Ben Wittes: Cohen Plea Suggests There Is a Much Broader Hand Mueller Is Holding

EXCERPT:

WITTES: “Well, so let me start with what John just said because the document that he is referring to is actually a proposed plea agreement between Corsi and the Justice Department or Mueller, and presumably, therefore, contains a relatively small percentage of what Mueller could allege. This is what he was willing to settle for. And so I do think it’s both that and the Cohen plea deal that was reached last week really suggests that there is a very — a much broader hand that Mueller is holding than that he’s showing right now. That takes place, as you just said, against the backdrop of the President’s continued abuse of the Justice Department right now in the form of the installation and maintenance of Matthew Whitaker as the acting attorney general. And so I think when you take all of that together, the basic lay of the land is that you have a Special Counsel with an extremely strong hand of which we’re seeing a small piece being supervised in a fashion that, you know, is — shall we say, does not comport with the highest standards of the department. It’s potentially a very explosive situation.”