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Gowdy on Mueller: Let the Man Do His Job!
Trey Gowdy is one Congressman whom I greatly admire. He was the 7th Circuit Solicitor and led an office of 25 attorneys and 65 employees before joining Congress. He has been at the forefront of the Congressional investigations and doesn’t mince words when he gives his opinion.
So when people have repeatedly attacked Special Counsel Robert Mueller and his work, Trey Gowdy supports him and suggests we let him do his job. As a result, I ask, why there is so much turmoil around the situation, so much gnashing of teeth? So, I investigated, and I think I know why people are so upset. And frankly, I think Trey Gowdy has the right idea.
Let’s look at the actual facts and some of the assumptions about the investigation:
Jeff Sessions recused himself from the investigation of Russia. And Rod Rosenstein didn’t think the Justice Department should handle the investigation. We can debate Sessions’ recusal and Rosenstein’s delegation another time. But if you’re going to be angry, be angry at those two men.
Assumption #1: We didn’t need a Special Counsel. That may be true, but Robert Mueller didn’t ask for the job, as far as I know.
Assumption #2: Almost all of Mueller’s law team were Hillary partisans and donors. That’s not true. After that news came out, that information was corrected. There were three consequential donors. Of the remainder of the team, some were Democrats, or Republicans, or even donated to both parties.
Assumption #3: Trey Gowdy was ripping apart Mueller’s team. He did — once:
The only conversation I’ve had with Robert Mueller, it was stressing to him, the importance of cutting out the leaks with respect to serious investigations.
So, it is kind of ironic that the people charged with investigating the law and executing the law would violate the law. And make no mistake, disclosing grand jury material is a violation of the law. So, as a former prosecutor, I’m disappointed that you and I are having the conversation, but that somebody violated their oath of secrecy. . .
Mueller’s team leaked the first indictment and Trey Gowdy reprimanded him and cautioned him to stop the leaks. And he also continued to support Mueller.
Assumption #4: The investigation is taking too long. My question is, how long is too long? What is the right amount of time? Don’t you want people who have violated rules or committed crimes to be held accountable?
Assumption#5: There must be no collusion or Mueller would have released that information. This assumption requires some dissecting of the facts. First, the original letter from Deputy AG Rosenstein said nothing about collusion (which is not illegal, by the way). The pertinent section authorized the Special Counsel to investigate—
. . . any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump . . .
That authorization says nothing about collusion or crimes on the part of Trump campaign. One could assume that might have been what was intended, but if the facts don’t support that assumption, there’s no issue. Clearly there was evidence regarding Paul Manafort but not in regard to the Trump campaign. Worse yet, Gowdy thinks that Trump’s own attorneys have inflamed the situation by harping on the collusion scenario with him. And finally, why does anyone think they must not have found collusion or they would have announced it, while the investigation is still in progress? Why not accept that we simply do not know?
Assumption #6: The Special Counsel was given too broad an agenda and because this investigation has gone so long, it must be a fishing expedition. First of all, there was never a deadline set because it would have been impossible to set one. Second, would you really want Mueller to stop his investigation without interviewing everyone connected to this issue? Besides the reports of people who’ve been interviewed, isn’t it possible that other relevant people have been identified and are being interviewed, and these interviews haven’t been publicized?
I’m sure I could come up with many more assumptions that have been made by people who want to defend Trump and the Republican Party and find people to attack and blame, but I hope I’ve made my point: it serves no useful purpose. And let me say that I am as frustrated as many of you by the fact that a Special Counsel was set up, that it will have gone on for nearly a year, that misinformation has been sent out but corrections were not well promoted. And it’s also possible that the misinformation has been spread by the Left and the Right. But this is where we find ourselves: with a tedious investigation that has weighed down the Trump administration, given Trump ample opportunity to rage at several of the related parties, and a chance for the Left to rub its hands gleefully at our anger and discomfort. Isn’t it time that we take a deep breath and follow Trey Gowdy’s advice regarding Robert Mueller:
I would encourage my Republican friends — give the guy a chance to do his job. The result will be known by the facts, by what he uncovers. The personalities involved are much less important to me than the underlying facts. So, I would — I would say give the guy a chance to do his job.
How about it?
Published in Politics
Nobody that supports Mueller et al, has the first inch to criticize Putin about pretty much anything.
We’re letting him do his job. He’ll do a better job under intense public scrutiny accompanied by wild speculation (as well as reasonable speculation).
I don’t know that I agree. I think intense public scrutiny is fine, but I think when things go wild, he just blows it off. Remember–he’s a prosecutor; he’s probably accustomed to drama.
Could you elaborate? What has Mueller done that you’d essentially compare him to Putin?
What means, “when things go wild?” Is that like shooting in the streets?
Assumption #3: Trey Gowdy was ripping apart Mueller’s team. He did — once:
More than once. Here is Gowdy in December 2017 (your example above is from October 2017):
…………………….
