by
Chip
Somodevilla/Getty
Images)
On
Wednesday,
Jeanine
Pirro
defiantly
insisted
that
her
investigation
of
Federal
Reserve
Chair
Jerome
Powell
was
ongoing.
“This
investigation
continues,”
the
US
Attorney
for
DC
huffed
at
a
press
conference.
“I
am
in
the
legal
lane.
There
are
others
who
are
in
the
political
lane.
I
don’t
intersect
those
two
lanes.”
This
indignation
would
have
been
more
credible
if
she
hadn’t
spent
the
past
four
months
harassing
one
of
the
president’s
most
persistent
foes.
After
Pirro’s
office
subpoenaed
the
Fed
in
January,
Powell
called
her
bluff
and
publicly
denounced
the
effort
to
intimidate
the
central
bank.
Then
in
March,
Chief
Judge
James
Boasberg
quashed
the
subpoenas,
noting
that
Pirro’s
office
had
declined
the
opportunity
to
present
evidence
in
camera
of
any
actual
crime.
“The
Court
is
thus
left
with
no
credible
reason
to
think
that
the
Government
is
investigating
suspicious
facts
as
opposed
to
targeting
a
disfavored
official,”
he
wrote.
“When
the
evidence
of
improper
motive
is
so
strong
and
the
justifications
for
these
subpoenas
are
so
tenuous,
it
is
hard
to
see
the
renovations
and
testimony
as
anything
other
than
a
convenient
pretext
for
launching
a
criminal
investigation
that
the
Government
launched
for
another,
unstated
purpose:
pressuring
Powell
to
knuckle
under.”
Incensed,
Pirro
vowed
to
appeal.
She
also
sent
a
couple
of
lawyers
from
her
office
to
bang
on
the
door
of
the
Fed
and
demand
to
be
let
in
for
a
spot
inspection.
“Should
you
wish
to
challenge
that
finding,
the
courts
provide
an
avenue
for
you;
it
is
not
appropriate
for
you
to
try
to
circumvent
it,”
the
Fed’s
lawyer
Robert
Hur
wrote.
“I
ask
that
you
commit
not
to
seek
to
communicate
with
my
client
outside
the
presence
of
counsel.”
But
Pirro
wasn’t
done
fighting.
“The
idea
that
a
judge
can
stand
at
the
door
of
a
grand
jury
and
tell
a
prosecutor
you’re
not
allowed
to
go
in
when
the
United
States
Supreme
Court
has
said
you
can
go
into
a
grand
jury
based
on
rumors
and
suspicion,
is
an
order
that
we
think
must
be
appealed,
and
we
are
continuing
in
this
investigation,”
she
snarled
on
Wednesday.
In
the
end,
though,
politics
came
for
Pirro.
Republican
Senator
Thom
Tillis
vowed
that
none
of
Trump’s
nominees
to
the
Fed
were
getting
out
of
the
Banking
Committee
until
Pirro
called
off
her
dogs.
And,
with
no
ability
to
replace
Powell
when
his
term
expires
in
three
weeks,
Trump
would
be
stuck
with
his
nemesis
indefinitely
according
to
the
bank’s
own
rules.
This
morning,
Pirro
blinked,
claiming
that
she
was
handing
the
case
off
to
the
Inspector
General
for
the
Federal
Reserve.
In
fact,
Powell
himself
asked
Inspector
General
Michael
Horowitz
to
review
the
project
last
July,
and
the
IG
confirmed
to
NBC
that
there
is
no
new
inquiry.
But
Pirro
was
willing
to
fudge
the
truth
to
make
the
climbdown
a
bit
less
ignominious
—
as
she
has
been
during
this
entire
ridiculous
outing.
“Note
well,
however,
that
I
will
not
hesitate
to
restart
a
criminal
investigation
should
the
facts
warrant
doing
so,”
she
tweeted,
acknowledging
even
as
she
flounced
out
that
the
facts
never
warranted
criminal
investigation
in
the
first
place.
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