What happens if Robert Mueller is still employed by the Justice Department in a month or two… or six?
The tendency for Democrats will be to think the administration is keeping him on the payroll to control his testimony going forward. But I think there is one possibility that would rock this administration to the core.
Robert Mueller still has an impaneled grand jury. The grand jury was extended for 6 months in January. What if the focus of that grand jury has moved to the conduct of Attorney General William Barr in his conduct of the release of the Mueller report?
John Mitchell, Richard Nixon’s Attorney General, spent nineteen months in prison for conspiracy, obstruction of justice and perjury. Of those three charges I think two fit the Barr case: If the Attorney General caused the Mueller report to be ended prematurely, and mischaracterized the findings to benefit the President, that may be obstruction. Barr manifestly perjured himself before the Senate.
The grand jury was described as conducting a robust ongoing investigation on March 27th, after the report was delivered and the Mueller team had disbanded. In effect the Mueller investigation may be ongoing with the conduct of William Barr simply the latest example of the administrations illegal obstruction of a lawfully conducted investigation being considered by the grand jury. A grand jury impaneled through mid July.
Can you imagine the furor if William Barr were indicted. Might there be a volume 3 of the Mueller report, detailing the true findings of his entire report with a synopsis that details the fall of Attorney General William Barr?
That’s not all folks… What if the grand jury has one other case to consider?
What if due to the abuse of the Justice Department policy forbidding the indictment of the President, Mueller feels obligated to also give the grand jury the chance to indict President Trump. If the department position does not allow the indictment, which in turn invalidates a legal investigation from continuing based upon that finding, you either over ride the policy or never conduct a legal investigation. Since any sane reading of the case finds the Mueller investigation to be lawful, the policy must go. There could be no better time to test that case than is presented now.
I think there is a much greater chance that the Attorney General’s conduct is legally scrutinized… and as things stand I would give that about a five percent chance. The likelihood that Mueller targets Trump is remote, but still possible.
Or this could just be some old liberals fevered conspiracy theory that never quite comes to fruition… which to be entirely honest is, by far, the most likely truth of the matter.