Paul Rosenzweig on Investigating American Presidents
The Lawfare Podcast
The Lawfare Institute
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 10 November 2018
⏱️ 32 minutes
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Summary
With the firing of Jeff Sessions and his replacement with former U.S. attorney Matt Whitaker, all eyes this week are focused on whether Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible coordination between the Trump campaign and the Russians will get to run its full course. But even before the Sessions firing, Benjamin Wittes and Paul Rosenzweig had inquiries into the presidency on their minds. On Tuesday morning, they sat down to discuss Paul’s recent 12-part lecture series on presidential investigations released through the online educational platform The Great Courses.
They talked about how Paul structured the lecture series, Paul’s own experience on Independent Counsel Ken Starr’s team investigating the Clinton White House, and the course’s relevance to the Mueller investigation.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The following podcast contains advertising. |
| 0:04.0 | To access an ad-free version of the LawFair podcast, |
| 0:08.0 | become a material supporter of LawFair at patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:14.0 | That's patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:18.0 | Also, check out LawFair's other podcast offerings, |
| 0:22.0 | rational security, chatter, law fair no bull, and the aftermath. |
| 0:30.0 | We ask questions like, what is the source of the executive privilege? |
| 0:38.0 | And how is it examined? Is a president who is sitting in office |
| 0:42.0 | inditable for criminal conduct at all? |
| 0:44.0 | Can he use the pardon power to excuse himself? |
| 0:48.0 | One of my favorite lectures in an odd sense is looking at the president's ability |
| 0:54.0 | and it's not really a legal question, but it is unique to President's ability |
| 0:58.0 | to change the public conversation and to use the bully pulpit as President Trump |
| 1:04.0 | does so masterfully to demonize his opponents and change the discussion. |
| 1:10.0 | He, for example, is fond of calling the Mueller investigation a witch hunt. |
| 1:14.0 | Turns out that Richard Nixon used the exact same words, you know, more than 45 years ago. |
| 1:21.0 | I'm Mikhail Afogal, and this is the LawFair podcast, |
| 1:25.0 | November 10, 2018. |
| 1:28.0 | With the firing of Jeff Sessions and his replacement with former US attorney Matt Whitaker, |
| 1:33.0 | all eyes this week are focused on whether special counsel Robert Muller's investigation |
| 1:38.0 | of Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible coordination between the Trump campaign |
| 1:43.0 | and the Russians will get to run its full course. |
... |
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