December 17, 2017
Former prosecutor Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC), who has never lost a case, just fired off a warning shot to Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
As a member of the House Intelligence Committee, he has already threatened to hold the FBI and Department of Justice in contempt of Congress for withholding information related to the removal of FBI agent Peter Strzok from Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.
Gowdy explained on Fox News that this Special Counsel has serious “integrity” problems now that we’ve learned that anti-Trump FBI agent Peter Strzok was removed for bashing the President
https://thepoliticalinsider.com/trey-gowdy-mueller-probe-embarrassing/
………………………..
But Gowdy suddenly turned on a dime. By January, just weeks after the instance I cited above, Gowdy was suddenly all “Mueller is a good man” and “Let him do his job.” And now he’s not running for reelection? For “family reasons”? Wonder what happened to this man.
Robert Mueller is as dirty as they come and in this corruption mess up to his eyeballs. He’s almost surely using his time in power to clean up after himself. It is sickening.
ding ding ding!
I don’t suppose it would be proper for reporters to ask him those questions.
Oh dear, I hadn’t heard of this.
This is a good piece, Susan. I am glad you wrote it. Trey Gowdy is also one of my favorites. Washington is losing some really fine men, in Paul Ryan, Trey Gowdy, and possibly some others with whom I am not that familiar. I do understand why they feel they must go. But… Tis a pity.
I think you and I agree on another important thing: We want the truth. Wherever it may lead. The truth is not always pretty; but it must always come out. After that, we do disagree on things.
But the most important thing is what we agree on: That we both want what’s best for beloved country. May the best always come about, for the land that we Love!
Have a good night, dear lady!
What Sessions should do is to force all the Obama DOJ/FBI holdovers and Mueller team to list out all their potential conflicts of interest they have with either Hillary or Trump. I’d go all the way back to Uranium one days. Then use that to get them all to recuse themselves or prosecute them for lying. That would include Mueller.
Let’s start with one simple issue.
Jeff Sessions recused himself from the Russian matter because of a perceived conflict of interest due to his two encounters (calling them meetings would exaggerate what happened) with the Russian ambassador during the campaign.
Robert Mueller refused to recuse himself despite his long association with James Comey, whose removal triggered his appointment, and refused to recuse himself once it became apparent in the course of his investigation that issues related to the behavior of the FBI, an agency he headed for 12 years, and worked with for many other years in his role as head of the criminal division of the US Attorney’s office in Boston.
And another thing:
Do we actually know how Mueller’s involvement with the investigation came about. Given what we know now I find it difficult to believe there was no connection between Comey, Rosenstein’s, and Mueller’s action, given their long-standing relationships.
Think about the situation:
Comey briefs the incoming President about the Steele dossier, including its most salacious details, knowing it will drive Trump crazy, but does not tell him the dossier was paid for by the Clinton campaign.
Comey tells the President on three occasions that he is not under investigation, while at the same time, he is leaking information damaging to the President to the NY Times, while not leaking the truth that the President is not under investigation.
Rosenstein prepares a memo telling Trump that he would be legally justified in firing Comey, though he does not make a specific recommendation.
Trump fires Comey.
Rosenstein hires Mueller, who knows both Rosenstein and Comey, to lead an investigation in which one of the issues is whether the President obstructed justice by firing Comey!
The whole thing stinks.
Yes. And let’s not forget Mueller’s hire of that toadish pitbull Andrew Weissmann.
I agree. Cleaning up after himself and his cronies.
Politically Trump is in a boxed canyon ….. he has to let Mueller finish his “job” because I get the sense Mueller is baiting Trump to fire him to create a political maelstrom which many hope would create an even greater impetus for impeachment next January.
The fundamental problems I have with the Mueller investigation are:
1)What is Mueller’s “job”?
2)Does Mueller intend to dig into any and every rabbit hole which have nothing to do with Russian collusion?
3)Given the above can Mueller honestly commit to completing his “job” or “jobs” before the end of the Trump four year term?
….. AND
4)Does Mueller actually want to finish his “job” given the definition of his job is whatever he decides his job is, and given the completion date of his job is whenever he says it is?
Had Mueller investigated Dems as well for possible collusion, and there was plenty cause from Podesta’s lobbying firm which represented Ukraine, I could have had confidence that he was doing his duty. However, he has only looked at anyone Trump knew. How in the world can any thinking person come away with any conclusion other than he is out for Republicans only? Give me a break!
According to people smarter than me (e.g., Andrew McCarthy), there has never been any actual evidence of a crime, which is supposedly the legal basis for even appointing a special counsel. It’s as if someone alleges that a murder has been committed, but there’s no body and no one (that we know of) is missing.
So we have a special counsel trying to ferret out any evidence that a crime MIGHT have been committed, and convict someone, anyone, for anything he might stumble across in his year-long, massively-staffed and infinitely-funded investigation.
The whole thing stinks.
Edit: Somewhere the condemned soul of Lavrentiy Beria is smiling.
I suppose one thing Mueller could do to get to the bottom of all this is conduct a raid on the offices of Hillary Clinton and Huma Abedin. I’m sure they’d have no trouble raising bail money.
