Got Whitaker News Today

Will stretch out the time. now, mueller may have to go back and double-check and he may have to get a whole new path for bringing whatever case hes going to bring forward. and this may extend the time, and now weve got whitaker at the justice department. who the hell knows whats going to happen the next few days or few weeks with all of this. i think its one more reason why the mueller investigation ought to be protected by the congress because this has become so uncertain and so bizarre. >> joh...

Along other parallels. is that a possibility? >> it certainly is. its possible cases have been farmed out for investigation or have even been filed under seal. for example, the erroneous unsealing suggesting that julian assange has been charged in the eastern district of virginia in that u.s. attorneys office. there could be a sealed indictment there. and other indictments against others in other districts as well already. >> what do you think, kim? >> yeah, sure. and i think the key there also,...

To very carefully look through anything that hes put together. the reporting has been that he spent several sessions with the lawyers, one four-hour session, another three-hour session talking through those answers. and so i have no doubt that the lawyers are going to be heavily involved in whatever answers ultimately get to robert mueller. >> one thing that struck me today about this piece, kim, and you had been the independent counsels office earlier, different than the special counsel, simila...

It could very likely be that mueller will point to indictments saying manafort helped make that happen. so watch that to happen in the next couple of weeks. >> that was the filing where they said well come back to you in a few weeks with more on how things are going with manafort. and the implication being that something will happen in the interim that shows the court how useful he has been as a cooperator. >> and both sides agreed to that. there was no fight over this delay. ordinarily youd say...

But the time frame is extremely compressed. weve got whitaker in place. in my observation, whitaker has one mission, one mandate, to mess with the special counsel investigation despite all the attestations to the contrary from senator graham and others. what does that mean? it means were coming to a head here with regard to the timing of trump submitting his answers that he alleged did himself, all by himself, to the mueller team where were going to come up on a line where muellers going to say ...

Probe is quite broad, ive read it carefully several times and i dont think theres a whole lot of question that something like -- that would arise out of the russia probe. that being said the big difference really between the white water investigation that i worked on and this one was that what was governing the white water investigation was an act of congress. the act of congress was passed because of the saturday night massacre. that is president nixon trying to game the system in his favor whe...

And i think the key there also, though, is that mr. whitaker of course is in charge of all of those u.s. attorneys offices. >> right. >> so we cant siphon off the special prosecutor the way we could ken starr, a fourth branch of the government. now to the extent to which hes handing things off to the states were in a situation where trump has very little control over that and he couldnt even do a pardon. thats significant. >> yeah, all right, barbara mcquaide and kim wehle, thank you. prosecut...

Some ways, youre investigating the president. this piece today that ran object mueller looking at a man named john hannah, mueller might be opening another front here, theres a clause in the mandate, open ended to the effect of any associated matters, could be a separate line of inquiry about efforts to influence the election by foreigners, the thinking being some regimes in the middle east. what do you think when you hear that in terms of the scope of what he may be working on? >> well, the man...

Done, move on. both sides agreed to that. i read into that that manafort is cooperating and well see the flutes in the next couple weeks. >> you view this as whitaker bearing down a kind of clock ticking, and theres always been this kind of weird game of chicken with the president and mueller about answering the questions. partly because my understanding is a sense that the mueller report cant be written until the questions are answered and maggie havreman pointed this out today, one important p...

The act of congress was passed because of the saturday night massacre. that is president nixon trying to game the system in his favor when there was an investigation of the white house. and here we are with history repeating itself. we dont have a statute anymore. that statute was allowed to lapse after white water. and we only have an internal doj regulation. theres a lot that mr. whitaker could do to stymy this investigation, including amend that actual piece of paper that hands off the scope ...