Secret Documents! The Ten Month Privilege Fight Whingers Claim Didn’t Happen
As always happens when people who don’t bother to check the public record get afraid, folks are complaining about Merrick Garland again, both that they didn’t notice the number of times Garland explained publicly that back in June 2021 DOJ had set up a special Election Task Force to prepare for this moment, and to complain that (they say) Garland hasn’t charged Donald Trump.
I was working on a timeline already when Politico’s two year effort to get the DC District Court to unseal grand jury proceedings bore fruit yesterday. Kyle Cheney has a story describing how the documents he liberated show both Beryl Howell and her successor as Chief Judge, James Boasberg, kept swatting back at Trump’s efforts to delay precisely because of the upcoming election.
More than 18 months ago, as Donald Trump sought to delay several high-profile witness’ testimony to a grand jury investigating his effort to subvert the 2020 election, Washington’s top federal district judge sensed a potential calamity.
“The special counsel’s investigation is moving quickly. There is an imperative that it moves quickly particularly so as not to interfere with the 2024 election cycle,” Chief Judge James Boasberg said on April 3, 2023, according to a newly unsealed transcript of the secret proceeding. “So when the former President’s pleading says that there will be a nominal impact from a delay, I think that is a vast understatement, that there would be a serious and deleterious impact from a delay.”
Boasberg’s warning in the early stages of special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation of the former president now rings prescient. A series of delays engineered by Trump, most notably an eight-month freeze while the Supreme Court considered his claim to be immune from the charges altogether, have caused the criminal proceedings to collide with the 2024 election cycle — and made it impossible for Trump to stand trial on the most serious charges he faces before Election Day.
The documents also confirm dates that, just yesterday, anti-Garland whingers claimed I made up. The fight over executive privilege started with a June 15, 2022 subpoena (probably to Greg Jacob and Marc Short) and continued through the next April, when Jack Smith — having come on after the precedents on executive privilege had already been set — got Mike Pence’s testimony on April 27.
Here’s the timeline mapped by the documents Politico liberated:
June 15, 2022: Subpoena to two officials (possibly Jacob and Short)
September 28, 2022: Order and opinion requiring testimony from two officials (possibly Jacob and Short)
October 6, 2022: Order and opinion denying stay of decision
November 19, 2022: Order and opinion requiring testimony (probably the two Pats, Cipollone and Philbin)
December 18, 2022: Order and opinion denying stay
January 23, 2022: Order and opinion extending appeal
December 9, 2022: Order and opinion requiring testimony (possibly Eric Hershmann, given description of his emails demanding written instructions)
January 10, 2023: Order and opinion denying stay
March 15, 2023: Order and opinion requiring testimony (this is the omnibus order covering eight people — see redacted list on page 2 — including Mark Meadows, Stephen Miller, and Dan Scavino)
March 25, 2023: Opinion requiring testimony, probably involving Mike Pence
April 3, 2023: Transcript of hearing, probably involving Mike Pence
April 10, 2023: Transcript of hearing, probably involving Mike Pence
More evidence of the machinations of the Deep State? Is that what you’re telling us?
In this time when I am profoundly dismayed at the large numbers of people willing to cast a ballot for TFG, I am also profoundly moved towards hope for the future by the jurisprudence being displayed in this story.
The deep sate doesn’t enter into it.
Gotta have one heckuva large beer stein for the Deep Sate.
Donald Trump portrays the deep state, a real thing, as if it were anyone who opposes his wishes. Many of those who comprise it may oppose Donald Trump, but that’s not what defines it.
Huh? If “Deep state” has any meaning in this country (which is doubtful), it refers to career civil servants, mostly in the executive branch. The “machinations” here all emanate from private attorneys-at-law working to defend their client (DJT) in a context where he is clearly guilty of the substantial charges & they are therefore reduced to “arguing the law” in hopes of obfuscating and especially delaying any conclusion to the case. The executive branch employees are simply pursuing a prosecution. The judicial branch gets a mixed review: kudos to Howell and Boasberg, hisses for SCOTUS.
Well put Ravenclaw.
I think Peter is being sarcastic with the Deep State reference – I hope so!
Roy Cohn’s fucking ghost has its slime all over these delays.
Trump is famous for abusing words in the way a Victorian workhouse manager abused children. There is a real deep state, but it’s not career civil servants. By definition, they are part of the official state.
The deep state more accurately refers to shifting coalitions of the very wealthy, corporations and foundations over which they have de facto control, and their senior courtiers, such as senior figures in finance and the law.