I wasn’t impressed with Gowdy’s Fox News Sunday interview yesterday. He’s a huge disappointment. I’m glad he’s leaving Congress.
Depends on what he sees his “job” as.
I think he sees it as defending the bureaucracies he’s spent his career with and getting rid of that terrible outlandish Trump. So I think he would see any of the options below as finishing the job:
I don’t think he’s going to try to indict Trump. Comey would not have released his book and gone on the speaking tour, which creates all sorts of problems for him as a potential witness in an obstruction case, unless he got the all clear from Mueller.
A good person in a needless and lawless position is still wasteful and wrong. In this case, it is dangerous.
I don’t care about Mueller. I care that his investigation does not meet the lawful requirements of special investigations generally and that it has only ever existed to meet demands of political theater, rather than justice.
According to Andrew McCarthy at NRO, the laws which set the basis for special investigations require that such an investigation be focused on a particular crime… and “collusion” is not a crime. Mueller’s task force was errant before it was even launched, like so many other pseudo-legal acts of Congress these days (Continuing Resolutions, for example).
It seems everyone s expecting that Muller is out to get Trump. Leftist expect it because that is what they want, and Trumpers expect it because it serves their persecution complex. Two perfect obsessions that create a self feeding positive reinforcement loop. That the presidents insatiable ability to create Melodrama keeps giving oxygen to. Frankly given all the hype of this if it doesn’t end with an impeachment for one reason or another I will feel disappoint. I paid good money for this show. I want to see Deep State vs. Russian Pupet go the distance and end by KO.
It is possible to both dislike Trump and dislike injustice and a two tiered system of law enforcement.
If Pence became President tomorrow I would be more than fine with that, but it does not make this entire Russian collusion farce and the purposely never ending Mueller crime search any less despicable.
Sorry, @susanquinn, Mueller’s report is irrelevant at this point. If it confirms the Left’s fondest desires, the Right will not believe it; if it fails to confirm the Left’s fondest desires, the Left will not believe it. The Clinton/Russian disinformation campaign has been successful beyond their wildest dreams with the sole exception that Madame Hillary is not president. I have zero expectation that the process will restore sanity. More things will be broken and we will need to pull ourselves out of the wreckage the best way we can. DC will not be the source of our salvation from the mess they have created.
Is Mark Steyn’s 5 1/2 year trial too long?
You mean the laws, trivial stuff, political correctness, and mob mentality that only apply to conservatives and not Democrats?
I don’t know. Let me ask Scooter Libby, Martha Stewart, Conrad Black, Dinesh D’Souza, etc.
After all the crap that Obama got away with?
…
The American justice system seems largely broken. I first noticed this with the O. J. Simpson case and the awful televising of that trial. I think the problems were confined to crazy places like California, but now it seems to have infected most urban centers, if not the whole country.
Misplaced loyalty to the tribe on Gowdy’s part: once a prosecutor, always a prosecutor.
Excuse me. Jeff Sessions recused himself because he failed to disclose those meetings, in essence, a lie of omission, during his Senate confirmation.
Let me help you with that.
That’s the letter by Rosenstein appointing Mueller. You can find a more readable version here but the meat of it is this:
It mentions 28 C.F.R. § 600.4(a). You can find the text here. It describes the jurisdiction of the special counsel, which includes this:
So to recap, Mueller’s job is to look at
That is Mueller’s job. There’s plenty of links between Russians and the Trump campaign. Mueller is probably finding other crimes as he turns over those rocks. And if anyone commits perjury or obstruction of justice while he’s doing that, he can also go after them.
Is Trey Gowdy compromised?
There is reason to believe so. This has been a pattern with precedent … http://www.wnd.com/2015/01/military-veterans-benghazi-inquest-compromised/#spEhi3ODBXu6tWGF.99
I wonder if there is any connection of this to all of these pending resignations in the GOP Congress? Rep. Mike Rogers and wife Kristi stand out as being compromised.
Let Mueller do his job? What job? He doesn’t have a job, other than to harass anyone associated with Trump and generate process crimes. The job of a prosecutor is to prosecute an identified crime. The job of an investigator is to determine who committed an identified crime. What do you call it when there is no identified crime, and someone is appointed to spend unlimited time and money trying to find (or create) a crime? You call it a special prosecutor. That is a job that shouldn’t exist in a democracy that claims to respect the rule of law. All special prosecutors should be banned. Period.
Politically, Gowdy is probably right. It wouldn’t look good to fire Mueller. But that is beside the point, or beside all the points raised by the OP. Susan, please tell us: Assume that a government official was appointed whose only job was to find some criminal act by you, or your family, or your business associates. This official has unlimited time and budget, and you have no assurance that he has any morals or desire to act in good faith. If he can’t get an indictment against you, he will smear you with leaks. Do you like that idea? Would your position be, “just let him do his job”? A Special Prosecutor is like the original Terminator, “It can’t be bargained with. It can’t be reasoned with. It doesn’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead.”