Dowd Says Trump’s Legal Team Knows More Than Mueller

Billionaire co-founder of Galleon Group Raj Rajaratnam, right, enters Manhattan federal court with his attorney John Dowd, Friday, April 29, 2011, in New York. Jury deliberations continue in the trial of Rajaratnam, who is accused of gaining $63 million from trading on illegal stock tips. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
FILE - In this April 29, 20111, file photo, Attorney John Dowd walks in New York. Down, one of the key lawyers in President Donald Trump’s corner navigated a popular United States senator through crisis, produced a... FILE - In this April 29, 20111, file photo, Attorney John Dowd walks in New York. Down, one of the key lawyers in President Donald Trump’s corner navigated a popular United States senator through crisis, produced a damning investigative report that drove a baseball star from the game and, early in his career, took on organized crime as a Justice Department prosecutor. Dowd assumed a more prominent place on the legal team after another lawyer, Marc Kasowitz, took a reduced role. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File) MORE LESS
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Former Trump attorney John Dowd claimed he knows more than the special counsel about the Russia investigation in a podcast interview with ABC released Tuesday, attributing his knowledge to joint-defense agreements with witnesses in the probe.

“I know a lot,” Dowd said. “Because as people have found out, we communicate on this side of the fence. Matter of fact, we’ve got, probably, better intelligence than they do.”

Yet Dowd declined to reveal any details when asked later in the interview about the impact Michael Cohen’s cooperation agreement with federal prosecutors has had on the case.

“You know what he knows? And I can’t — I never discuss joint defense, because of confidential communications,” Dowd said. “We were just — we were just briefed, like every other witness, on what he was gonna tell the House and Senate and — and other things.”

Dowd left President Trump’s personal legal team in March 2018, with different reports saying that he had alternately been pushed out or left voluntarily over disagreements about legal strategy.

During Dowd’s time on Trump’s legal team, he negotiated with Mueller over the President’s cooperation with the investigation. In particular, he recommended against allowing Trump to sit for an in-person interview.

“First question, easy. Second question, easy. Third question, he wasn’t sure,” Dowd said, describing what a Trump interview would have been like. “And he doesn’t like being unsure. So he’ll guess. There’s your trap, right there.”

He added that he was worried about that Trump “couldn’t do it. There’s no way he could — I mean, we’d have to script it.”

Dowd went on to say that the President was simply processing too much information to handle the special counsel investigation.

“It’s not a matter of integrity. It’s overload,” he said.

Dowd also told the ABC podcast that he doubted Mueller would release a detailed report about the Russia investigation.

“All he is is a departmental attorney, nothing more, okay?” Dowd said. “That’s it. I mean, he abides by the rules. And by the way, it’s gotta go up — it’s gotta go up to Barr.”

 

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