They are not a conspiracy. They are coalitions whose members share similar values about the extent to which they can and should control American society and role government should play. Members shift over time, depending on the issue and succession patterns among the wealthy. They strongly influence public policy in or out of government.
Examples from the 20th century include the Rockefellers; their eponymous foundation; their family bank, Chase; the Rockefeller-founded Trilateral Commission; and the Rockefeller influenced Seven Sisters oil companies. They also include top law firm partners, such as the Dulles brothers and John J. McCloy; the Ford Foundation and Dean Rusk; and members of the CEOs-only Business Roundtable.
In the 21st century, coalitions have shifted. Its members include top billionaires and their businesses and foundations. Some of their senior courtiers are less well-known, such as Antonin Scalia’s son, Eugene. Others, such as Len Leo have been less successful in hiding their influence.
There have also been big changes, which increase its influence and how it operates. These include the rise of private equity and idiosyncratic billionaires, such as Musk, Bezos, and Zuckerberg; a plethora of think tanks and pseudo-foundations and charitable organizations since the 1970s; a heavy concentration in news media; a major narrowing of corporate responsibility, following Milton Friedman’s profits-only movement; and a massive expansion of overt corporate involvement in politics, following the movement expressed by the Powell Memo.
I observed the “deep state” as you characterize in on a smaller scale as a Curator at a local museum after the wife of a wealthy benefactor took umbrage at a drawing of a nude in an exhibition about to be opened to the public. This led to the picture being withdrawn from the show.) This was reported by the local art critic.
The machinations are the same: the Board meets, a response to negative publicity is written, and the most powerful member of the Board, a nephew of the woman for whom the museum was named, who is also on the Board of the (then) locally-owned newspaper, calls the Editor and reads the response, which is printed in that paper’s evening edition. Supposedly end of controversy. (Except, the woman who caused the trouble becomes the laughing stock of the local social world and retreats to her mountain home for 3 months to recover.)
Bezos is the equivalent laughing stock of the world which values opinions, thinking articles, accurate accounts of news, and democracy.
A really valuable summary! Annotated with sources, it could be the framework for a Contemporary American History course required for the major.
And with a slightly different reading list, a valuable law school elective.
FWIW, IAAL and history major.
The works of G. William Domhoff (UC Santa Cruz) and the late C. Wright Mills (Columbia) are good places to start.
https://whorulesamerica.ucsc.edu/wra50_chapter_1.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._Wright_Mills
BTW, the wiki entry for “Deep State in the United States” is is one of its shittiest entries. It describes a conspiracy theory, but reads as if it were written by the counter-conspiracy theorist, who invented the Magic Bullet theory.
Just gonna leave this here cause I’m old and always want to know what others think
https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Deep%20State
An unseen body of people within a country (espec. US) who collectively have powerful influence on government policy.
“The US deep state wants its existence to be known as a conspiracy theory.”
by derw00d February 8, 2022
I think many countries have their own versions of the deep state. The Brits are certainly one. The French, too. And the Chinese.
Dick Cheney was an advocate for the view that the more powerful you were and the longer your reach, the harder it was to see you. He was a master bureaucrat, who worked through other bureaucrats. One of his things was to get even with even the lowliest civil servants. Pour encourager les autres.
Nice synthesis.
Tangentially, I wonder if the Bechtel family of S.F. belongs on that list.
Reply to earlofhuntingdon
October 29, 2024 at 8:25 pm
“I think many countries have their own versions of the deep state. The Brits are certainly one. The French, too. And the Chinese.”
The term “Deep State” originated in Turkiye.
There is a real deep state, but it’s not career civil servants.
The deep state more accurately refers to shifting coalitions …
Thanks for debunking this. Will be useful in the 1984 sequel being written now..
The concept long predates the 1990s use of the phrase in Turkey.
Shorter: Trump has been fighting in the courts his whole life. He owns half the judges. Why would any expect him to give up any advantage, real or imaginary.
But didn’t he get tired of winning?
My impression is that the long arm of the Law has been getting him good.
I acknowledge that SCOTUS and Florida have gone rogue, but isn’t the Law being held up in the majority of cases?
I could be way off as it’s not my forte (I’m a Finance practitioner who got caught up following Law and Politics as a reqirement of understanding my business).
“But didn’t he get tired of winning?”
No—mostly because Trump hasn’t been winning.
He hasn’t gotten tired of whining, either.
Trmp had a sister who was a Federal judge. She retired ahead of the revelations about how the Trmp family dealt Fred Jr’s children, Fred III and Mary, out of their inheritance and the accounting games around that. I believe Mary has filed another lawsuit on some of these issues.
