(NewsNation) — Former President Donald Trump‘s lawyers are clearly concerned that he will soon be indicted by special counsel Jack Smith on a variety of possible crimes.
So, when I heard that his lawyers had reached out to the Department of Justice and tried to set up a meeting to talk, I thought that was a good idea. After all, defense attorneys regularly plead their cases to the DOJ, outside of a courtroom, either in an effort to avoid an indictment or to have charges reduced or dismissed, etc.
But then I actually read the letter written by attorneys John Rowley and James Trusty. It’s just one paragraph long and really more partisan screed than real lawyers making real arguments.
It’s the sort of argument the former president’s political allies might make, but not something lawyers should be doing.
It reads in part: “No President of the United States has ever, in the history of our country, been baselessly investigated in such an outrageous and unlawful fashion.”
Putting aside the fact that he isn’t president any longer, there is nothing about the investigation itself that is baseless or outrageous.
The question is whether charges should be brought for allegedly lying and obstructing in response to a criminal subpoena, in addition to other possible charges, and his lawyers’ goal should be to try to avoid charges at all costs.
That’s why I presume they were asking for a meeting in the hope of persuading the DOJ to not bring charges. The same DOJ, by the way, that decided to defend the former president against E. Jean Carroll and her defamation lawsuit against Trump and the same DOJ that has been defending the former president in the case brought by former senior FBI agent Peter Strzok after he was removed from special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia interference probe for sending anti-Trump text messages to a colleague and then later fired from the bureau.
In both of those cases, the DOJ made the decision to defend the former president over the furious objections of many on the left. So, one would think his lawyers would know this is a DOJ that will at the least hear them out if they want to make legal arguments.
Instead, the lawyers just “request a meeting at your earliest convenience to discuss the ongoing injustice that is being perpetrated by your special counsel and his prosecutors.”
There were no specifics about the supposedly justices, just unsupported attacks on the investigation.
Now, one might expect this sort of rhetoric from Trump himself trying to make it political. But these are lawyers who are supposed to make legal arguments, which of course, none of this is.
Look, we’ll see if the DOJ agrees to meet with the lawyers. If they do, it would likely be with special counsel Jack Smith himself and not AG Garland.
If the goal was just to rile up his political base, he may have scored some small points. But if, on the other hand, the goal was to make a real legal effort to try to avoid an indictment, this does the former president a disservice and his lawyers should know better.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author, and not of NewsNation.
