SUMMARY: On Tuesday, President Trump pardoned or commuted the sentences of 11 people he said had served enough time or been treated unfairly. The moves come as the President has sharply criticized the Department of Justice for its handling of the case of longtime Trump advisor Roger Stone. William Brangham talks to two former judges, Harvard Law School’s Nancy Gertner and University of Utah’s Paul Cassell.
SUMMARY: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and Washington Post columnist Michael Gerson join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week in politics, including Sen. Bernie Sanders’ victory in the New Hampshire primary and how it shapes the race for the 2020 Democratic Presidential nomination, President Trump's strategy for reelection and the political conflict surrounding the Justice Department.
Judy Woodruff (NewsHour): And that brings us to the analysis of Shields and Gerson. That is syndicated columnist Mark Shields and Washington Post columnist Michael Gerson. David Brooks is away.
Hello to both of you.
Mark Shields, syndicated columnist: Judy.
Michael Gerson, Washington Post: Good to be here.
Judy Woodruff: So, we have had a primary, New Hampshire. We now know what happened in the first-in-the-nation contest, after Iowa, where there was some confusion about the results.
Mark, what do we make of it?
Mark Shields: Judy, here's the bright side for the Democrats. It broke the turnout record, after a disappointing turnout in Iowa the week before. Among Democrats, there was a new turnout record. So, enthusiasm was up.
Bernie Sanders got half as many votes as he got four years ago against Hillary Clinton. He beat Hillary Clinton by 57,000 votes. He beat Pete Buttigieg by 3,900 votes. And yet winning is coming in first. And Bernie won. So, Bernie coming, out of a popular vote, if not a delegate vote, win in Iowa, and a popular vote win in New Hampshire, has to be considered the front-runner at this point.
Judy Woodruff: Has to be considered the front-runner. Any doubt about that?
Michael Gerson: No.
I think the biggest results of New Hampshire were results of exclusion. I think that Warren is now not competing very effectively for the left lane of the Democratic Party. Sanders really solidified that. And I think Biden took a real blow in the results, coming in fifth, it was.
Judy Woodruff: Fifth.
Michael Gerson: That — for the former vice President to do that.
So you have clarity on the left in the Democratic Party, but you do not have Bernie Sanders proving yet that he can go beyond his traditional coalition of young people and very — and liberals. These results didn't prove he can move beyond that. And if he's going to unit the party, he's going to need to do that.
Judy Woodruff: And can he do that? That's the big — that's the question.
Mark Shields: Well, I'm not sure he can, but I think it's also — we ought to at least mention the other candidates quickly.
Judy Woodruff: For sure.
Mark Shields: Amy Klobuchar, after really having a disappointing showing in Iowa in her next to home state of New Hampshire with a fifth, had a strong third, a surprising third, and did it on those who disparaged debates as being important events.
I mean, it was her Friday night debate and her performance there that probably saved Bernie Sanders, if you think about it, because Joe Biden was collapsing, as Michael pointed out, and the Biden votes were up for grabs. They either have to probably go to Buttigieg or to Amy Klobuchar.
Amy Klobuchar got the lion's share, based upon, in my judgment, her performance that night, and Buttigieg's less-than-spectacular performance in the debate. He did very well. He had a strong second. He's been exceeding expectations more than anybody else in this rate, has Pete Buttigieg.
But now we go from what's called retail to wholesale. In retail, in Iowa, New Hampshire, by effort and energy, you can meet enough voters. You can talk with them. You can…
(CROSSTALK)
Judy Woodruff: Coffee shops, door to door.
Mark Shields: Coffee shops, exactly.
Judy Woodruff: Right.
Mark Shields: And you do it. And you have the time to do it.
Judy Woodruff: Right.
Mark Shields: And that's what the premium is upon.
Now, Judy, it's landing on tarmacs, it's going to TV studios, 14 states on one day, on Super Tuesday. It changes. And the premium becomes money and resources, a lot more than it does time and effort and human energy.
Michael Gerson: I agree with that, except for one thing.
