Dershowitz: ‘Mueller Has Revealed His Partisan Bias’ In Favor of Democrats
‘Gave political gift to Democrats in Congress seeking to institute impeachment proceedings against President Trump,’ he says
Constitutional lawyer Alan Dershowitz penned a blistering op-ed criticizing Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s statement implying that President Trump may have committed a crime despite not bringing forward any charges against him.
In an op-ed for The Hill entitled, “Shame On Robert Mueller For Exceeding His Role,” Dershowitz stated that Mueller’s public statement on Wednesday was more irresponsible than fired FBI Director James Comey’s exoneration of Hillary Clinton.
“The statement by special counsel Robert Mueller in a Wednesday press conference that ‘if we had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime we would have said that’ is worse than the statement made by then FBI Director James Comey regarding Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential campaign,” Dershowitz wrote Wednesday.
“Comey said in a 2016 press conference, ‘Although we did not find clear evidence that Secretary Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classified information, there is evidence that they were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive highly classified information.'”
“Comey was universally criticized for going beyond his responsibility to state whether there was sufficient evidence to indict Clinton. Mueller, however, did even more. He went beyond the conclusion of his report and gave a political gift to Democrats in Congress who are seeking to institute impeachment proceedings against President Trump,” he continued.
“By implying that President Trump may have committed obstruction of justice, Mueller effectively invited Democrats to institute impeachment proceedings. Obstruction of justice is a “high crime and misdemeanor” which, under the Constitution, authorizes impeachment and removal of the president.”
Dershowitz, himself a Democrat, then threw Mueller’s professional integrity in doubt, saying Mueller demonstrated his favoritism for the Democrats after he handed them a “political gift” of muddying the waters on obstruction of justice, which the Department of Justice determined did not take place.
“Until today, I have defended Mueller against accusations that he is a partisan. I did not believe that he personally favored either the Democrats or the Republicans, or had a point of view on whether President Trump should be impeached. I have now changed my mind,” he wrote.
“By putting his thumb, indeed his elbow, on the scale of justice in favor of impeachment based on obstruction of justice, Mueller has revealed his partisan bias. He also has distorted the role of a prosecutor in our justice system.”
The constitutional scholar added that Mueller’s only logical purpose of going beyond his report was to smear Trump to help the Democrats with impeachment proceedings, which they immediately called for following Mueller’s public statement.
“No prosecutor should ever say or do anything for the purpose of helping one party or the other. I cannot imagine a plausible reason why Mueller went beyond his report and gratuitously suggested that President Trump might be guilty, except to help the Democrats and to encourage impeachment talk and action. Shame on Mueller for abusing his position of trust and for allowing himself to be used for partisan advantage.”