I thought Trump’s sister’s precipitate retirement was to forestall a judicial ethics investigation of the tax arrangements used to transfer their father’s estate to the beneficiaries. The shabbiness of the treatment of their eldest brother’s heirs was incidental.
Her motivations seem interrelated. Avoiding discussion of Fred Jr’s more than “shabby” treatment seemed intended to protect both her and, more importantly, Donald. But one motivation does not preclude the other.
But, yes, her retirement meant that she was beyond the reach of the judicial code of ethics and investigation by its enforcers. No one else picked up the baton.
Perhaps the issue would be better defined by not being the fault of the actors/judiciary (with the exception of the Supreme Court), but the process itself.
What you said and budgets. After Jan 6th, I would have expected a huge increase in the DOJ’s budget and the courts to go after the Seditionists. That did not happen.
As a consulting engineer, my boss used to say there are three parts to an engineering design: timeliness, quality and cost. My client controls two, I control the third. Double my workload (timeliness), refuse me any increase in the budget and the quality goes way down.
Financing the J6 prosecutions and the prosecutions of Trump
Oct 2022
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/doj-says-needs-money-jan-6-probe-spending-bill-may-last-chance-rcna51767
Dec 2022
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna62557
Jan 2024
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2024/01/05/politics/justice-department-trump-cases-expenses
Aug 2024
https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisondurkee/2024/08/29/jack-smith-and-doj-have-spent-more-than-35-million-prosecuting-trump/
Ths Legend Of The Feckless Coward Merrick Garland, Who Didn’t. Even. Try. is etched in stone at this point. The geometric logic of “it’s so obvious” sweeps away all obstacles, including the rule of law itself. It’s a real testimony to the power of fear that so many intelligent and insightful people I respect can advocate such a nihilistic idea.
Merrick Garland is not feckless. He was following the Rule of Law. Any other response from him would have put him in a class with Bill Barr and/or Trump who want to do whatever it takes to take down their opponents, even if it runs counter to the Law.
Trumpism has messed with a lot of brains which should know better about Constitutional and Legal matters.
In the end, Justice will come. Justice takes time. And Integrity. Patience!
Keep your fingers crossed for that outcome. Without electoral victory to the Dems, the wheels will come off the bus.
If the line for sparkle ponies is on the left, the line for just giving up starts in the back.
Some may recall why our current Attorney General dragged his feet for well over a year, ensuring Trump would not face convictions for his multifarious crimes prior to the 2024 election:
”Merrick Garland was extremely concerned with the DOJ’s reputation, fearing accusations of partisanship and political weaponization should they go forward with a prosecution of Donald Trump.”
And it’s a darn good thing Garland did wait so long to act. Otherwise Trump and his MAGA allies in Congress and the press might have accused him of partisanship and political weaponization. Boy, that would have been awful.
When you use a quote or make a contentious point, provide a link or full citation for your source. Also useful when question begging, which you’re doing here.
Dammit, you’re right. For the life of me, I am unable to find the source of that quote, and I should not have posted it without proper attribution. I apologize.
I offer this instead:
“The second problem is that Garland is an institutionalist, more committed to the reputation of the DOJ (and to his own reputation) than the pursuit of justice itself.” — Elie Mystal, Justice Correspondent at The Nation — https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/merrick-garland-must-go/
BrrGrrDelux
October 29, 2024 at 9:19 pm
And
BrrGrrDelux
October 29, 2024 at 10:23 pm
I am still going to call bullshit unless you can provide some meat and some bones to your nebulous allegations of foot dragging.
EG WTF does the Eli Mystal quote add to the sum total of human knowledge. ‘Expert opinion’ depends on two things
1 Relevant expertise
2 An adequate factual basis to serve as a foundation for the opinion
The quote is untethered to either.
As a start you might try to construct a “reffuttal” of the points made here:
https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/merrick-garland-isnt-blame-delays-trumps-election-interference-case-rcna141213
Recalling that Garland Assumed office March 11, 2021
I invite you to
A.specify,with particularity and citations,
B what are the steps, we now know of because of the current state of the public record regarding a complex investigation necessarily conducted out of the public gaze,
C which could and should have
1 occurred sooner than they did
2 and the source of the delay was Garlands unnecessary caution
(as opposed to eg the actions of other actors in the legal system broadly understood)
Generalised assertions quoting someone quoting someone else about Garlands “well renowned caution” doesn’t cut the mustard.
You might also point me to a passage in the Mystal piece which has an actual factual foundation as opposed to being part of a litany of tendentious supposition.