Mark Shields: OK.
Michael Gerson: I think Buttigieg and Klobuchar need to prove they can go to minority communities and get a significant amount of support.
If I were Buttigieg, I would have his supporters from Indiana down in South Carolina right now spreading the word that this guy is acceptable.
Mark Shields: Yes. Yes.
Michael Gerson: So, I…
Judy Woodruff: You think that's his main challenge, Buttigieg's main challenge?
Michael Gerson: Well, his main challenge is that he's the mayor of a small town and — was the mayor of a small town — and has to keep proving that he can play in that league. So he has to keep winning in order to do that.
But I think, in order to do that, he's going to have to show that he can appeal to Hispanic and black voters. And I think that's a requirement.
Judy Woodruff: And Nevada coming up a week from tomorrow, the 22nd of February, Mark.
Mark Shields: Yes.
Judy Woodruff: There's a powerful culinary workers union there which said it's not endorsing in the race.
Mark Shields: Not endorsing. Did take a shot at Bernie Sanders.
Judy Woodruff: Did take a shot.
Mark Shields: Yes.
Judy Woodruff: They put out a flyer saying they don't like his single-payer…
Mark Shields: They have got a Cadillac health plan.
Judy Woodruff: I interviewed him on the program yesterday, and he said he does protect their workers.
But the point is, he didn't get that boost that he would have liked.
Mark Shields: No, nor did Joe Biden.
Judy Woodruff: Nor did Joe Biden.
Mark Shields: No. And they are important.
But you're right. And that is a Latino, Hispanic constituency, largely. And…
Judy Woodruff: But coming back to Klobuchar quickly, though, Mark.
Mark Shields: Sure.
Judy Woodruff: I mean, Pete Buttigieg has a lot to prove. She [Klobuchar] has something to prove, doesn't she?
Mark Shields: Oh, absolutely. Yes.
No, I mean, Michael spoke of Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders for the liberal wing. For the woman alley, she seems to have prevailed over Elizabeth Warren at this point.
What she has to do, Judy, is put together a national campaign on the fly. You don't have — time is your enemy.
Judy Woodruff: Klobuchar.
Mark Shields: Klobuchar.
She doesn't have the resources. She's got to raise money, hire people, and campaign in places all at the same time. What she's got to do is figure out, picking one or two states on Super Tuesday and figuring, I'm going to make my fight here, challenging Bernie.
And Buttigieg, to the same degree, has to do the same thing, and making those — we can't cover 14 states at once. OK? There's going to be two or three that are going to emerge as the battleground. And it's going to be strategic convincing the press and public that these are the two or three states. And that's where I think Buttigieg and Klobuchar's chances lie.
Judy Woodruff: So, Michael, we have got — we have a week from tomorrow is Nevada, and then the Saturday after that is South Carolina…
Michael Gerson: That's right.
Judy Woodruff: … where you do have a different electorate. Something — more than 50 percent of the Democratic vote there is African-American.
So Buttigieg has his work cut out for him. So does Sanders, for that matter, and Klobuchar. But let's not forget — I do want to come back to Biden, and Elizabeth Warren, who faded. She came in ahead of Joe Biden, but far back, I think, from where some thought she might be.
Michael Gerson: Yes, I agree with that.
South Carolina is Joe Biden's last stand.
Mark Shields: Absolutely.
Michael Gerson: I think that Warren has invested some time and attention in Nevada. And I think she's going to need to show some strength there in order to feel like that she can move along.
But there is going to be a fight for that moderate, liberal lane right now. Biden seems out of the running. Buttigieg and Klobuchar seem in the running. But then you have Bloomberg in the wings, essentially betting that all of them will fail, and that he will be the ultimate alternative to Bernie Sanders.
And I don't know if that strategy works or not, but, so far, it's coming — some of the steps have taken place.
Judy Woodruff: But, before we get to Bloomberg — and I want to ask you about that, Mark — Joe Biden.
He has come in a distant, what, fourth in Iowa, fifth in New Hampshire. He argues he can come back. That's only two states out of 50.
