Trump Legal Team ‘Quietly Preparing’ for Criminal Charges from the DOJ, Including Searching for ‘Fall Guys’ to Blame: Report
Alex Wong/Getty Images
Legal advisers for former President Donald Trump are “quietly preparing” for possible criminal charges to be filed by the Department of Justice, according to a Rolling Stone article published Sunday evening — including strategizing for one or more “fall guys” to take the blame.
According to the report by Rolling Stone’s Asawin Suebsaeng and Adam Rawnsely, Trump’s legal team has been growing “increasingly anxious” that the ex-president could face prosecution for his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss to President Joe Biden, including the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Three anonymous sources described as “people familiar with the matter” spoke to Rolling Stone and provided written communications for the magazine to review, saying that the lawyers were “brainstorming strategy and potential defenses,” and that Trump had been briefed “on potential legal defenses on at least two occasions this summer.”
June’s bombshell testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Trump’s then-Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, before the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack was the trigger for why the legal team had “intensified” their efforts, the sources claimed.
“Members of the Trump legal team are quietly preparing, in the event charges are brought,” one source said. “It would be career malpractice not to.” The source added that Trump’s lawyers were skeptical that the Department of Justice — especially with the cautious Attorney General Merrick Garland at the helm — would actually go so far as to file criminal charges against a former president, “[b]ut we’ve gotten to a point where if you don’t think criminal charges are at least somewhat likely, you are not serving the [former] president’s best interests.”
One significant aspect of the legal battle plans includes “shifting blame from Trump to his advisors for the efforts to overturn the election,” by finding one or more “fall-guys.”
Potential targets highlighted in links within the Rolling Stone article include Meadows and attorney John Eastman, who played a key role in shaping a strategy for then-Vice President Mike Pence to reject the votes of the Electoral College or otherwise delay certifying the vote.
One source commented on the “terrible advice” Trump got from some of his attorneys, theorizing that he might try to assert an “advice of counsel” defense. In addition to Eastman, that particular finger of blame could be pointed at Rudy Giuliani or Sidney Powell, among others.
