Two Unintended Consequences of the Special Counsel Appointment

WASHINGTON - Jan. 12, 2023 - PRLog -- As he explained, AG Merrick Garland appointed Robert Hur as special counsel to investigate the handling of classified documents found in places related to Biden in order to help assure the public that a criminal investigation fraught with conflicts of interest would be conducted as fairly and impartially as possible.

But today's bombshell is likely to have two additional and probably unintended consequences, suggests public interest law professor John Banzhaf:

First, although the situations are very different, the appointment of a second special prosecutor to oversee classified document cases is likely to create a false equivalency in the minds of many, thereby making it more difficult to charge Trump with criminal offenses related to his own handling of classified documents.

Second, for this and other reasons, it is increasingly likely that the first - and perhaps the only - indictment of Trump will be brought in Fulton Country, Georgia, by DA Fani Willis, for the clearly documented attempts by Trump and his allies to falsify presidential election returns.

Although to most lawyers and sophisticated observers, the cases involving Biden and Trump are very different, the mere fact that the AG has appointed special prosecutors to oversee the criminal investigations of both situations involving the mishandling of classified documents is likely to create a false equivalency between the two.

That false equivalence was already being touted by many members of Congress, newscasters, columnists, and others, but the decision by Garland to treat them the same way for now greatly increases the credence and strength of those claims, argues Banzhaf.

This, Banzhaf says, is just one additional reason why it would be so difficult for Garland to approve the criminal prosecution of Trump but not Biden; so it appears that the first - and perhaps only - indictment of Trump will occur in Georgia where the facts and law are much clearer, and many of the other impediments to a federal prosecution of Trump do not exist.

Although there are vast legally significant differences between any classified document criminal cases against Trump and against Biden, many laymen may well see them as similar enough to expect if not demand substantially the same treatment, thereby risking not only public outrage if Trump but not Biden is prosecuted, but also the very real possibility of juror nullification, says Banzhaf, an expert in both jury- and juror nullification, and the lawyer who filed the formal complaint which led to Willis' criminal investigation of Trump.

Even before this recent classified document revelation involving Biden, many experts have concluded that the case under Georgia's criminal law was the strongest of the three which might be brought against Trump

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