Mark Shields: It is only two states out of 50.
Judy Woodruff: I mean, has that been done before?
Mark Shields: They're the two that gets the most attention every four years.
I agree with Michael. South Carolina is it. There are no moral victories in South Carolina. Joe Biden has to win. And he was basing his confidence on his strong support in the African-American community.
We saw the African-American community turn on a dime in 2008, when they were overwhelmingly for Hillary Clinton until Barack Obama won in Iowa. And once he won in Iowa, the African-American community in South Carolina said, my goodness, this fellow really does have a chance, and they switched.
I think Joe Biden now, who is running on electability, a no longer relevant thesis, has to bank on the loyalty of the African-American community and his long service and identity there and his service with Barack Obama.
But that's it. I mean, that's it for him.
Judy, when he said at the beginning of the debate, we took a gut punch in Iowa and I'm probably going to lose here, anybody who was going to go door to door for him that weekend just said, wait a minute.
Judy Woodruff: And then left New Hampshire before…
(CROSSTALK)
Mark Shields: And left New Hampshire and said, well, maybe I ought to look at Klobuchar and Buttigieg.
Judy Woodruff: So, now — so, let's come back to Michael Bloomberg, because you're right, Michael, he does seem to be out there waiting, spending, what, $300 million on advertising.
Mark Shields: Three-fifty.
Judy Woodruff: A modest amount.
Is he in a position to benefit if this race remains muddled coming out of these next…
Michael Gerson: Well, as the focus comes to him, he has baggage, stop and frisk baggage, baggage as the mayor.
He has — if you watch commercials, at least where I am, in Virginia, you see him with Barack Obama all the time. He's trying to establish that he cooperated with him.
(CROSSTALK)
Mark Shields: … his running mate.
(LAUGHTER)
Michael Gerson: Yes, exactly. Yes.
And, so, I think he's trying to, you know, take care of that. And he's going to have a unique advantage, completely untested, with those 15 or 16 states on Super Tuesday. He's going to be able to spend a lot in each one of them.
Judy Woodruff: And he suggests, Mark, that he's in his — whenever you see him making a speech, every time he's out there, he's prepared to go toe to toe with President Trump.
Mark Shields: Yes.
In a strange way, I think that's a mistake and one of the few mistakes he's made. Americans do not want a Trump vs. Trump race. They don't want an insult race. I think one of the great appeals, sleeper appeals, of Pete Buttigieg in this entire campaign is that he lowers the emotional thermostat in the room, that he speaks reasonably.
Coming back to Michael Bloomberg, Judy, you're absolutely right. I have never seen anybody spend like this before. But his campaign has been totally controlled. He's never mixed it up. Now there's even some mention that he might not even go to the debates, where you get a sense of people and how you feel about them.
And Americans, in the final analysis, Michael worked with George W. Bush, of the last seven Republican nominees, the only one to win a popular majority of the vote in a Presidential election in 2004.
Why did they vote for George W. Bush over John Kerry, who, I think, by most testaments, won the three debates between the two men? Because they prefer, I-like over I.Q. They were more comfortable with George W.
There's no comfort level with Michael Bloomberg at this point. Nobody knows him. We don't know if he's got a temper, if he's got a sense of humor, if he's self-deprecating. Can he mix it up?
He's never mixed it up in a debate or in Iowa or New Hampshire. I think that's what we're going to have to find out. And if in a month from now, we're talking about his spending, rather than his ideas and how he's different and what he's going to do differently, we know where he is on climate change and gun control, then I think his campaign will be in trouble.
SUMMARY: Roger Stone, the sixth former associate of President Trump to be convicted on charges stemming from the Mueller probe, is again at the center of controversy. Federal prosecutors recommended Stone be sentenced to seven to nine years in prison, but senior Justice Department officials intervened. Now, all four line prosecutors quit the case. John Yang talks to The Washington Post’s Matt Zapotosky.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Four lawyers who prosecuted Roger Stone quit the case Tuesday after the Justice Department said it would take the extraordinary step of lowering the amount of prison time it would seek for President Donald Trump’s longtime ally and confidant.
