Trump’s Hail Mary vs Biden? Hail Durham; Hail Barr! Or will Biden Hail Dunn-Bauer?

William Barr by Nancy Ohanian

The one thing, which could plausibly sink Biden’s ticket and (less easily) re-elect Trump’s ticket, would be bombshells from the Attorney General William Barr-delegated investigation, by U.S. Attorney John Durham, of the Russiagate investigation (which includes, without being limited to, criminal conduct).

That’s my view, and apparently the view of the two VSPs who have recently published, in the VSP forum Just Security, the following two shots across Durham’s bow.

[July 25th 2020-- 1st Shot: Danger to US Intelligence Analysis:]

• one wonders whether the long-running investigation shepherded by John Durham... is being readied for a role as the next election-shaping "October Surprise." If true, the reported nature of Durham’s investigation poses a serious threat to US foreign intelligence collection and analysis extending well beyond any political impact.

Author:

• George Croner: Former principal litigation counsel at the National Security Agency. He is a Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, and a member of the Advisory Council at the Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law (CERL) at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. Follow him on Twitter @GeorgeCroner.

[August 6th 2020-- 2nd Shot: Open Letter to Durham:]

• If the conclusion is reached by you [Durham] or others at the Justice Department that a report on your investigation should be issued, or that criminal indictments are warranted, these actions should be deferred until after the 2020 presidential election.

Author:

• Fred Wertheimer (@FredWertheimer)... served from 1981 to 1995 as President of Common Cause, a national citizens’ advocacy group. is the Founder and President of Democracy 21... primary focus is campaign finance issues and laws and it promotes government integrity, transparency and accountability policies to accomplish its goals.

Barr has publicly predicted that Durham will find new evidence of old allegations and perhaps new examples of improper conduct. Barr's prediction seems credible to me because the contrary arguments tend to be less granular, tend to over-simplify the findings of previous investigations, and tend to delay as long as possible addressing new disclosures that keep trickling out from Rightwing lawsuits under the Freedom of Information Act.

Although the strength of evidence Durham may find is impossible to predict, what is already foreseeable is that Barr would probably like to balance several competing pressures, such as:

1- Barr has long opposed constraints on Presidential power, and clearly hates the way that Russiagate was used against Trump.
2- Barr must hate being vilified by the many elite critics of his performance as Trump’s attorney general.
3- Barr has occasionally admitted that Trump himself is one reason that Barr's work in the Trump administration is so stressful (and of course Barr can see as well as anybody else that Trump's casual polarizing of the populace is bad for preservation of domestic and imperial institutions).

Bottom line, Barr’s sweet spot is probably for Durham to bring any indictments, and to make any other public indications of his findings, soon after the November 3 vote count has been finalized, and to push them forward as far as possible before the new Administration takes office. This approach would:

1- Cool off the TDS rage of Barr’s critics (by not helping Trump get re-elected);
2- Vindicate some of Barr’s previously vilified actions; and
3- Deliver to the next administration the gift of reinforced Presidential powers/immunities (which will be greatly appreciated behind the scenes, even if not in public rhetoric).

Durham himself presumably appreciates how the above balancing would play out for Barr, and similarly for Durham himself, without there needing to be any express discussion of such crass matters between two such experienced government lawyers.

So how bad will Durham’s results be for Biden? Nobody knows, but everybody knows it could easily be bad enough to undermine the ‘honeymoon’ (if any) available to Biden. This feeds through to Biden’s selection of Vice Presidential running mate. For example:

1- Biden might hesitate to select Susan Rice, because any Durham dirt on Biden would probably also splash onto Susan.
2- Biden might hesitate to select the Republican (close to W. Bush) Condoleeza Rice out of concern that this would further incentivize Barr and Durham to wound Biden so grievously that he must hand over the Presidency to his Republican Vice President.
3- Of course, if much today’s polarization in D.C. is basically an intensified version of the Kabuki of prior decades, then a Biden selection of Condi could be part of a deal in return for Barr and Durham downplaying Biden’s role in whatever dirt they find. That would be win-win for everybody who is anybody (which of course does not include us, or Bernie, or even political neophyte E. Warren). The main barrier to this type of deal would be that Biden doesn’t appear to have the mental bandwidth for this kind of plotting. Also, his inner circle doesn’t appear to have the type of beltway lawyer whom Barr would be comfortable trading winks and nudges with.

But the second circle, according to [Poliitico’s Biden’s Retro Inner Circle], contains just such a person:

• “Anita is the go-to person on both, ‘How do we go on offense and dominate the news cycle?’ and ‘How do we clean this mess up?’” said a former colleague. (Dunn’s husband, Bob Bauer, Obama’s former White House counsel, is also a key member of the larger Biden brain trust.)