On
Friday,
the
Trump
Justice
Department
got
a
very
unwelcome
treat
from
Judge
Lorna
Schofield.
No,
not
a
Bit-O-Honey!
It
was
an
unsealing
order
in
federal
court
in
New
York.
The
DOJ
tried
every
trick
in
the
book
to
hide
its
harassment
of
New
York
Attorney
General
Letitia
James,
but
the
judge
unwrapped
the
case
anyway.
On
August
5,
the
US
Attorney’s
Office
for
the
Northern
District
of
New
York
(NDNY)
subpoenaed
the
New
York
Office
of
the
Attorney
General
(OAG)
for
the
entire
record
in
two
cases:
New
York
v.
Trump
and
New
York
v.
National
Rifle
Association.
The
political
implications
don’t
need
to
be
spelled
out,
but
of
course
Trump
and
his
minions
did
it
anyway.
After
Trump
was
found
liable
for
civil
fraud,
he
and
his
lawyers
brayed
for
retribution.
Future
Attorney
General
Pam
Bondi
huffed
that
New
York
Attorney
General
Letitia
James
“needs
to
be
looked
at.”
And
Trump,
who
recently
pushed
out
his
own
nominee
as
US
Attorney
for
the
Eastern
District
of
Virginia
for
failing
to
indict
James,
called
her
a
“reverse
racist”
who
“illegally”
sued
the
NRA.
The
OAG
moved
to
quash
the
federal
subpoenas,
filing
lawsuit
which
implicates
two
of
the
most
persistent
legal
issues
of
Trump’s
second
term:
weaponization
of
the
Justice
Department
and
installing
MAGA
lackeys
as
US
Attorneys
without
Senate
confirmation.
Asked
and
answered
The
legal
sufficiency
of
the
civil
fraud
cases
against
Trump
and
the
NRA
has
been
thoroughly
litigated.
The
defendants
argued
over
and
over
that
the
charges
were
unsubstantiated,
tainted
by
bias,
or
otherwise
defective.
Trump
sued
James
in
multiple
federal
courts
seeking
to
ward
her
off,
as
did
the
NRA,
which
also
tried
to
two-step
its
way
out
of
New
York
into
Texas
by
means
of
a
comically
fraudulent
bankruptcy
filing.
None
of
it
worked.
Court
after
court
agreed
that
the
cases
were
appropriately
predicated,
and
Trump
and
the
NRA
were
both
found
liable
for
years
of
fraud.
On
appeal,
Trump
has
so
far
managed
to
reduce
the
penalty,
but
the
verdict
stands.
With
the
reins
of
the
Justice
Department
in
his
hands,
though,
Trump
is
now
demanding
retribution.
According
to
the
New
York
Times,
the
DOJ
aims
to
criminally
charge
his
enemies
for
civil
rights
violations
under
18
USC
§
242.
The
Times
suggests
that
using
§
242
in
this
way
would
be
“remarkable,”
since
the
law
is
more
often
used
to
hold
accountable
public
officials
who
discriminate
on
the
basis
of
race.
A
more
apt
term
might
be
“perverse.”
In
its
motion
to
quash,
the
OAG
argues
that
the
subpoenas
for
millions
of
pages
of
internal
prosecutorial
deliberations
were
issued
in
transparently
bad
faith
and
“unreasonably
interfere
with
the
State
of
New
York’s
sovereignty.”
Moreover,
they
insist
that
the
subpoenas
are
null
and
void
because
the
US
Attorney
who
issued
them
was
illegally
appointed.
Another
dress-up
prosecutor
The
author
of
this
perversion
is
John
Sarcone,
III,
who
was
installed
as
US
Attorney
for
NDNY
following
a
now-familiar
pattern.
On
March
17,
Trump
tapped
Sarcone,
a
MAGA
loyalist
who
never
worked
as
a
prosecutor,
to
lead
the
office
in
Albany.
Sarcone’s
tenure
has
been
lackluster
at
best.
In
June,
he
claimed
that
a
man
on
the
street
outside
a
hotel
lunged
at
him
and
threatened
to
kill
him.
That
encounter
turned
out
to
have
been
rather
different
from
Sarcone’s
description.
But
it
led
to
an
investigation
by
the
Albany
Times
Union
which
revealed
that
Sarcone’s
putative
residence
in
the
district
was
actually
a
boarded-up
vacant
property.
That
in
turn
led
to
an
ethics
complaint
after
Sarcone
removed
the
paper
and
its
journalists
from
approved
media
lists.
In
short,
Sarcone
is
exactly
the
kind
of
guy
who
would
abuse
the
grand
jury
process
to
seek
revenge
on
Trump’s
nemesis.
After
Sarcone’s
120-day
interim
appointment
timed
out,
he
claimed
that
he’d
been
given
the
nod
to
stay
on
by
the
district’s
judges,
pursuant
to
28
USC
§
546.
