Back before the Mueller Report was released to the public, I though a lot of redactions in the Mueller report would be Executive Privilege ones. I was wrong.
Barr didn’t use Executive Privilege to redact info, but now the question of Executive Privilege and the Report comes up again.
At the time the report was released I asked my friend Lisa Graves, co-director of Documented , if she would be talking about redactions on the Lawrence O’Donnell show. I had a few questions about Executive Privilege that I know the answers to now, but I really wanted to know what smart moves Democrats could make given this current delaying tactic?
Trump does things like this all the time, ignoring norms and breaking conventions. The democrats on the committee always seem to be in reactive mode. Trump’s assertion of Executive Privilege is bogus, so what are the steps to flip it so it hurts Trump and speeds his impeachment?
Ian Millhiser over at ThinkProgress said,
Trump’s claim that the Mueller report is protected by executive privilege is hot garbage
He doesn’t have a legal claim, but he can probably run out the clock.
There are two big Executive Privilege cases cited in this NY Times piece. One in 1997 in which Clinton’s lost his claim of Executive Privilege another in 2016 where Obama lost his.
If I was in charge of the committee’s media strategy I would get the people who won against Obama and Clinton on Executive Privilege on TV, STAT. Heck, these people could even go on Fox News!
Get the lawyers who beat Obama on TV to say, ‘Executive Privilege FAILED when OBAMA tried it. An attempt by Trump will FAIL too.”
Experts answer technical questions about Executive Privilege for the media all the time, but what I want to know is, “How political are the people in the ruling bodies right now?”
What ideology controls the deciding institutions?Are they all Federalist Society judges? How political are the ones who would get this case first? Name some names. For example, would it be Amy Berman Jackson, Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia?
She ruled against Obama in an Executive Privilege case. She was appointed by Obama. (She is also the judge who was taking no crap from Roger Stone.)
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| Amy Berman Jackson ruled against Obama’s Executive Privilege claim in 2016 |
Even is she isn’t the judge who would get the case, get some retired judges to comment. Can a judge throw the case out quickly with a warning, “This was already decided, this is bogus, stop doing this.”?
Since Executive Privilege was waived earlier, I wonder if there is a mechanical or automatic process that makes the release of the unredacted report possible?
What happens if someone releases the unredacted report to Congress? Maybe someone released it to congress already before this latest claim of Executive Privilege. Might they be following orders of a co-equal branch of government when they did this? What would the consequences be for that person?
I’m trying to think at least two steps ahead of Trump, so I’m going to guess the White House will next claim they can’t release the unredacted Mueller Report because of National Security concerns. Trump will say, “National Security” and people shut up, so it will be important to get the people in that area, who make those decisions, to be prepared to talk and explain what unredacted info they can give to congress and why it is okay for them to see it.
You don’t have to be from the future like me to know what Trump will do next. Just look for the obvious maliciously, incompetent norm-breaking act that could save his hide from getting busted for his treasonous actions.
