Government

Put Your Pants Back On, Jeff Clark! You're In The Clear!*

*Offer not available in Georgia.

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jeffrey clark Justice Department Makes Announcement On Opioid Settlement In Washington

(Photo by Yuri Gripas-Pool/Getty Images)

Congratulations to Jeff Clark, the big winner in Donald Trump’s superseding indictment in the election interference case against Donald Trump. Co-Conspirator 4, “a Justice Department official who worked on civil matters and who, with the Defendant, attempted to use the Justice Department to open sham election crime investigations and influence state legislatures with knowingly false claims of election fraud” has disappeared from the charging document. But not from our hearts! Or from the DC Bar’s hit list!

“The superseding indictment, which was presented to a new grand jury that had not previously heard evidence in this case, reflects the Government’s efforts to respect and implement the Supreme Court’s holdings and remand instructions in Trump v. United States, 144 S. Ct. 2312 (2024),” Special Counsel Jack Smith wrote in the notice accompanying the filing.

When SCOTUS’s six conservatives legalized presidential bribery on the last day of the term, they also threw in an extra parting gift, excluding evidence of official acts even when the charged conduct is non-official. That includes Clark’s attempted coup at the DOJ, wherein he tried to get himself made acting attorney general so he could tell swing state legislatures that there had been outcome-determinative vote fraud and they should claw back Biden’s electoral votes.

Gone is the section on “The Defendant’s Attempt to Leverage the Justice Department to Use Deceit to Get State Officials to Replace Legitimate Electors and Electoral Votes With Defendant’s.” And the jurors will not get to hear former Deputy AG Rich Donoghue recount how he snarked to Clark in the Oval Office, “You’re an environmental lawyer. How about you go back to your office and we’ll call you when there’s an oil spill?”

Clark is reacting with his usual aplomb and and deep understanding of the law.

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In case he blocks you — the list is long and distinguished — he’s ranting about Justice Scalia’s dissent in Morrison v. Olson, the case in which the Supreme Court held that the Independent Counsel Act was constitutional.

“One problem Scalia spotted with Independent Counsels (and the same problem applies to Special Counsels) is that they are given only one man or woman to target,” he natters. “This inherently makes them like Lavrenty Beria of the Soviet Union (show me the man and I’ll find you the crime).”

This is, of course, nonsense. Special Counsel Mueller indicted Paul Manafort, Michael Flynn, Roger Stone and not Donald Trump. Independent Counsel Ken Starr indicted Susan McDougal and Webster Hubbell and not Bill Clinton — and it sure wasn’t for lack of trying. And Jack Smith has indicted Trump’s idiot henchmen, Walt Nauta and Carlos de Oliveira along with their boss.

But Clark wasn’t done. He went on to lament the special counsel’s independence, because someone inside the government would take a holistic approach and un-indict Trump for the good of the country.

In a saner age and with use of only a Non-Independent/Non-Special Counsel, after the failed assassination attempt on Trump, an ordinary prosecutor thinking about the national interest might say to him or herself: Let me drop this hyper-political case and help the Nation heal. People can go to the ballot box. That is enough.

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Ummmmmmm …

Note that Mister No Pants Dance isn’t calling for Special Counsel David Weiss to drop the charges against Hunter Biden, criminal mastermind, in light of his father’s exit from the political scene.

And not for nothing, but who does Jeff think would be prosecuting Trump if not Jack Smith? Main Justice? The US Attorneys for DC and Florida? Does he understand the entire point of this exercise is to remove the inherent conflict of interest when the president’s political appointees investigate his political rival or his kid?

But let’s not be a Debbie Downer on our buddy Jeff’s special day. He’s not going to have to testify, and he’s no longer an unindicted co-conspirator in a federal case. Of course, he’s still under indictment in Georgia and facing a two-year suspension from the practice of law. But if his hero gets back into the White House, maybe he’ll get to be Attorney General after all.

Liz Dye lives in Baltimore where she produces the Law and Chaos substack and podcast.

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