Testimony from one of Robert Mueller’s top prosecutors, not the ex-special counsel himself, is when the real “damage” to President Trump will be done, according to attorney Joe diGenova.
Mueller agreed to public testimony before the House Intelligence and Judiciary committees on July 17 in response to a pair of subpoenas from Chairmen Adam Schiff of California and Jerry Nadler of New York. As part of the deal, Schiff told CNN that there will also be an “executive session” with Mueller and members of his staff.
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DiGenova, a former U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, dubbed Mueller a “cadaver,” predicting his testimony “is going to be basically worthless” during an interview Thursday on Fox Business. Instead, he said watch out for what Andrew Weissmann could tell lawmakers in a closed setting.
“Well, Jerry Nadler, the mumbler, is going to be questioning Bob Mueller, the cadaver. If you’ve watched Mueller, he barely functions. His testimony is going to be basically worthless. He may want to answer some of the questions and he may even try to go beyond the four corners,” diGenova said on Lou Dobbs Tonight.
“The real damage is going to be done the next day when they have testimony from Weissmann and his aides which will be done in executive session with unlimited questioning,” he added. “That’s when the damage to the president is going to be done. Bob Mueller is nothing more than a figurehead. This has always been the Weissmann investigation, and it’ll be the Weissmann testimony.”
Weissmann, who recently scored a book deal, was known as Mueller’s “pitbull.” According to Michael Wolff’s book Siege, Weissmann led the initiative to draft a three-count obstruction of justice indictment against Trump, which Mueller’s spokesman denied existed.
Both diGenova and his wife Victoria Toensing, who is also a lawyer, agreed that Weissmann and his colleagues will lie.
DiGenova served as an independent counsel in the 1990s for a case on President Bill Clinton’s passport before he was elected. Last year, it was announced diGenova and Toensing were joining Trump’s legal team for the federal Russia investigation, but that plan was nixed within days. He has been highly critical of Mueller’s Russia investigation, claiming that Trump had been “framed” by the Justice Department and the FBI.