The decision by the Justice Department came just hours after Trump complained that the recommended sentence for Stone was “very horrible and unfair.” The Justice Department said the sentencing recommendation was made Monday night — before Trump’s tweet — and prosecutors had not spoken to the White House about it.
The four attorneys, including two who were early members of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia team, had made up the Justice Department’s trial team and had signed onto a Monday court filing that recommended up to nine years in prison for Stone.
The department’s decision to back off the sentencing recommendation raised questions about political interference and whether Trump’s views hold unusual sway over the Justice Department, which is meant to operate independently of the White House in criminal investigations and prosecutions.
Attorney General William Barr has been a steady ally of Trump’s, clearing the President of obstruction of justice even when special counsel Robert Mueller had pointedly declined to do so and declaring that the FBI’s Russia investigation — which resulted in charges against Stone — had been based on a “bogus narrative.”
On Monday night, prosecutors had recommended Stone serve seven to nine years behind bars after being convicted of charges including lying to Congress, witness tampering and obstructing the House investigation into whether the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia to tip the 2016 election. The recommendation raised the prospect that Stone could receive the harshest sentence of any of the half-dozen Trump aides charged in Mueller’s probe.
In a tweet early Tuesday, Trump said the case against Stone was a “miscarriage of justice.” A Justice Department official said authorities decided to step in and seek a shorter sentence because they had been taken by surprise by the initial recommendation. The person, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said prosecutors had told the department to expect a shorter recommendation.
It is extremely rare for Justice Department leaders to reverse the decision of its own prosecutors on a sentencing recommendation, particularly after that recommendation has been submitted to the court. Normally, United States attorneys have wide latitude to recommend sentences on cases that they prosecuted.
The departures came abruptly after the decision by Justice. Jonathan Kravis resigned his position as an assistant U.S. attorney. He had been a veteran prosecutor in Washington [DC], and though not part of Robert Mueller’s original team, was nonetheless involved in multiple cases brought by the special counsel’s office. Besides the Stone prosecution, Kravis had also signed onto the case against former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, which resolved with a guilty plea, and against a Russian troll farm accused of sponsoring a cover social media campaign aimed at dividing public opinion during the 2016 presidential election.
Aaron Zelinsky quit the case and his job in Washington [DC], and would go back to his job as a federal prosecutor in Baltimore. He was working there when he was selected in 2017 for the Mueller team. He was involved in cases aimed at determining what knowledge the Trump campaign had about Democratic emails that were hacked by Russia and what efforts Trump aides made to get information about them. He was also involved in the prosecution of George Papadopoulos, the former Trump campaign aide who played a critical role in the FBI launching its investigation in the summer of 2016.
A third prosecutor, Adam Jed, who was an original member of Mueller’s team, also withdrew from the case. His status at the Justice Department was not clear. Before joining Mueller’s team, he worked on civil cases at the Justice Department.
After the attorneys quit the case, Justice Department officials filed a revised sentencing memorandum with the judge, arguing its initial recommendation could be “considered excessive and unwarranted under the circumstances,” but that it would defer to the court. None of the original prosecutors in Stone’s case signed onto the revised memo.
Sentencing decisions are ultimately up to the judge, who in this case may side with the original recommendation. U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson has repeatedly scolded Stone for his out-of-court behavior, which included a social media post he made of the judge with what appeared to be crosshairs of a gun.
The judge barred Stone from social media last July after concluding that she repeatedly flouted his gag order.
Meanwhile, Democrats decried the decision, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer calling for an investigation by the DOJ’s Inspector General.
“The rule of law and this grand, grand tradition of this wonderful Justice Department is being totally perverted to Donald Trumps’ own personal desires and needs,” the New York Democrat said. “And it’s a disgrace.’’
House Intelligence Committee Adam Schiff said it would be a blatant abuse of power if the Justice Department intervened on behalf of Trump.
