Mueller And Co. Will Teach Law Students About Russia Probe’s ‘Challenges And Trade-Offs’

WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 24: Former Special Counsel Robert Mueller (center) is seen leaving after testifying to the House Judiciary Committee about his report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election on Capitol Hill on July 24, 2019 in Washington, DC. Mueller dismissed President Trump's claims of total exoneration before the House Judiciary Committee earlier in the day on Wednesday. (Photo by Alex Wroblewski/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 24: Former Special Counsel Robert Mueller (C) departs after testifying to the House Intelligence Committee about his report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election on Capitol H... WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 24: Former Special Counsel Robert Mueller (C) departs after testifying to the House Intelligence Committee about his report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election on Capitol Hill on July 24, 2019 in Washington, DC. Mueller earlier testified before the House Judiciary Committee in back-to-back hearings on Capitol Hill. (Photo by Alex Wroblewski/Getty Images) MORE LESS
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Former special counsel Robert Mueller and three attorneys who worked in his office will regale students at the University of Virginia School of Law with stories of the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election, the law school announced Wednesday. 

Mueller will lead “at least one class,” a press release read, though the six-session fall course, “The Mueller Report and the Role of the Special Counsel,” will be primarily taught by Aaron Zebley, Jim Quarles and Andrew Goldstein, three high-ranking attorneys in Mueller’s special counsel office. 

“The course will focus on a key set of decisions made during the special counsel’s investigation,” the law school said. “Instructors will talk about the legal and practical context for those decisions in a discussion format, and walk through the challenges and trade-offs when making decisions in a high-profile investigation.” 

The class will be structured chronologically, starting with the beginning of the investigation and focusing, among other things, “on navigating the relationship with the Justice Department and Congress” and “presidential accountability and the role of special counsel in that accountability.” 

The former special counsel team should have a lot to say on those points: A recently unredacted opinion showed a federal judge’s scorn for former Attorney General Bill Barr’s role preempting the release of the Mueller report.

In 2019, Barr released a four-page letter to Congress “summarizing” the encyclopedic report’s conclusions nearly a month before the report was made public — a “summary” that didn’t actually reflect the report’s crucial findings.

Judge Amy Berman Jackson, who also oversaw Roger Stone’s trial and sentencing, wrote that Barr’s advisers were working behind the scenes on “getting a jump on public relations.”

“I look forward to engaging with the students this fall,” Mueller said in the law school’s press release.

Tierney Sneed contributed reporting. 

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Notable Replies

  1. Students will be taught to hide any definitive conclusions when taking the finals.

  2. Will the syllabus be redacted?

  3. Fat Donnie will attend, incognito, and have someone take the final exam for him.

    And the Arizona Senate will audit the course.

  4. Lesson One: Allowing the Subject of Your Investigation to Dictate Its Parameters.

  5. I hope he tells the students more than he told Congress.

    Otherwise, it could just be a one-day brown bag lunch talk.

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