Yesterday Stephanie Grisham was on CNN pushing her new book. She said she thought it was a coup. That Trump was fomenting violence. Jake Tapper asked her if she had talked to the 1/6 commission. She said no, but that she would if they, “reached out.”
Brazilians of books are being written by former Trump staff. They’ll be careful not to incriminate themselves, but they might incriminate others. If they didn’t commit the crime, they might have witnessed others committing them.
People like Grisham and Omarosa aren’t experts on the law. They likely witnessed multiple crimes. They might have been told what was happening was legal. Or, they knew it was illegal, and looked the other way hoping the entire admin would never be prosecuted.
I think the DOJ, state AGs and various committees investigating the Trump White House should get early copies of the books.
Someone should be reading these books looking for crimes and prosecution worthy information.
The publishers can send advance copies to former US attorney’s like Preet Bharara, Barb McQuade or former prosecutors, like Glenn Kirschner to review them on their podcasts.
People complain that journalists like Woodward have withheld critical info for their books so they could make headlines and sell more books. If they want bigger headlines, the publisher of the book should send early copies to the various committees and the DOJ in appropriate states. They could say:
“Hey, based on our reporting it looks like Trump’s staff might have committed crimes in your state. You might want to check it out. People could have lied to our authors, since they weren’t under oath when we talked to them. The book is coming out in 2 weeks. You might want to subpoena some people
This would have been great for Carol Leonnig’s books. For example, when Carol Leonnig and Phil Rucker wrote their books on the Secret Service and Trump, I spotted actions taken by Trump’s staff that were violations of Oklahoma’s COVID-testing reporting laws and New Jersey’s mask laws, but Leonnig & Rucker didn’t know it was a violation of specific testing laws. They couldn’t, since they weren’t allowed access to private data. But a state Attorney General getting the book and told to check it out, could. The committee that oversees the Secret Service could investigate. But only if they knew where to look for the info.
I’ve read these books. I know what will make the ears of the TV producers stand up. But I don’t know all the laws. I can’t read a story about a meeting and, based on the account they are giving, realize that the people were probably breaking laws. A prosecutor can say, “This needs to be investigated to get hard evidence and hear from witnesses under oath.”.
For example, in this disappointing interview by Brian Williams he refers to Trump’s “mishandling” of the pandemic. I think what he did was more than “malpractice.”
We now have several books by insiders and journalists about what the Trump admin was doing during the pandemic. Someone needs to read those together with the goal of identifying the crimes committed, so they can be investigated.
The people promoting the book are looking for “newsworthy” stories when setting up interviews for the book like, “Trump was getting a colonoscopy but didn’t want late night comedians to make him the butt of their jokes!” That was covered by all the major late night comedy shows.
In the future when I see Trump-era books come out, I want more than juicy “newsworthy” items. I want to know who in the book is being investigated and prosecuting for the crimes they committed!
