DOJ and FBI officials reach out to lawyers as potential Trump revenge prosecutions loom
Current and former senior DOJ and FBI officials are reaching out to lawyers in anticipation of being criminally investigated by the Trump administration, people with knowledge of their deliberations say.
Multiple current and former senior Justice Department and FBI officials have begun reaching out to lawyers in anticipation of being criminally investigated by the Trump administration, according to three people with knowledge of their deliberations.
Following Trump’s decisive election victory, many Justice Department officials and career staffers were already nervous about the possibility that they would be targeted by Trump loyalists, particularly members of Congress. But the selection of former Rep. Matt Gaetz, a firebrand Trump ally who was the subject of a recent FBI investigation, to lead the department has sharply increased the sense of alarm, the sources said.
“Everything we did was aboveboard,” said a former senior FBI official who has started contacting lawyers because he expects to be prosecuted himself. “But this is a different world.”
The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of becoming even more of a target, doesn’t believe any attempt to prosecute him will be successful. Judges and juries have the power to throw out cases or find defendants innocent if they deem prosecutions to be baseless.
But like many other current and former Justice Department officials, he is bracing for a potentially long and costly legal battle, as well as the possibility of protracted congressional investigations, after Trump takes office in January.
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