TrumpLand keeps getting more and more interesting, in its constant fervor at keeping Washington from being boring.
On Friday, the public (much to the chagrin of associate solitary reporter Susanna Sherman) was prevented from observing secret hearings in the United States Court House for the District of Columbia (where, long ago, your solitary reporter represented Secretary of Labor Geoprge Shultz in wage-hour cases).
There, lawyers for Special Counsel Robert Mueller argued in secret before a federal district judge and a panel of judges from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia (https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/14/politics/mueller-grand-jury-mysterious-friday/index.html).
As ASR Sherman observed in total fascination, Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker, Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen — Trumpites all — acted in unison to Occupy the courthouse.
“Enough is enough,” Whitaker told Donald Trump’s close personal friend Sean Hannity. “There is no justice in the United States any more, when a rogue former FBI Director — Mueller — can commandeer an entire floor of the court house. We’ve takin’ over.”
Nielsen was equally emphatic. “I can use that crummy old building as an undisclosed location.”
For his part, Office of Management and Budget Director Mulvaney, who, as a Congressman from South Carolina, was a member of the Freedom Caucus, wrote down on a government-issued notepad how much money the government is saving from the closing of the courthouse; and he’s actively working to implement Nielsen’s plan of turning the courthouse over for her project.
Litigants, parties, prospective jurors, and reporters were all looking forward to taking their lunch at the nearby National Gallery of Art. They’re sure to be disappointed when they see Nielsen’s troops occupying the building, which is only a short distance from the Capitol.