“Doing so would send an unmistakable message that President Trump will protect those who lie to Congress to cover up his own misconduct, and that the Attorney General will join him in that effort,” the California Democrat said.
Trump later told reporters that he didn’t speak to Justice officials. “I would be able to do it if I wanted,” he said. “I have the absolute right to do it. I stay out of things to a degree that people wouldn’t believe, but I didn’t speak to them.”
Federal prosecutors also recently softened their sentencing position on former national security adviser Michael Flynn, saying that they would not oppose a probation of punishment after initially saying that he deserved up to six months in prison for lying to the FBI. The Flynn prosecution is also being handled by the U.S. Attorney’s office in Washington.
In the initial memorandum Monday evening, prosecutors asked for Stone to serve between 87 and 108 months in federal prison — the sentence they said was in line with federal guidelines. Such a sentence would send a message to deter others who might consider lying or obstructing a congressional probe or tampering with witnesses, they said.
The prosecutors wrote in the court papers that “Stone’s actions were not a one-off mistake in judgment” and that he “decided to double – and triple – down on his criminal conduct by tampering with a witness for months in order to make sure his obstruction would be successful.”
Stone has denied wrongdoing and consistently criticized the case against him as politically motivated. He did not take the stand during his trial and his lawyers did not call any witnesses in his defense.
Witnesses in the case testified that Trump’s campaign viewed Stone as an “access point” to the anti-secrecy site WikiLeaks, which was in possession of more than 19,000 emails hacked from the servers of the Democratic National Committee and tried to use him to get advance word about hacked emails damaging to Hillary Clinton.
Prosecutors charged that Stone lied to Congress about his conversations about WikiLeaks with New York radio host Randy Credico — who had scored an interview with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in 2016 — and conservative writer and conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi.
SUMMARY: Outrage over the Justice Department's new, shorter sentencing recommendation for Roger Stone, an ally of President Trump, bubbled over on Wednesday on Capitol Hill, where congressional critics of the president say he unfairly interfered to help a friend. Are the Justice Department's moves justified? Yamiche Alcindor talks with two former Justice Department officials, Mary McCord and James Trusty.
SUMMARY: The Department of Justice alleges that the government of Saudi Arabia is surveilling people living in the United States — by leveraging Twitter. Specifically, the indictment charges that a Saudi official is recruiting Twitter employees to share personal details of critics of the Saudi government, so that those dissidents can be targeted for persecution. Nick Schifrin talks to Judy Woodruff.
SUMMARY: Attorney General William Barr testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday to explain his handling of the Mueller report. While Barr defended his actions, Democrats zeroed in on a newly discovered letter from Mueller criticizing Barr's summary of the report's “principal conclusions.” Meanwhile, Barr said he would not attend a planned House hearing Thursday. Judy Woodruff reports.
SUMMARY: It was a contentious day on Capitol Hill as Attorney General William Barr appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee to discuss his handling of the Mueller report. Yamiche Alcindor and Lisa Desjardins join Judy Woodruff to analyze Barr’s testimony, including his explanation of why he determined President Trump hadn’t committed obstruction of justice.
SUMMARY: Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia is ranking Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, which planned to question Attorney General William Barr on Thursday. Judy Woodruff talks to Collins about Barr’s late-breaking decision not to attend the hearing, why Collins believes that Democrats are engaging in a partisan “stunt” over the Mueller report and what questions he would ask of the attorney general.
SUMMARY: When reports emerged Tuesday that special counsel Robert Mueller had sent Attorney General William Barr a letter expressing concern over Barr’s characterization of the Mueller report’s conclusions, several Democrats called for Barr to resign. Among them was California Rep. Ted Lieu, who joins Judy Woodruff to discuss that and his reaction to Barr's decision not to attend a House hearing Thursday.
SUMMARY: After Attorney General William Barr failed to appear before the House Judiciary Committee for a scheduled hearing on the Mueller report, House Democrats threatened to hold him in contempt. Meanwhile, Republicans argue Mueller’s investigation was biased against President Trump. Amna Nawaz talks to former Justice Department official David Rivkin and Neal Katyal, former acting solicitor general.
