Mueller subpoena fight

Trump denies he’s already in a Mueller subpoena fight

The special counsel appears to be locked in a legal battle with a mysterious Russia probe target who is fighting a subpoena.

By DARREN SAMUELSOHN

President Donald Trump and his lawyers pushed back in force Wednesday against a POLITICO op-ed suggesting the president is already locked in a secret subpoena battle with special counsel Robert Mueller.

“No,” the president, shaking his head, told reporters on the White House lawn as he prepared to fly to Fort Myers, Fla., for a midterm campaign rally.

Trump’s remarks echoed those of several current and former members of his personal legal team who swung back against a POLITICO opinion piece written by Nelson Cunningham, a former federal prosecutor who was attempting to decipher a mystery legal battle that appears to involve an attempt to fight a Mueller subpoena.

Cunningham’s op-ed suggested Mueller may have already issued a historic subpoena for the president because of the “unusual alacrity” with which the federal judges weighing the case have considered the issue.

“At every level, this matter has commanded the immediate and close attention of the judges involved — suggesting that no ordinary witness and no ordinary issue is involved,” wrote Cunningham, who worked under then-U.S. attorney Rudy Giuliani in the Southern District of New York and later served in the Clinton administration.

As the basis for his speculation, Cunningham leaned on a recent POLITICO story that first reported the existence of the grand jury subpoena case, which is slated for oral arguments in mid-December in federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. That article did not identify the person involved in the grand jury fight, and Trump attorney Jay Sekulow is quoted in the story insisting it didn’t involve the president.

On Wednesday, Sekulow called the new POLITICO op-ed “completely false” and insisted, “There has been no subpoena issued and there is no litigation.”

“Totally wrong not even a bit of truth,” Giuliani, now a lawyer for Trump, added in a text message.

The original POLITICO report linked the grand jury fight to Mueller based on a reporter observing a man earlier this month inthe D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals clerk’s office requesting a copy of the special counsel’s latest sealed filing. The individual wanted the document so his firm could craft its response.

Another detail linking the case to Mueller came when the witness’s lawyers asked the entire appeals court to review the lower district court’s decision. The court docket showed only nine of the 10 active justices participated, with Judge Greg Katsas recusing himself. Katsas, a former deputy White House counsel, pledged during his Senate confirmation hearing last October that he’d likely recuse himself from any matters related to the Mueller Russia probe because he worked on the issue during his time in the Trump administration.