He
had
not.
Instead,
AG
Bondi
purported
to
keep
him
on
the
job
by
appointing
him
as
the
first
assistant
US
Attorney
at
NDNY,
and
having
him
succeed
himself
as
acting
US
Attorney
by
operation
of
the
Federal
Vacancies
Reform
Act
(FVRA).
Alternatively,
she
appointed
him
a
“special
attorney”
authorized
to
conduct
“any
kind
of
legal
proceedings,
civil
or
criminal,
including
Grand
Jury
proceedings
and
proceedings
before
United
States
Magistrates,
which
United
States
Attorneys
are
authorized
to
conduct.”
This
may
have
been
the
first
time
Bondi
tried
this
wheeze,
but
it
wasn’t
the
last.
She
executed
the
same
maneuver
in
New
Jersey,
Nevada,
and
California,
and
courts
rejected
it
every
time.
In
each
of
those
cases,
the
motions
to
disqualify
the
district’s
chief
prosecutor
were
assigned
to
out-of-district
judges
to
avoid
potential
conflict.
And
since
the
OAG’s
motion
to
quash
the
subpoena
in
Albany
challenged
legality
of
Sarcone’s
appointment,
it
was
assigned
to
Judge
Schofield,
a
senior
judge
brought
in
from
the
Southern
District
of
New
York.
It’s
not
a
secret
if
we
all
know
about
it
Because
grand
jury
matters
are
presumptively
secret,
the
court
clerk
docketed
the
OAG’s
motion
to
quash
the
Sarcone
subpoenas
under
seal
—
that
is,
it
did
not
appear
on
the
public
docket.
But
here
the
existence
of
the
subpoenas
and
the
DOJ’s
“civil
rights”
investigation
was
widely
reported,
and
so
the
OAG
filed
a
motion
to
unseal,
effectively
heading
off
the
government’s
effort
to
hide
its
harassment
campaign
in
the
jury
room.
On
Halloween,
Judge
Schofield
ruled
that
unsealing
was
not
only
permissible,
but
mandatory.
“The
‘special
circumstances’
of
this
case
—
namely
that
the
grand
jury
information
at
issue
is
not
secret
and
that
the
motion
to
quash
implicates
questions
of
national
concern
—
weigh
decisively
in
favor
of
unsealing,”
she
wrote,
noting
the
widespread
interest
in
potential
weaponization
of
the
DOJ,
intrusions
on
state
sovereignty,
and
the
illegal
appointment
of
(yet
another)
US
Attorney.
None
of
this
bodes
well
for
Sarcone,
who
has
to
prove
to
Judge
Schofield
that
he’s
entitled
to
stay
on
the
job.
In
New
Jersey,
Nevada,
and
California,
trial
judges
ruled
that
Trump’s
lackeys
were
unlawfully
appointed
using
the
identical
first
assistant/special
attorney
ploy.
But
in
each
case,
the
court
denied
the
defendants’
motion
dismiss,
since
other,
legally-appointed
lawyers
participated
in
their
prosecutions.
Judge
J.
Michael
Seabright
went
further,
ruling
that
Bill
Essayli,
the
goon
who
overstayed
his
welcome
as
the
US
Attorney
for
the
Central
District
of
California,
could
still
exercise
authority
as
the
first
assistant.
But
in
the
Eastern
District
of
Virginia,
Bondi
appears
to
have
gotten
sloppy.
She
never
made
Trump’s
insurance
lawyer
Lindsey
Halligan
the
first
assistant
or
a
special
attorney.
She
simply
installed
her
as
interim
US
Attorney
—
a
move
that
has
been
rejected
by
three
different
courts
now.
Halligan’s
position
is
thus
uniquely
vulnerable,
as
are
the
indictments
of
AG
James
and
former
FBI
director
James
Comey.
Halligan
signed
the
indictments
herself,
since
no
other
lawyer
in
EDVA
would
get
near
those
cases.
So,
if
her
appointment
is
illegal,
then
those
indictments
are
likely
a
nullity.
Sarcone
will
have
to
argue
that
his
position
is
more
like
Essayli’s
than
Halligan’s.
On
the
one
hand,
his
name
is
the
only
one
on
the
subpoenas,
which
he
signed
as
“Acting
United
States
Attorney.”
On
the
other,
he
could
almost
certainly
have
secured
the
subpoenas
in
his
capacity
as
first
assistant
or
special
attorney.
So,
perhaps
the
judge
will
disqualify
him
as
US
Attorney,
and
find
that
the
subpoenas
are
still
valid.
Whatever
happens,
the
episode
is
further
proof
that
Trump
has
corrupted
the
Justice
Department.
The
court
should
reject
these
revenge
subpoenas
and
put
an
end
to
this
gross
perversion
of
prosecutorial
authority.
Oh,
and
PS:
Guess
which
public
office
Sarcone
ran
for
in
2022.
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to
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