SUMMARY: On the eve of the House Judiciary Committee’s deadline for the Justice Department to turn over special counsel Mueller's full report, questions remain over whether the time limit can be enforced. The deadline comes as Democrats threaten Attorney General Barr with contempt over his refusal to testify before the committee. Wall Street Journal reporter Sadie Gurman joins Hari Sreenivasan to discuss.
As set forth in detail in this report, the Special Counsel's investigation established that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election principally through two operations. First, a Russian entity carried out a social media campaign that favored presidential candidate Donald J. Trump and disparaged presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. Second , a Russian intelligence service conducted computer-intrusion operations against entities, employees, and volunteers working on the Clinton Campaign and then released stolen documents. The investigation also identified numerous links between the Russian government and the Trump Campaign. Although the investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts, the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.
The report describes actions and events that the Special Counsel's Office found to be supported by the evidence collected in our investigation. In some instances, the report points out the absence of evidence or conflicts in the evidence about a particular fact or event. In other instances, when substantial, credible evidence enabled the Office to reach a conclusion with confidence, the report states that the investigation established that certain actions or events occurred. A statement that the investigation did not establish particular facts does not mean there was no evidence of those facts.
In evaluating whether evidence about collective action of multiple individuals constituted a crime, we applied the framework of conspiracy law, not the concept of "collusion." In so doing, the Office recognized that the word "collud[ e ]" was used in communications with the Acting Attorney General confirming certain aspects of the investigation's scope and that the term has frequently been invoked in public reporting about the investigation. But collusion is not a specific offense or theory of liability found in the United States Code, nor is it a term of art in federal criminal law. For those reasons , the Office's focus in analyzing questions of joint criminal liability was on conspiracy as defined in federal law. In connection with that analysis, we addressed the factual question whether members of the Trump Campaign "coordinat[ ed]"-a term that appears in the appointment order-with Russian election interference activities. Like collusion, "coordination" does not have a settled definition in federal criminal law. We understood coordination to require an agreement-tacit or express - between the Trump Campaign and the Russian government on election interference. That requires more than the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests. We applied the term coordination in that sense when stating in the report that the investigation did not establish that the Trump Campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.
SUMMARY: The Department of Justice has indicted two Chinese hackers for infiltrating U.S. companies and government agencies and stealing vast amounts of sensitive data to help Chinese companies compete with their American counterparts. John Demers, Assistant Attorney General for National Security, explains to Judy Woodruff how the cyber intrusion occurred and why it violates a 2015 U.S.-China agreement.
SUMMARY: What does the departure of Attorney General Jeff Sessions mean for the Mueller investigation? Matt Whitaker, the acting attorney general, was formerly Sessions’ chief of staff, but before joining the Justice Department, he was openly critical of the Mueller probe he now oversees. William Brangham speaks with Devlin Barrett,who covers the Justice Department for The Washington Post.
In his first public statement as acting attorney general, Matthew Whitaker said he was “committed to leading a fair department with the highest ethical standards.”
But Whitaker, who was chief of staff to Attorney General Jeff Sessions before President Donald Trump picked him Wednesday to replace Sessions, has worked as a conservative activist in recent years, raising questions about whether he can lead a department overseeing special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Whitaker, a former U.S. attorney, is a well-known figure in conservative legal circles in Washington, D.C.
Prior to joining the Justice Department as Sessions’ chief of staff, Whitaker founded a conservative judicial watchdog group, the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust, that called for investigations into Hillary Clinton, former Rep. Patrick Murphy (D-Florida) and into accusations that the Democratic National Committee was working with the government of Ukraine to dig up dirt on Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential election.
During the 2016 election, Whitaker, who ran as a Republican for the U.S. Senate in Iowa in 2014, called for a special counsel to be named to investigate Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state.
He has also repeatedly criticized Mueller’s Russia investigation, which the Justice Department oversees, both in appearances as a CNN commentator and on Twitter. Those attacks on the Mueller probe, in particular, are drawing fresh scrutiny now as Washington waits to see how Whitaker will approach the investigation in his new role.
