Robert Mueller fires back at Donald Trump’s lawyers
Special Counsel Robert Mueller has made a number of definitive and high profile moves in his investigation into Donald Trump’s Russia scandal, and he’s allowed his actions to do the talking. Now, in the rarest of moments, he’s actually speaking to the media – at least through his spokesman. It comes at a crucial moment which sees Mueller and Trump both trying to position themselves as the stakes get higher.
After a week of (massively overhyped) media buzz about the possibility of Trump trying to get Mueller fired, last night Mueller leaked to the media that he’s been sitting on fifty thousand incriminating emails since the early days of his investigation. This sent a clear signal that he already has several of Trump’s people dead to rights, and that if they don’t keep Trump from trying to fire Mueller, they’ll be arrested before Trump can even complete the complex firing process. This prompted Trump’s attorneys to publicly whine about how Mueller acquired the emails.
Trump’s legal team is claiming that some of the emails are privileged in nature and should be returned. However, legal experts across the board have weighed in on that claim with laughter and eye rolling. This prompted Mueller to take the extraordinary step of publicly firing back through his spokesman, saying “When we have obtained emails in the course of our ongoing criminal investigation, we have secured either the account owner’s consent or appropriate criminal process” (link). What’s remarkable here is that Mueller is speaking at all.
The media has continued to push the narrative that Donald Trump is about to fire a helpless Robert Mueller and magically get away with it without any consequences. In reality, it’s not even clear that Trump is considering such a move, and it appears his Republican allies are mainly just looking to muddy the waters so they can push forward with their tax scam bill. Meanwhile, Mueller is upping his aggressiveness, just in case Trump gets any funny ideas.
