Who could have possibly predicted that illegally installing a beauty pageant winner who never prosecuted a case to a high profile position and directing her to indict one of your enemies would go wrong. WHO COULD HAVE PREDICTED THIS?
All of us. That is who. Literally *all of us* knew it would go badly for Lindsey Halligan, Pam Bondi, the DOJ and Donald Trump.
But even I am shocked at how badly Halligan messed this whole thing up. And the judge seems even closer to dismissing the whole thing – not just because of vindictive prosecution or government misconduct, but because of issues with the grand jury not even seeing the full indictment!
This last revelation came today, during the hearing about vindictive prosecution, and it caught everyone off guard – definitely the judge.
Here is how it unfolded. ABC News reports that Halligan “told a judge Wednesday that the full grand jury that indicted Comey did not see the final indictment — only the foreperson and another grand juror did.”
This is NOT how the grand jury process is supposed to go, to be clear. The entire grand just needs to see the final indictment before they vote, and definitely before the foreperson signs it.
Halligan tried to clean her mess up by telling the judge that “the full grand jury saw the original indictment that was presented, but that the charges against Comey that are currently on the court docket were not reviewed by the full grand jury — though they reflected the full grand jury’s full vote on the previously rejected indictment.”
That’s a beauty queen version of bluffing when you are in front of a microphone and know you have no good answer.
Another crazy admission during this hearing was when a DOJ attorney “refused to answer whether a memo prepared by career prosecutors in the U.S. attorney’s office prior to Halligan’s appointment recommended against bringing charges against Comey.”
I kind of feel like denying whether the document exists actually confirms that it does exist, right? If it didn’t exist, they would just say “no, your honor, of course no such memo was ever drafted.”
Judge Nachmanoff was not buying it, leading to this exchange with DOJ attorney Tyler Lemons:
JUDGE: “Was there a declination memo?” “
LEMONS: “I don’t know the world of what documents exist.”
JUDGE: “You did not seek to find out whether there was a declination memo?”
Lemons admitted the court that he was DIRECTED by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche’s office “not to disclose the answer.”
The judge finally got Lemons to admit that he was aware of “various draft memos.”
Comey’s trial is set to begin on January 5th, but I think it may be DOA.