Whitaker’s record on the Mueller investigation
In an op-ed published last year by CNN, Whitaker warned Mueller would be crossing a “red line” if his investigation looked into the finances of the Trump family.
“If he were to continue to investigate the financial relationships without a broadened scope in his appointment, then this would raise serious concerns that the special counsel’s investigation was a mere witch hunt,” Whitaker wrote.
During an appearance on CNN last year, Whitaker suggested that whoever replaced Sessions would not need to fire Mueller but could reduce his budget “so low that his investigations grinds to almost a halt.”
In August 2017, Whitaker retweeted an article that called Mueller’s team a “lynch mob.”
Whitaker warned Mueller would be crossing a ‘red line’ if his investigation looked into the Trump family’s finances
The New York Times reported in September that the Trump administration was prepared to name Whitaker as the No. 2 at the Justice Department should Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein resign. Rosenstein kept his job after a flurry of speculation that he would be fired following a New York Times report that suggested Rosenstein had raised concerns about Trump.
Rosenstein had been overseeing the Russia investigation after Sessions recused himself. But a Justice Department spokesperson said Wednesday that Whitaker is now “in charge of all matters under the purview of the Department of Justice,” which presumably would include the Russia probe.
Progressive activists denounced Whitaker as a political operative.
“This is somebody who has already been out there, who has opined about the scope of the investigation, who is a political appointee,” Marge Baker, the executive vice president of People for the American Way, a liberal advocacy group, said in an interview. “It would be laughable if it wasn’t so serious as a threat to democracy.”
Whitaker’s legal and political career
Whitaker has long been involved in Republican Party politics.
Whitaker received a law degree from the University of Iowa and then worked in private practice before being appointed in 2004 by then-President George W. Bush to serve as U.S. attorney for the Southern district of Iowa. Whitaker held the position until 2009.
As U.S. attorney, he prosecuted national security, immigration, income tax and firearm cases. Few of those cases were high profile. In 2008, he was part of a nationwide effort by the Justice Department to crackdown on fraud in the H1-B visa program for high-skilled immigrant workers.
Whitaker, who has said he believes marriage should be between one man and one woman, grabbed headlines when in 2007 when he prosecuted an openly gay Democratic state senator in Iowa for alleged extortion. The senator was found not guilty, and Whitaker was criticized for running a politically motivated case.
After leaving the office of U.S. attorney in 2009, Whitaker, along with Chris Hagenow and Bill Gustoff, founded the law firm Whitaker Hagenow & Gustoff LLP. The firm’s name was changed to Hagenow & Gustoff when Whitaker left in September of last year to become Sessions’ chief of staff at the Justice Department.
People who know Whitaker say he deserves an opportunity to prove himself
Whitaker’s private legal career largely focused on white collar litigation. People who have known Whitaker for decades said he deserves an opportunity to prove himself.
Gustoff said he, Whitaker and Hagenow founded their law firm with common conservative beliefs and the goal of serving their faith, families and Iowans rather than solely to make money.
“Our politics plays into our law and our law plays into our politics,” Gustoff said in an interview.
Others praised Whitaker’s integrity and argued he wouldn’t let his personal beliefs cloud his judgment.
“Regardless of what his positions are, he has a job to do, and he will do that within the frame of the law,” said Scott Raecker, the executive director of Drake University’s center focusing on leadership ethics and civility and a former Iowa state representative.
Still, Whitaker has made his strong conservative viewpoint and support for the Republican Party clear. Whitaker was the co-chair of Raecker’s 2010 re-election campaign for the state legislature, and co-chaired former Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s 2012 presidential campaign in Iowa. He ran for Iowa state treasurer in 2002, years before making his failed 2014 U.S. Senate.
During a 2014 debate when Whitaker was running for U.S. Senate, he said appointed judges should have a “biblical view of justice.” If they had a secular worldview, he said that would make him “very concerned about how they judge.”
