The interview that will (likely) never happen

As negotiations between the Trump and Mueller camps drag on, the perceived odds of the encounter actually happening have diminished. “The whole thing has been a charade, and Giuliani is playing for what he ultimately believes may be an impeachment hearing. He is trying to win the hearts and minds of the people. . . . all of this negotiating is pure nonsense,” Glenn Kirschner, a former homicide prosecutor, told me, dismissing the notion that Giuliani and the rest of Trump’s legal team will ever allow the president to go toe-to-toe with Mueller. “I joke that if you ask the president 10 questions, he probably picks up nine false-statement charges after the first question, which is state your name. I am assuming that he can get that one right, but we have all seen the man—he is a showman, and not a particularly good showman.”

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Giuliani appears to be betting that Mueller won’t want to engage in a months- or years-long legal battle over whether a sitting president can be subpoenaed. But it is just as likely that Mueller figured an interview was always a long shot, and has been playing along, in part, to establish that their negotiations were always in good faith.

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“Bob Mueller has a very, very good instinct for politics and the dangers of Washington, D.C., that’s what made him a very good F.B.I. director,” said Robert Grant, a top former F.B.I. agent and a longtime colleague and friend of the special counsel. “I think his greatest strength was his ability to navigate shark-infested waters very well. He is in tune with both Republicans and Democrats,” Grant continued. “I think going into the election, he is going to be very mindful of the potential impact of anything he does on the midterm elections.”

Kirschner concurred. “The one thing I am confident of is that he is going to make sure that he doesn’t do anything on the timing front that would interfere with the midterm elections. . . . I suspect that we are not going to see anything dramatic between now and the midterms,” he told me. But after a pause, he added, “Who knows? These are unprecedented times and circumstances.”

  Vanity Fair

Preet Bharara, the SDNY AG fired by Trump says the same thing.

But after a pause, [Kirschner] added, “Who knows? These are unprecedented times and circumstances.” The former homicide prosecutor said that while it wouldn’t surprise him if Mueller went radio silent for the next 60 days, he could also see his former boss operating on the fringes of the investigation, possibly bringing indictments against “satellite players” in the probe such as longtime Trump confident and G.O.P. operative Roger Stone and his associates. “I don’t think those kinds of indictments would necessarily impact or interfere with the midterms,” he posited.

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“Bob Mueller is notoriously impatient,” noted Grant. “My guess is that he is pressing his lawyers as hard as he can without interfering with the strategy or the tactics of the investigation.” After the midterm elections, many observers expect the Justice Department to bring indictments that implicate more significant targets, potentially including Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr. and his son-in-law and top adviser, Jared Kushner, for their roles in a Trump Tower meeting with Russian agents peddling dirt on Hillary Clinton. “I have a feeling one way or another that we are going to see a large conspiracy indictment. Who that might include, that is hard to say,” Kirschner said.

Nice Christmas present.

The special counsel, for his part, has given no indication that he is shying away from the political battle to come. “Bob is not afraid of anything for god’s sakes, given what he went through in Vietnam,” said Kirschner. Indeed, everyone I have spoken with who knows Mueller has expressed an unwavering trust that the former F.B.I. director will see his job through to the bitter end. “He is the real deal. He will get to the bottom of this and no one is going to stop him,” said Eugene Casey, the former chief of the F.B.I.’s Eurasian Organized Crime Unit. “I just hope he doesn’t get fired and is able to complete his investigation.”

If he does get fired, I would expect his team to take it personally and dig in.