Andrew McCarthy made the case for exactly what Sessions is doing in an article in early March. The way he lays it out, it makes a lot of sense .... no out-of-control special prosecutor ranging far afield, blowing millions, having to hire a team & get up to speed, then feeling like they have to get somebody on something to justify the appointment.
No New Special Counsel
https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/03/second-special-counsel-fisa-not-necessary/
Link excerpt:
Clearly, there needs to be an investigation. Goodlatte and Gowdy are entirely right about that. Regardless of whether there is a solid basis for a criminal investigation, the Justice Department is always responsible for ensuring the integrity and lawfulness of its own operations — it must investigate credible allegations of misconduct by its component agencies, including the FBI. Goodlatte and Gowdy are also right to suggest (as I believe they have) that the contemplated investigation should scrutinize the handling of the Clinton-emails probe — how it comported, or failed to, with Justice Department practices and policies. The chairmen are right yet again that the jurisdictional limitations on Michael Horowitz, the Justice Department’s very able inspector general, make it impossible for him to conduct the investigation that is needed.
Neither, however, should that investigation be conducted by a special counsel.
The special counsel is a pernicious institution that operates outside the procedures and discipline of a normal U.S. attorney’s office — where the merits of every case must be weighed against those of every other in the competition for limited investigative and prosecutorial resources. Special-counsel appointments should be resisted whenever possible. Indeed, with Robert Mueller already — and inevitably — straying far afield from his original “collusion” inquiry, we should be discussing how that investigation can be limited and brought to a just conclusion; we should not be encouraging the launch of yet another special-counsel extravaganza. Never again should a special-counsel investigation be commenced in the absence of concrete evidence that a crime has been committed — a crime that serves to cabin the special counsel’s investigation lest it become a fishing expedition without end.
Here is what should be done. Attorney General Sessions should assign a U.S. attorney from outside Washington to conduct a probe of how the Clinton-emails and Trump-Russia investigations were handled by the Justice Department and FBI.
Under my proposal, the designated U.S. attorney would handle this investigation along with the rest of the work of his or her office — this would not be a prosecutor whose only assignment is to pursue a single target or set of targets, and who thus faces great pressure to file charges, no matter how far afield from the original focus of the investigation, in order to justify the appointment. Unlike the inspector general, the U.S. attorney would have full jurisdiction to convene a grand jury; investigate any crimes attendant to the Clinton-emails and Trump-Russia probes; issue subpoenas and seek other court process (such as search warrants) to secure evidence; and prosecute any violations of law by persons inside or outside of government.
Doesn’t it also have the effect of putting the jury outside Washington?
Sessions is hanging everything on the release of the IG Report. It should come out in the next two weeks, about the time that Comey is on his ‘book’ tour. Had it not done it this way, then it would have been deemed another ‘witch hunt’ by the Republicans and it would have been even more difficult to get to the truth with a stacked media. I agree with McCarthy’s assessment. However, Sessions will lose his position if he does nothing after the release of the Report. He has held off the Prosecutor until the IG Report is released, but after that, things will have to happen rapidly. Everyone has lost their patience with Sessions and the slowness of the process, but with the whole Deep State entrenched and dug in, it makes it much harder.
why was Paul Ryan making a trip to the Czech Rep over this guy?
30 Mar: Radio Free Europe: Alleged Russian Hacker Nikulin Pleads Not Guilty After Extradition To U.S.
A Russian hacker who allegedly stole data and is wanted by both Washington and Moscow has pleaded not guilty to the charges at a court in San Francisco after being extradited to the United States from the Czech Republic...
During a visit to the Czech Republic, U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan said on March 27 in Prague that “we have every reason to believe and expect that Mr. Nikulin will be extradited to America.”...
Nikulin’s lawyer said his client claimed the FBI is trying to link him to the hacking of the Democratic Party’s servers during the 2016 U.S. presidential election campaign.
https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-us-czech-republic-accused-hacker-nikulin-extradited/29135397.html
11 Mar: Washington Times: Russian charged with breaching U.S. firms says FBI attempted to coerce confession over Clinton hack
By Andrew Blake
A Russian man wanted by the Justice Department on charges connected to hacking U.S. companies now claims the FBI offered him immunity in exchange for accepting responsibility for cyberattacks targeting former Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
Yevgeny Nikulin, the alleged hacker, laid the claim to Russian media Thursday in a letter sent from a Czech Republic prison cell amid an international extradition battle currently underway between Washington and Moscow.
FBI agents promised Mr. Nikulin money, American citizenship and a free apartment for taking the fall over hacking Mrs. Clinton’s campaign, he alleged in a letter published Thursday by Nastoyashchoe Vremya, a Russian-language website...
FBI agents interviewed Mr. Nikulin twice since his arrest, he wrote, and each time asked him to confess to hacking American political targets. Mr. Nikulin said he refused their initial request last November, then received a second offer three months later...
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/may/11/yevgeny-nikulin-alleged-russian-hacker-claims-fbi-/
Time will tell whether Session’s choice was the better one for prospective prosecutions.
I am surprised we have not seen more recent analysis from McCarthy and others on Comey’s leaks from last year. This is from an McCarthy article early last summer:
“as Turley observes, Comey never sought a classification review of his memos by the White House or the Justice Department. It is possible that they’d disagree with Comey’s conclusion that the memos are not classified. Going forward, it will be interesting to see what position the government takes regarding the memos: Their disclosure has already been demanded by Congress, and additional disclosure demands will be the subject of Freedom of Information Act litigation.
I’m betting the memos are not classified. There is no doubt, though, that at least one of them has been leaked, and that the leak was, to say the least, improper.”
https://www.nationalreview.com/2017/06/comey-memos-leaking-improper/