Former DOJ officials raise Trump AT&T interference concerns

[wishstar]

Source: NBC News

WASHINGTON — A group of former top Department of Justice lawyers are arguing the Trump administration's attempt to challenge the AT&T-Time Warner merger violates the Constitution if the action is punishment for CNN's news coverage.

On Thursday night, at least eleven former U.S. officials filed an amicus brief in the lawsuit between AT&T and the Department of Justice. The DOJ in November of 2017 sued to block the telecom giant’s $85.4 billion bid to take over Time Warner, the parent company of CNN. The trial is set to begin March 19.

The effort includes Preet Bharara, the former U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York from 2009 to 2017 who was fired in the early months of the Trump administration. John Dean, a onetime White House counsel to former President Richard Nixon who became a prominent figure in the Watergate scandal, is also part of the brief.

The group is also concerned about Trump targeting other news organizations including threats to rescind broadcast licenses of media networks, hints about using antitrust authorities to punish the owner of the Washington Post and calls for journalists to be fired by their employers."



Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/top-attorneys-try-help-t-challenge-potential-trump-interference-n855036

[Wwcd]

1. Important Article. McCaskill's statement said much about what is taken for granted in the US

On Wednesday night, the New York Times reported that Trump approached key witnesses in the special counsel’s Russia probe about their private testimony. It’s the latest example of Trump potentially attempting to influence the work of law enforcement officials, dating to Comey’s claim last year that Trump had asked him for a loyalty pledge.

“The president thought that this was going to be his Justice Department. He thought these lawyers were like the lawyers he hired for real estate deals. He thought they were working for him, not for the Constitution,” Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., said Thursday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” program.

“We have in this country a separation between politics and law enforcement that the rest of the world envies and we’ve got to be very sure that doesn’t get eroded during this presidency,” McCaskill said.

Bhahara was one of the nation’s most aggressive prosecutors of corruption and Wall Street crime. He has also been an outspoken critic of Trump.

Dean pled guilty to helping to cover up the Watergate scandal, becoming a key witness for the prosecution that brought down Nixon. He’s also been an outspoken Trump critic.

[laserhaas]

2. If one is - Above the Law - then it matters not, what one does

Link to tweet

.