Under Pressure to Keep His Job, Attorney General Sessions Considers Special Counsel to Investigate Clinton

Abuse of Power

Even before he became president, Donald Trump promised to put Hillary Clinton in jail. Now 53 weeks after the election, it appears he is moving toward that publicly stated goal, and undermining the very tenets of American democracy to do so.

Trump has been pressuring his attorney general to prosecute his former political opponent, Hillary Clinton, so hard that Sessions at one point felt it proper to tender his letter of resignation. It was refused.

But that has not stopped the president from making very public attacks against Sessions.

And now, it appears that in order to keep his job, Attorney General Jeff Sessions is considering appointing a special prosecutor – special counsel – to investigate the president’s former top political opponent.

This is how developing nations, “banana republics,” and authoritarian dictatorships operate, not the United States of America.

“The Justice Department said Monday that prosecutors were looking into whether a special counsel should be appointed to investigate political rivals President Trump has singled out for scrutiny, including Hillary Clinton,” The New York Times reports.

The department, in a letter sent to the House Judiciary Committee, said the prosecutors would examine allegations that donations to the Clinton Foundation were tied to a 2010 decision by the Obama administration to allow a Russian nuclear agency to buy Uranium One, a company that owned access to uranium in the United States, and other issues.

The Times makes clear: this is not how America operates.

Any such investigation would raise questions about the independence of federal investigations under Mr. Trump. Since Watergate, the Justice Department has largely operated independently of political influence on cases related to the president’s opponents. 

And then Times notes what’s behind this clear attempt to prosecute Trump’s political opponents:

People close to the White House said there might be another issue at play: Mr. Sessions might be able to forestall the president’s firing him by appointing a special counsel to investigate the uranium deal.

Sessions, to boot, has recused himself from all things Clinton and Russia, specifically including the Clinton Foundation, so he would be violating that previous promise:

Sessions is scheduled to appear before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee Tuesday at 10 AM.

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Image by Ronald Woan via Flickr and a CC license

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