And as for Mystal’s point concerning Garland giving the Documents case to Jack Smith as opposed to taking personal charge of that investigation himself— this is an argument of such batshit stupidity even Mystal should be embarrassed, as should anyone who cites the article with approval.
My tolerance for false claims on this point is almost non-existent at this point. So I urge you not to make them.
Garland did not wait a year. He opened investigative prongs into both Rudy and Sidney Powell in 2021.
TFG is like the child accused of killing his parents and then asking the court for mercy because he’s now an orphan. He delayed proceedings closer and closer to the election until he could claim that the election was too close. In pari delicto and spirit of justice should mean no more delays even during the election.
“In pari delicto and spirit of justice should mean no more delays even during the election.”
This.
The People agree.
Sloppy Steve is out of prison!
Hey Sloppy, when is Trump’s press conference with his 27 victims? Trump loved your idea for his 2016 presser with Clinton’s 4 victims. Will E. Jean Carroll be there? Will you be there?
You should wear 4 shirts this time. Will be wild!
The Onion, on Bannon’s fashion sense, September 2022:
https://theonion.com/steve-bannon-arraigned-on-public-indecency-charges-for-1849518169/
“What was the toughest part about prison? Being forced to shower once a week.”
–Sloppy Steve
HARRIS at the Ellipse NOW:
https://www.c-span.org/video/?539540-1/vice-president-harris-delivers-address-ellipse-washington-dc&live
7:42 PM E Pluribus Unum […] As Americans, we rise and fall together.
More than 500K watching online, right now!
Now that’s what I call Presidential. Great speech, great presentation. Commanding, concise, cogent. For the people. Can’t wait to call Kamala Madam President.
I sure hope you’re right. After glancing at 538 and the betting portals, I’m not as confident as you are.
That‘s the information you’re using to evaluate the race?
It’s just one of the ways TRUMP is [trying to] “FIX” it.
First, let me note for other community members this ^ is your 13th approved comment here since June 2023; you made 8 approved comments in 2008 as “parbuster.”
Second, it’s been discussed here recently that betting portals are reflexively based on polls, and polls have been manipulated by the GOP. If you’re relying on them, congratulations, you’ve been successfully manipulated by Trumpers and I’m sure they’ll be happy to know it worked on you.
Third, I’m not going to put up with sowing of FUD in threads this close to the election. Do not do MAGAs for work for them here.
When Trump and his posters claim he’ll “fix” the election, he does not mean repair actual or perceived problems with its rules or fair administration. He means “fix” in the sense of fixing a fight, so that the mob’s bets always pay off.
ABSOLUTELY!, SL.
Kamala HARRIS, 10/29/24, at The Ellipse:
I am SO ready to “turn the page.”
Speaking of turning the page and starting a new chapter, I’m proud of how law enforcement responded to this incident at a polling place at a library. This was the last library that I managed before I retired. I loved working there. At that time there was a woman from India and a man from Jamaica on the staff, as well as staff of many other ethnic and cultural backgrounds. That library is part of the Jacksonville system, but it is in a separate city with its own mayor.
And I have to add, this is a far different response than what happened at another branch I managed where white supremacists threatened staff, customers, and me. We were instructed to ignore and tolerate the abusive behavior. And we were told we were not permitted to call law enforcement for help. That was when Susie Wiles worked in the Jacksonville mayor’s office. A person in the know told me he believed she played a significant role in how things played out.
But now Jacksonville has its first woman mayor. She is doing a great job. And she lives at the beach so she is quite familiar with what is going on there. That’s one of the reasons I’m optimistic about the election and future.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igyF5XwuQME
“Police: 18-year-old arrested after waving machete toward 2 women at Neptune Beach polling location”
January 10, 2022 should be January 10, 2023.
Marcy: https://bsky.app/profile/emptywheel.bsky.social/post/3l7qd277azv26
October 30, 2024 at 10:09 AM
MANY on SCOTUS LIVE in Virginia.
I know Clarence [Insurrectionist Spouse] THOMAS and
Sammy [Upsidedown American Flag Spouse] ALITO do.
AND John [“For The Ages”] ROBERTS.
When you’re committed to the revolution, there can be no limit to what you’ll do. /s/ John “One-Eye” Roberts.
Obviously, this is pro-Trump interference, in hopes a thousand or two votes will turn Virginia red, because it stops the lower federal courts from doing their job and allows VA’s governor to suppress votes.
Ordinarily, that wouldn’t bode well for the independent state legislature doctrine invented by Republicans. But this Court has demonstrated that rationality and consistency are like leaving money on the political poker table.