Now we know why Rachel Brand resigned from Trump’s DOJ
Yesterday came the surprising announcement that Rachel Brand, the No. 3 at the Department of Justice, was resigning to take a job in the private sector. This sent shockwaves across the political landscape because Brand would have been next in line to inherit control over the Trump-Russia investigation if Donald Trump ever figures out how to get rid of Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. Now we’re learning that her departure doesn’t mean anything, because she wasn’t going to inherit the investigation anyway.
The pessimists of the Resistance feared that Rachel Brand’s exit was a sign that Trump was about to magically get away with it all. The conspiracy theorists suggested that Trump might have somehow managed to convince Walmart to make Brand an offer she couldn’t refuse, in order to get her out of the line of succession. But it turns out Brand was about to have to recuse herself from the Trump-Russia probe entirely.
Carl Bernstein of Watergate investigative fame reported on CNN today that Brand’s husband is a partner in the law firm that just took over the defense for Trump-Russia suspect Rick Gates. That law firm is now negotiating a plea deal with Special Counsel Robert Mueller. This means that Brand could not have been in charge of Mueller’s investigation. If Trump did oust Rosenstein, it would have forced Brand to take a pass, and hand it off to the next person in the line of succession.
This makes it fairly easy to figure out why Rachel Brand resigned. She wasn’t going to be in charge of the Trump-Russia investigation one way or the other, meaning her departure wasn’t going to put the sanctity of the investigation at risk. As so often turns out to be the case with these kinds of incidental developments that get hyped to the sky by cable news, this story is a nothingburger. Bring on impeachment.
