Garland did follow the rule of law, just in the case of way he had been successful before - bottom up investigation. And quietly. In the January 6, 2021 Trump case Garland's nose was no way near the political realities should have told him his finger should have been, go after Trump, the law breaker, as hard and as fast as the law allowed. Trump's attack on democracy in his denial of his election loss was plenty of evidence of what Trump was on about. We certainly, from the beginning, fog-horned it from the rooftops here.
If Biden is frustrated with Garland, it’s his own darn fault
April 4, 2022More than 3 years ago
Attorney General Merrick Garland delivers remarks during a news conference on April 1. (Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)
Attorney General Merrick Garland is accumulating a legion of critics over his ponderous pace in investigating the 2020 coup. That includes members of Congress and the White House dismayed about his failure to move more swiftly to investigate and indict the former defeated president Donald Trump and his inner circle. Some legal experts fear he might have already ruled out indicting Trump, because he either thinks prosecution will be unsuccessful or believes there is some legal infirmity with prosecution. The conversation moves fast. Keep up with the Prompt newsletter.
The New York Times reports .. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/02/us/politics/merrick-garland-biden-trump.html?smtyp=cur&smid=tw-nytimes , “The attorney general’s deliberative approach has come to frustrate Democratic allies of the White House and, at times, President Biden himself." The Times says that "while the president has never communicated his frustrations directly to Mr. Garland, he has said privately that he wanted Mr. Garland to act less like a ponderous judge and more like a prosecutor who is willing to take decisive action over the events of Jan. 6.” Biden’s frustration notwithstanding, the blame is not only Garland’s. Advertisement
A host of former DOJ lawyers, prosecutors, commentators and legal experts warned Biden that the qualities needed to be a federal judge were different than those suited for attorney general. As Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) has remarked, Garland "comes out of an ivory tower judgeship, far away from a lot of the political mischief. And I’m not sure how much situational awareness he has about the forces that are operating … around the department and operated through the department, it appears, during the Trump administration.”
Biden knew what he was getting when he picked Garland. He selected someone totally lacking not only in partisanship but in political awareness and savviness. Biden chose a judge known for his deliberate, copious analysis. He and his advisers certainly knew Garland avoided public speaking and writing as a judge. That Garland has eschewed the public limelight and lacked prosecutorial zeal and willingness to challenge Justice Department protocol and traditions should come as no surprise.
Garland likes to invoke as a role model Edward Levi, the post-Watergate attorney general who reformed the Justice Department. However, Garland misses a critical attribute Levi possessed, as Lawfare’s legal gurus explain .. https://www.lawfareblog.com/merrick-garland-needs-speak : “Ed Levi spoke a lot. Garland has been, in sharp contrast, largely invisible. … You don’t establish norms, or reestablish them, merely by modeling them. You establish them by articulating them, by talking about them, and by convincing people that they are the right way to behave.”
And you do not reassure the public that you are defending democracy by failing to explain the crime you are investigating: a plot that began well before Jan. 6 to overthrow our democracy and install the losing candidate.
If Biden is displeased with Garland — or finds he lacks the necessary qualities to conduct the sort of investigation our fragile democracy requires — Biden can replace him. He has every right to a new attorney general who embraces the public, educational nature of the job and who will push back aggressively against institutional reticence and wariness of disrupting outmoded conventions.
In addition to selecting an attorney general who lacked political deftness and prosecutorial zeal, Biden has certainly not helped matters by failing to address the urgency of the Republicans’ assault on democracy. He has studiously avoided making the connection between defense of democracy in Ukraine and defense of democracy here at home. He refuses to give a speech explaining that our ability to mount a democratic alliance in support of the West demands we defeat domestic authoritarian impulses, such as big lies and conspiracies in service of propaganda, assaults on election results and election officials, and the embrace of violence.
Without naming specific defendants, Biden can publicly declare that those legally responsible for the coup must be held accountable. (One hopes he made this clear when he interviewed Garland.) And Biden could still task the Justice Department as a matter of policy with presenting a report on threats to democracy and recommendations for addressing it.
In sum, Biden chose someone not suited for prosecuting a former president and co-conspirators, and not inclined to play the public role that is a critical part of the job. Biden has not lit a fire under Garland. Certainly, the public has every reason to be frustrated with Garland. But the buck stops with his boss. If Biden is a lackluster defender of democracy at home, what do you expect of his attorney general?
Jennifer Rubin wrote reported opinion for The Washington Post. She is the author of “Resistance: How Women Saved Democracy from Donald Trump” and is host of the podcast Jen Rubin's "Green Room." follow on X@JRubinBlogger
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