Special counsel Robert Mueller just took the gloves off.
A new report detailing a pre-dawn raid at the home of a key Trump ally by FBI agents armed with a wide-ranging search warrant is intended to send a message.
The Washington Post reports:
Federal agents appeared at Paul Manafort’s home without advance warning in the predawn hours of July 26, the day after he met voluntarily with the staff for the Senate Intelligence Committee.
The search warrant was wide-ranging and FBI agents working with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III departed the home with various records. Jason Maloni, a spokesman for Manafort, confirmed that agents executed a warrant at one of the political consultant’s homes and that Manafort cooperated with the search.
The raid came as Manafort has been voluntarily producing documents to congressional committees investigating Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election. The search warrant indicates investigators may have argued to a federal judge they had reason to believe Manafort could not be trusted to turn over all records in response to a grand jury subpoena.
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Manafort’s allies fear that Mueller hopes to build a case against Manafort unrelated to the 2016 campaign, in hopes that the former campaign operative would provide information against others in Trump’s inner circle in exchange for lessening his own legal exposure.
This high-pressure tactic appears to come from a member of Mueller’s team – Andrew Weissmann, who Reuters described as “a veteran federal prosecutor” known for “persuading witnesses to turn on friends, colleagues, and superiors.”
Weissmann was a key prosecutor in the Enron scandal.
At the time he was brought on Mueller’s team, Reuters also noted:
Critics have said say Weissmann’s hardball approach can lead to prosecutorial overreach. A number of Enron convictions were overturned on appeal . . .
Defense lawyer Tom Kirkendall, who represented clients related to the Enron case, said the task force intimidated witnesses and misinterpreted the law.
With an investigation team designed to bring down a president, Trump won’t have the benefit of overturning his “conviction” on appeal.
This latest development may be just the latest sign the Deep State is ramping up its efforts to take down Trump for good.