Well, I guess this is a last lick here for the Robert Mueller hearings…for now. I’m sure this hot mess will be dredged up again at some point in the future. Yet, of the many, many ‘what the hell’ moments from this trainwreck of a hearing, there’s one that should’ve raised some eyebrows. It was when the former special counsel refused to say whether his team leaked details of the FBI raid against Trump confidant Roger Stone to CNN. You remember that, right? CNN just happened to be there as FBI agents in full tactical gear prepared to raid the home of Mr. Stone. The Federalist was all over this, submitting a FOIA request for all communications between CNN and the FBI leading up to the raid. That was in April, and the bureau refused to turn them over:
The FBI … rejected an open records request from The Federalist for any and all emails sent to or from CNN the day of the pre-dawn raid at the home of Roger Stone.
“Please provide all e-mails sent to or received from any account with a ‘cnn.com’ domain from January 24, 2019 through January 25, 2019,” The Federalist wrote in a Freedom Of Information Act request submitted on the morning of January 25, 2019.
CNN was the only network present at the Fort Lauderdale home of Roger Stone, a former Trump associate who was indicted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, prior to the arrival of FBI agents dispatched to arrest the bombastic former Nixon aide. The pre-dawn arrival of CNN at what was supposed to be a surprise raid of Stone’s home raised questions about whether the network had been tipped off about the impending FBI arrest of Stone.
David Shortell, the CNN reporter who broadcast live from Stone’s home during the raid, rejected suggestions that he had been tipped off to the raid and claimed that it was a gut feeling that compelled him to camp outside Stone’s residence the same day federal agents showed up to arrest Stone.
“It’s reporter’s instinct,” Shortell said…
So, for an investigation that appeared to be a tight-run ship, did the team leak details of the raid to the press? Mueller refused to answer:
U.S. Rep. Chris Stewart (R-Utah) asked Mueller directly during the former special counsel’s testimony before the House Intelligence Committee whether the office tipped off CNN of the incoming raid on Stone’s Florida residence in February.
Are you aware of anyone on your team having given advanced knowledge of the raid on Roger Stone’s home to any person or the press including CNN?” Stewart asked.
“I’m not going to speak to that,” Mueller responded.
Mueller’s answer comes amid scrutiny over how CNN, which was the only news organization to stake out Stone’s home for his arrest, knew that there was going to be a raid on the political consultant’s home in Fort Lauderdale.
Overall, these hearings were a good day for the Trump presidency. Mueller didn’t play along with House Democrats and their lust for impeachment. He came off as aloof, disengaged, and perfectly embodied a deteriorating Uncle Junior from The Sopranos. This wasn’t the only area that Mueller refused to answer questions. He decided to stay mum on the entire saga between Fusion GPS, the Trump dossier, and Christopher Steele, the ex-MI6 spook who compiled it. Oh, and this effort was funded by the Clinton campaign and the Democrats. It’s why we’re all here. The Trump dossier is the reason for this whole circus in the first place, but maybe Mueller thought that since Attorney General Barr is looking into the origins of the Trump-Russia collusion myth, he’d be the one who delivers the final kill shot to this liberal media invention. The same goes for the alleged FBI-CNN tag team on the Roger Stone raid. We’ll see, but while Mueller’s refusal to answer questions about the dossier were annoying, it must’ve driven the Democrats to near insanity that their star witness came off as soggy, proving to many that yanking Mueller up to the Hill seemed like a massive overreach.