FARRELL: Mueller And His Team Look Worse By The Day

From Chris Farrell’s Op-Ed for The Daily Caller:

The full story of Robert Mueller’s special counsel investigation of the Russian collusion myth has yet to be told, but important pieces of the tale are emerging. It is increasingly clear that Mueller exerted little to no control over what was going on. The narrative-driven image of Mueller as the steely-eyed force of justice who would take Trump down collapsed when the investigation found no Trump ties to Russia, and Mueller emerged publicly as a low energy, sometimes confused shadow of his former self. Instead, Mueller’s underlings ran the show, dragging out the pointless investigation even when they knew it was a dry hole, illicitly hobbling the Trump presidency while making sure they covered their tracks.

Last week, responding to a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit, the Justice Department released heavily redacted documents showing that several dozen phones belonging to members of Mueller’s team were wiped or disabled before they could be examined by Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz during his office’s review of the special counsel’s investigation. In each case, the phones were somehow accidentally rendered useless. Two were “in airplane mode, no passcode provided, data unable to be recovered so had to be wiped.” Disgraced FBI lawyer Lisa Page’s phone was inexplicably restored to factory settings. Lawyer James Quarles’ phone spontaneously wiped itself. Several other phones, such as the one used by Mueller deputy Andrew Weissman, were disabled after inputting too many incorrect passwords. It should be noted that disabling an iPhone this way, including the timeouts, would take well over an hour of effort.

Could this mass wiping be viewed as criminal obstruction? Others have faced serious consequences for much less. These same fumble-fingered federal attorneys sought to imprison George Papadopoulos for 20 years simply for switching cell phones and deactivating his Facebook account. The government argued that Papadopoulos knowingly committed obstruction per 18 US Code section 1519, with the intent of impeding or otherwise influencing a federal investigation. Papadopoulos admitted doing it, but said he acted on advice of counsel. Had he instead said it was an accident because he was a tech idiot, like the Mueller lawyers, the government would have had a harder time proving the necessary intent.

It is beyond suspicious that all these phones and the evidence they held were accidentally disabled en masse just as the OIG was closing in. The story is too incredible, and the magnitude of the destruction is prima facie evidence of a coverup. This raises the more interesting question; what do these people have to hide?

Read More Here.