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Does AG Garland Need to Appoint A Third Special Counsel To Investigate Potential-Presidential-Candidate Pence?
Reason ^ | 1.24.2023 | Josh Blackman

Posted on 01/24/2023 3:06:31 PM PST by nickcarraway

To maintain the appearance of neutrality, Garland may have to.

Breaking news! Classified documents were found in the home of former Vice President Pence. These documents were discovered by Pence's own teams. But, if the Biden experience has taught us anything, a search by the FBI may turn up more documents.

So what is Merrick Garland to do? Mike Pence very likely may be a presidential candidate for 2024–a candidate who will run against Trump, and potentially Biden. And we know that Garland waited for Trump to announce before appointing a special counsel. Does Garland appoint yet another special counsel to investigate Pence now? Does Garland wait till Pence announces? What a mess.

I highly recommend Jack Goldsmith's guest essay in the Times today. He explains the potential coordination problems between the two current special counsels.

Even if the Trump and Biden investigations turn out to be factually and legally quite different, as it seems they might, the dual special counsel structure will make it hard for the department to portray its decisions as principled. Normally in such prominent side-by-side investigations, an official reporting to the attorney general would ensure that the same legal and discretionary judgments informed decision-making in the two cases. But these decisions are now delegated to the special counsels Jack Smith and Robert Hur, who do not have the incentives or even the mechanism to coordinate their decision making.

Mr. Hur and Mr. Smith will take many public steps along their investigative paths, including a final decision about the presence of any potential criminality and what, if anything, to do about it. These decisions will invariably raise questions about disparate treatment. Yet neither special counsel will be in a position to explain how his decisions are consistent with the other's. Nor can the attorney general obviously do so, since the key decisions are formally out of his control so long as they stay within broad department guidelines. If Mr. Garland does end up defending the coherence of the decisions, some might question the degree to which the special counsels were actually independent.

Now, there might be a third special counsel investigation to coordinate.


TOPICS: Breaking News; Crime/Corruption; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; US: Indiana
KEYWORDS: classified; justicedepartment; pence; specialcounsel
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1 posted on 01/24/2023 3:06:31 PM PST by nickcarraway
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To: nickcarraway

What needs to happen is all former presidents and VP’s, need to have their homes and offices searched for any Classified Documents. No doubt there will plenty found and then what is going to happen? Now the DOJ can’t just try and prosecute Trump with these other incidents out there or there is going to be some appeals and this will end up in Supreme Court.

The DOs and Garland are going to look like total fools and idiots now, they are in quite a box.


2 posted on 01/24/2023 3:11:05 PM PST by Captain Peter Blood
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To: nickcarraway

How about a special council to investigate Garland ?


3 posted on 01/24/2023 3:11:11 PM PST by wardamneagle
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To: wardamneagle

Perhaps a special counsel to investigate special counsels?


4 posted on 01/24/2023 3:15:47 PM PST by Jim Robinson (Resistance to tyranny is obedience to God.)
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To: wardamneagle

Precisely. First thing that cam to mind.


5 posted on 01/24/2023 3:16:12 PM PST by Fester Chugabrew (/s)
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To: nickcarraway

They are souvenirs. Everybody takes souvenirs from the white house. 😂😂📦📦📦📦


6 posted on 01/24/2023 3:16:20 PM PST by George J. Jetso
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To: nickcarraway

We are getting to see in real time that the politicians are not the ones in charge.


7 posted on 01/24/2023 3:17:28 PM PST by packagingguy
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To: nickcarraway

We got here because Biden got caught now it has to be “everybody does it” so Biden’s hiney is covered.


8 posted on 01/24/2023 3:18:15 PM PST by Nextrush (FREEDOM IS EVERBODY'S BUSINESS-REMEMBER PASTOR NIEMOLLER)
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To: nickcarraway

It appears that Pence is in the clear as President Trump would have declassified any documents Pence may have had.


9 posted on 01/24/2023 3:18:39 PM PST by Round Earther
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To: George J. Jetso

“They are souvenirs. Everybody takes souvenirs from the white house. “

Bill and Hillary Clinton actually took White House furniture and other items with them when they left the White House. When the fact became public they ended up sending back $28,000 worth of items and paid $86,000 for “gifts” they kept. See story link below:

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=121856&page=1

Could documents have also been taken?


10 posted on 01/24/2023 3:21:58 PM PST by Soul of the South (The past is gone and cannot be changed. Tomorrow can be a better day if we work o)
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To: Jim Robinson; wardamneagle; GOPJ; DoughtyOne

How about 87,000 SCs? There are probably a million who have access.


11 posted on 01/24/2023 3:23:07 PM PST by ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas (Re-imagine the media!)
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To: Round Earther
Is it really true any president can declassify material without even noting it? So Bill Clinton could legally give any U.S. secrets to China without any repurcussions?

Someone could be convicted for stealing or trafficking's material that has been declassified, because they never knew it was declassified? That seems like a real flaw in our laws.

12 posted on 01/24/2023 3:23:22 PM PST by nickcarraway
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To: Soul of the South; George J. Jetso
Could documents have also been taken?

Sorry but you are an idiot. The Clintons took tons of classified material. They took classified FBI files on many people.

13 posted on 01/24/2023 3:24:46 PM PST by nickcarraway
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To: nickcarraway

Pence is a nobody. Don’t waste a dime on investigating him.


14 posted on 01/24/2023 3:28:10 PM PST by Jim Noble (You have sat too long for any good you have been doing)
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To: Captain Peter Blood

Why would this end up in the Supreme Court?

No Federal issues are involved (except if Biden were indicted). The claim of classification authority is a triable fact in an ordinary court.


15 posted on 01/24/2023 3:29:47 PM PST by Jim Noble (You have sat too long for any good you have been doing)
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To: nickcarraway

LOL sounds like that would be a species of karma to me


16 posted on 01/24/2023 3:40:10 PM PST by rottweiller_inc (inter canem et lupum)
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To: nickcarraway

Ball park vendors sold programs and such teams as the Yankees didn’t put player names on their backs so more programs would be sold.

We need programs now for the mysterious new locations of Biden’s classified documents, slanders against Trump and now discoveries about the sternly pious religious icon Pence.

Recently posts here said “Heard there is a new 3rd place....” and a couple of hours later “Did you mean the 4th or the 5th?”

And, sadly, they need names for the shooters like the old serial killer nicknames. This morning reports on California news had to say. which was the one previous to this Half Moon Bay one.


17 posted on 01/24/2023 3:46:09 PM PST by frank ballenger (You have summoned up a thundercloud. You're gonna hear from me. Anthem by Leonard Cohen)
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To: nickcarraway

First think to search for with Pence: loyalty, integrity, honesty behind the mask of purity with a totally repressed personality.

I have a feeling there is a brooding weirdo beneath the Puritan schoolmaster facade.


18 posted on 01/24/2023 3:48:16 PM PST by frank ballenger (You have summoned up a thundercloud. You're gonna hear from me. Anthem by Leonard Cohen)
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To: nickcarraway

Don’t leave Hussein out of the big picture. Mr. ‘scandal-free’ should be locked up.


19 posted on 01/24/2023 3:56:56 PM PST by Libloather (Why do climate change hoax deniers live in mansions on the beach?)
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To: Nextrush
If everybody does it, then the next question goes to Obama.

-PJ

20 posted on 01/24/2023 3:58:45 PM PST by Political Junkie Too ( * LAAP = Left-wing Activist Agitprop Press (formerly known as the MSM))
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