now there's more danger and less of a cost
Wasn’t that gracious of him. See how Trump repays weakness.
Mueller failing to uphold that would have been used as a bludgeon to proclaim that he and his team were trying to influence the midterms, and even with the same outcome we'd instead see pages of recriminations that 'if only Mueller had kept his mouth shut, we would've won X, Y, and Z'.
As much as we might hate the whole 'norms and standards are only for Democrats', this was a situation where sticking to the book was (imo) the best play. Trump and his ilk will always make up bullshit, but being able to point out that they factually did their due diligence may prove to be important, both for the court of public opinion and actual courtrooms.
First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
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AbsalonLands of Always WinterRegistered Userregular
But democrats can reappoint Mueller in January, so this seems a bit like an attempt to delay or complicate for a bit.
But democrats can reappoint Mueller in January, so this seems a bit like an attempt to delay or complicate for a bit.
I would be very surprised if Whittaker actually removes Mueller instead of just sabotaging him. Now I guess the House could ask Mueller "investigate more" afterwords if they wanted.
Every legal expert I have ever heard comment on this matter have all agreed that Mueller needs permission to indict someone. That's just been a given no matter how this investigation has been discussed. Where along the line of the process of a normal indictment approval from the immediate supervisor of Mueller lies I am not sure.
Perhaps its before they are considered by the Grand Jury?
Perhaps its after the Grand Jury vote and the AG or DAG has to approve before it goes into action?
The Grand Jury has the power of indictment - they don't need anybody's approval iirc? It would be approval to present to the Grand Jury. Once the indictment comes from them, that's formal charges, isn't it?
I write this letter in haste and pray that it finds you while you are still able to receive it. I have just received word that you have been mired in some troubling circumstances, and I felt that, if ever you needed to hear these words, it was now:
Good fucking riddance to you, you racist authoritarian fuck.
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I wonder how many of the people he hired are willing to work pro bono for the protection of American democracy.
They all took massive pay cuts basically already.
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They have contingencies and they are smart.
Yes, he has complete control over the investigation. All indictments have to have approval, as do subpoenas and new avenues of investigation. Whittaker is obviously just going to bring that to a complete halt. I would be very surprised if Roger Stone is indicted now.
I don't know how the particulars work, but even if an indictment for Stone was approved by Rosenstein and Mueller was just waiting until the election was over for it, Whittaker could probably retroactively deny that indictment before it happened.
Of course not, he's still the Special Counsel, he's still doing his job, we've just made a few adjustments for budgetary concerns!
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If the House subpeonas the reports though I do 't think he can stop them releasing them.
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He can. Worst case scenario for Whittaker it goes to the supreme court.
And if, somehow, everyone working on the investigation agrees to work for free, they'll just fire them then, or deny all their requests for literally anything down to new pencils.
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The House of Reps flipped blue meaning that Trump is no longer protected on that front as Nunes cannot stall that Intelligence Committee any further. Furthermore, there's be lots of talk about subpoenaing Trump's tax returns since that's something the House can do without also having it checked by the Senate. But any of those potential actions is still a couple of months away since the new Congress doesn't get sworn in or seated until early January.
In response, right now, for no apparently rational reason, Jeff Sessions gets fired resigns. This is after setting up and maintaining a successful voter suppression campaign that seems to have made all the difference in at least Florida, Georgia, Texas, and North Dakota. While also having ran full interference for the administration in the courts to middling results. With this "resignation" we get a supposed Trump puppet (evidence not yet apparent of the degree of toadying) as acting AG while the deputy AG remains the deputy and largely keeps up the appearance, if not actual function, of an independent office. The worry being this new puppet would scrap that appearance at any moment by firing said deputy AG, thus creating a direct line to also fire or interfere with the special prosecutor's investigation that has a high probability (based on court records) of having Trump being an unnamed co-conspirator.
Are we certain that Sessions didn't actually want out? I'm not saying that the above isn't or can't be true. But it sure is complicated.
"Because"
Like, he's the AG, he doesn't need to do anything he doesn't want to. Who's gonna stop him?
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As a rule, I assume that when you start a resignation letter with "At your request," you didn't wanna go.
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Fuck Joe Manchin
If I'm the Democrats, I might just wait until October of 2020 and oh surprise, Mueller is going to testify in front of Congress about the investigation and release his 'personal notes'.
It seems he could deny Mueller the authority to bring an indictment before the grand jury
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
also
ALSO
arguments in what is very possibly an appeal to the DC court's ruling that the President must respond to a subpoena are happening soon. All the documents have to be filed by next Wednesday and oral arguments are set for Dec 14th!!
DOing this now may mean that the DoJ stops pursuing this line and prevents Mueller from forcing the President to give testimony before a grand jury.
It's a potential Hatch Act violation.
Can he literally stop things being filled in court? If we're talking things that Mueller has already given to a grand jury and they've indicted on, I don't see how (practically or legally) Whittaker can bury that
I was responding to viskod saying even already done indictments could be "denied"
If the ruling being appealed is that POTUS does have to answer a subpeona, then they don't have an out like that - the court would presumably appoint someone to defend the lower ruling.
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Edit: would they, Polarite?
And will the Court be able to appoint someone who actually can argue the case based on facts? They can't see any of Mueller's evidence and if the DoJ won't defend the ruling, who else possibly could?
Perhaps its before they are considered by the Grand Jury?
Perhaps its after the Grand Jury vote and the AG or DAG has to approve before it goes into action?
CNN producer:
If don jr was ready to be indicted can’t he still very much be so?
pleasepaypreacher.net
He could just say the indictment is beyond the scope of the Special council
Reading the order that created the office it sounds like that scope is completely determined by the AG(or DAG when it was Rosenstein)
My guess is Mueller told Rosenstein who to indict, but Rosenstein technically has to file the paperwork with the court.
The Grand Jury has the power of indictment - they don't need anybody's approval iirc? It would be approval to present to the Grand Jury. Once the indictment comes from them, that's formal charges, isn't it?
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It could be because this mystery person is Don Jr or Kushner and this is the nuclear reaction that you'd expect Trump to have if the investigation got that close to him.
Or it could be that they've always planned to do this because doing it right after the election regardless of its outcome means you have two years to ride out the fallout from such an action and bury all the facts in lies and half truths, misdirection, and projection.
For what its worth there was story recently about Don Jr expecting to be indicted but not from a known reliable source.
Mueller failing to uphold that would have been used as a bludgeon to proclaim that he and his team were trying to influence the midterms, and even with the same outcome we'd instead see pages of recriminations that 'if only Mueller had kept his mouth shut, we would've won X, Y, and Z'.
As much as we might hate the whole 'norms and standards are only for Democrats', this was a situation where sticking to the book was (imo) the best play. Trump and his ilk will always make up bullshit, but being able to point out that they factually did their due diligence may prove to be important, both for the court of public opinion and actual courtrooms.
I would be very surprised if Whittaker actually removes Mueller instead of just sabotaging him. Now I guess the House could ask Mueller "investigate more" afterwords if they wanted.
This is certainly my understanding anyway
I write this letter in haste and pray that it finds you while you are still able to receive it. I have just received word that you have been mired in some troubling circumstances, and I felt that, if ever you needed to hear these words, it was now:
Good fucking riddance to you, you racist authoritarian fuck.
Warmly,
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