DOJ subpoenas dozens of people close to Donald Trump, seizes some of their phones, as the hammer drops
Even as Donald Trump tries to buy himself a bit of time with this special master stunt in the DOJ criminal probe into the nuclear secrets he stole, the DOJ is now dropping the hammer in its criminal probe into Trump’s election overthrow plot and January 6th plot. In fact the DOJ is dropping about forty hammers.
For awhile now it’s circumstantially felt like the DOJ has been lining up its various Trump probes so that they’ll all be ready at around the same time, thus allowing the DOJ to bring a smorgasbord of criminal charges against Trump all at once. The manner in which the DOJ has ramped things up this past week seems to underscore this scenario.
In the past week alone the DOJ has issued grand jury subpoenas to forty people close to Trump, and seized some of their phones, as part of its probe into Trump’s election related crimes, according to the New York Times. This means that everyone around Trump is being forced to provide evidence and/or testimony against him. It’s worth keeping in mind that unlike congressional subpoenas, which can drag out forever in court, grand jury subpoenas tend to be enforced rather swiftly.
We still lack sufficient context to understand just how close to completion this DOJ probe is. Are these evidence-gathering subpoenas which represent the start of a new phase of the probe? Are these grand jury testimony subpoenas which point to the start of the process of actually indicting Trump? We don’t know yet. But while we don’t know when the DOJ will indict Trump, at this point it’s painfully obvious that the DOJ will indict Trump – and on various kinds of criminal charges.
