Washington CNN –
As Donald Trump moves closer to launching another presidential bid after the midterm elections, Justice Department officials have debated whether a Trump bid would create the need for a special counsel to oversee two sprawling federal investigations related to the former president, say sources familiar with the matter. CNN.
The Justice Department is also staffing its investigations with experienced prosecutors so it is ready for any decision after the midterms, including the possible unprecedented move to indict a former president.
In the weeks leading up to the election, the Justice Department has observed the traditional quiet period of not making any overt moves that could have political consequences. But behind the scenes, investigators have kept busy, using aggressive grand jury subpoenas and secret court battles to compel testimony from witnesses in both the probe into Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election and his alleged mishandling of national security documents stored at his Palm Beach home. .
Now federal investigators are planning a post-election flurry of activity in Trump-related investigations. That includes the possibility of indicting Trump associates, moves that could become more complicated if Trump declares a run for president.
“They can indict almost anybody if they want to,” said a defense attorney working on matters related to Jan. 6, who added that defense attorneys “have no idea” who will ultimately be indicted.
“That’s what’s scary,” the lawyer said.
Trump and his associates also face legal exposure in Georgia, where Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is investigating Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election in the Peach State and he hopes to wrap up his investigation by the end of the year.
Impeaching an active candidate for the White House would surely cause a political firestorm. And while no decision has been made on whether a special counsel might be needed in the future, DOJ officials have debated whether doing so could insulate the Justice Department from accusations that the Joe Biden administration is targeting his main political rival, people familiar with the matter say. CNN.
Special counsels, of course, are hardly immune to political attacks. Both former special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe and special counsel John Durham’s investigation into the origins of the FBI’s Russia probe were the subject of blistering criticism from their opponents.
The Justice Department declined to comment for this story.
The Justice Department has brought in an intellectual trust for high-level advice on the Trump investigations, according to people familiar with the moves.
Senior justice officials have consulted an old guard of former prosecutors in the Southern District of New York, bringing in Kansas City-based federal prosecutor and national security expert David Raskin as well as David Rody, a former prosecutor in defense attorney who has previously specialized in gang and conspiracy cases and worked extensively with government collaborators.
Rody, whose involvement has not been previously reported, left a lucrative partnership at the prestigious corporate defense firm Sidley Austin in recent weeks to become a senior DOJ attorney in the Washington Criminal Division, according to his LinkedIn profile and sources familiar with the measure. .
The D.C. U.S. Attorney’s Office team handling the day-to-day work of the Jan. 6 investigations is also growing, even as the office’s sedition cases against right-wing extremists they go to trial
A handful of other prosecutors have joined the Jan. 6 investigative team, including a high-ranking public fraud and corruption prosecutor who has left a supervisory role to join the team , and a prosecutor with years of experience in criminal appellate work now involved in some of the grand jury work.
Taken together, the prosecutors’ reshuffle signals a serious, snowball investigation into Trump and his inner circle.
The decision on whether to indict Trump or his associates will ultimately rest with Attorney General Merrick Garland, who was handpicked by President Joe Biden because his tenure as a judge provided some distance from partisan politics, after Republicans of the Senate blocked his nomination to the Supreme Court in 2016. .
Several former prosecutors believe the facts exist for a potentially indictable case. But Garland will have to navigate the politically dangerous and historic decision of how to approach the potential impeachment of a former president.
In March, Garland declined to answer a CNN question about the possibility of a special counsel for Trump-related investigations, but said the Justice Department “does not shy away from cases that are controversial, sensitive or political.”
“What we will avoid and what we must avoid is any partisan element in our decision-making on cases,” Garland said. “That’s what I intend to do to make sure that the Department’s decisions are made on the merits, and they’re made on the facts and the law, and they’re not based on any kind of partisan consideration.”
Garland’s tough decisions go beyond Trump. The long-running investigation into Hunter Biden, the president’s son, is nearing conclusion, people briefed on the matter say. Also pending on the gangs: A final decision on the investigation of Florida Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz, after prosecutors recommended charges.
It likely won’t take long after the midterms to shift focus to the 2024 presidential race. That could incentivize top DOJ officials to make crucial charging decisions as soon as possible, including whether to bring charges against Trump himself or others top political activists, other sources familiar with the inner workings of the Justice Department say.
“They’re not going to charge before they’re ready to charge,” said a former Justice Department official with some knowledge of the thinking on the investigations. “But there will be additional pressure to get past the review” of the cases before the typical five-year period the DOJ has to file charges.
Things could also be complicated by the situation in Georgia, where Willis is investigating Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election there. Willis has said he is aiming for a special grand jury to finish its investigative work by the end of the year.
Willis has observed his own version of a quiet period around the midterm elections and is trying to bring witnesses to the grand jury in the coming weeks. Sources previously said CNN indictments could come as soon as December.
Key Trump allies, including South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, are among the witnesses who have tried to fight subpoenas in the state investigation into efforts to interfere with 2020 Georgia election.
How these disputes are resolved in Georgia, including whether courts compel testimony, could improve the DOJ’s ability to gather information, as the Jan. 6 House Select Committee investigation added to DOJ investigations from Trump’s White House.
The months leading up to the elections have provided little respite from the political and legal activity surrounding the investigations. The U.S. attorney’s office in D.C., which is still handling the bulk of investigations as of Jan. 6, has dealt with a drain on its ranks as prosecutors are bringing to trial or securing guilty pleas from more than 800 rioters who were on the Capitol grounds and still seeking to charge hundreds more.
Trump has also thwarted the DOJ’s efforts to keep things quiet in the weeks leading up to the election, leading to a steady barrage of headlines related to the investigation.
Trump’s legal team successfully launched a complicated court-led process to order thousands of documents seized from Mar-a-Lago to determine whether they are privileged and off limits to investigators. But the Justice Department and the intelligence community have had access for weeks to about 100 records marked classified that Trump had kept in Florida.
The outcome of the intelligence review of those documents may determine whether criminal charges will be filed, according to a source familiar with the Justice Department’s approach.
However, in both investigations, judicial activity under seal never abated, and the Justice Department sought to compel at least five witnesses around Trump to secretly provide more information in their grand jury investigations in Washington, D.C. CNN previously reported.
On Tuesday, a federal judge ordered Trump adviser Kash Patel to testify before a grand jury investigating the handling of federal records at Mar-a-Lago, according to two people familiar with the investigation.
D.C. District Court Judge Beryl Howell granted Patel immunity from prosecution over any information he provides in the investigation, another major step that moves the Justice Department closer to possible indictment in the case.