A federal judge tore into all of the legal arguments that a lawyer for President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort made on Wednesday in his long-shot civil case to convince her that Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation has run amok and should be reined in.
“I don’t really understand what is left of your case,” U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson said to Kevin Downing, Manafort’s attorney, after peppering him with a lengthy series of questions.
Manafort filed a civil lawsuit on Jan. 3 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia against Mueller and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, the Justice Department official who appointed the special counsel, in a key legal test of how far Mueller’s mandate extends.
Jackson did not say when she might rule on the civil case, which the Justice Department is seeking to dismiss.
Manafort's accusation that the Mueller investigation had gone off the rails in its investigation of his past interactions with Ukraine and Russia, was essentially undermined by the revelation that Rod Rosenstein specifically directed Mueller to do just that:
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein told special counsel Robert Mueller in a classified August 2, 2017, memo that he should investigate allegations that President Donald Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort was "colluding with Russian government officials" to interfere in the 2016 presidential election, prosecutors in the Russia probe revealed late Monday night.
Mueller was also empowered by Rosenstein to investigate Manafort's payments from Ukrainian politicians, a cornerstone of the Trump adviser's decades-long lobbying career that has resulted in several financial criminal charges so far.
That does not leave Manafort a legal leg to stand on here, which is essentially what this judge is explaining to his lawyers.
All Paul Manafort has to do to make much of this go away is to flip and start voluntarily cooperating with the Mueller investigators.
The fact that he will not do that makes me think that there is more here than simply defending his former boss.
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