46 of them. out of blue in warning all on one day this week here comes 17 replacements. the justice department explained all of the appointments all had to happen on wednesday all at once for a very specific reason. this is from their press release, quote. some of those acting united states attorney also have served the maximum amount of time permitted under the vacancy reform act, 300 days. so that explains the sudden rush of 17 new prosecutors. that deadline arrived. they announced the 17 new people were in right under the wire at day 299. on wednesday. quote, the appointments announced by the attorney general today filled the vacancies. well we and everybody else in creation noted that 300 day delinquent and figured oh, okay that s the rush. that s why it happened. maybe not. a veteran justice department official looking at this same story that everybody reported the same way suggested that this is actually worth a closer look. joining us now for the interview
council don mcgann he is one of the few white house officials allowed to have direct contact with the justice department. but the whole reason those rules exist is to prevent the white house any white house from having untoward influence on law enforcement decisions that are made at the justice department. there is a reason there is strict rules about not very many people from the white house being allowed to speak to justice department officials. don mcgone is one of the people people allowed to speak to the justice department under the strict rules. but if he was sent to the justice department by the president specifically to interfere with the justice department on a law enforcement matter, specifically to interfere with jeff sessions s recusal decision which is part of how the justice department administers the rule of law, then that would be a pretty obvious violation of those important rules that govern how the white house and the justice department are supposed to communicate
deliberate and important decision that jeff sessions is conspicuously not there, well, i think there might be at least be reason to brace yourself for this weekend in terms of what might be happening here. last night the new york times reported in a bombshell pete from michael schmid that the president personally orred the white house counsel to go to the justice department this past spring to try to persuade jeff sessions to not recuse himself are from the russia investigation. this is important for a couple of wreens. one is the reported context according to the reporting in the frorkts last night the president explained at the time why it was so important to him that jeff sessions not recuse himself. he explained that as being based on his belief reportedly that the attorney general should protect him from the russia investigation. another reason this is potentially important is that unthe strict rules that govern the way the white house and the department of justice are supposed
so if mcgann lobbied sessions on his recusal. if mcgann did what the white house times excuse me what the new york times reports he did, there is a reasonable legaleth ethics case that don should resign as white house counsel for having done that. that said nbc furthered this story today when they reported that the president didn t just send the white house counsel don mcgann to the justice department to lobby jeff sessions. according to the nbc he sent senior white house personnel to the justice department to lobby sessions that he shouldn t recuse from the russia investigation. so both of those things, both the fact that the president reportedly said the reason sessions shouldn t recuse is so the president can be protected from that fbi investigation, and the prospect that the that the prospect that the white house counsel may have violated the rules about contact with the
investigation of a member of congress accused of ethics violation. they turn up evidence of criminal wrongdoing by that member of congress, wrng doing not otherwise known to or being pursued by the relevant law enforcement agency. in cases like that the ethics committee would finish their report, their ethics committee report on the member s behavior but might make a criminal referral to the appropriate law enforcement agency if they turned up something serious that law enforcement wasn t otherwise onto. that s not what happened here. in this case senator chuck grassley lindsey graham do not appear to have turned up any new information concerning former mi 6 spy christopher stiehl. the reason the so-called criminal referral to the justice department about him today is in part classified is because what these two just sent to the justice department about christopher steele is information they got from the justice department about christopher steele. they didn t turn up anything in