Biden insists he was in the dark about Justice Department’s new special prosecutor for Trump probes
This article is more than 1 year old
This article is more than 1 year old
Donald Trump is being investigated by the Justice Department for allegedly obstructing justice while his presidency was being investigated. But Vice-President Mike Pence has remained in the dark on the special counsel’s investigation, and no one in his administration has been interviewed by special counsel Robert Mueller.
According to news reports, Mueller has requested the testimony of all of the top officials in the Trump administration, including Mike Flynn and Pence, to get a better sense of how the president has tried to obstruct the investigation. The Justice Department inspector general is not ruling out that Mueller may end up being the special counsel overseeing the FBI investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 US election.
The question for Pence, who has been publicly non-committal about the Mueller investigation, is whether he will end up as an indicted witness, or a target under subpoena in the investigation into possible obstruction.
The US vice-president has said he would leave the decision to Mueller, but a legal challenge filed by Mike Flynn’s defence attorney suggests that Pence may have a conflict of interest in the Mueller investigation and may be forced to testify.
Pence and his office have resisted the request for a subpoena for Flynn to appear before Mueller, according to the legal challenge. This week, however, his staff confirmed that Flynn would be interviewed by Mueller.
Biden says he was in the dark about the appointment of a special prosecutor
Pence’s non-committal response to the investigation is likely to give more fuel to the Mueller probe. At a conference in India on Friday, Pence said: “The president has not made a decision on whether or not to continue the investigation, so that’s why we’re here.”
A spokesman for the vice-president, Cameron Hammond, declined to say whether the vice-president is in or out of the Mueller investigation, saying: “The president makes determinations on his own.”
