A valet for President Donald J. Trump has alleged that Joe Biden’s Justice Department raised his lawyer’s application for a judgeship in a meeting where he was being asked to co-operate in investigations against the 45th President of the United States, raising the specter of state-level coercion in one of the most high-profile cases in America.
The Guardian reports Thursday afternoon:
At issue is an incident that took place last year, around November, when prosecutors were trying to gain the cooperation of valet Walt Nauta, who has been under scrutiny because prosecutors suspected he helped the former president conceal classified documents that had been subpoenaed.
Nauta had already spoken to prosecutors in the investigation when they called his lawyer Stanley Woodward and summoned him to a meeting at justice department headquarters for an urgent matter that they were reluctant to discuss over the phone, the letter said.
When Woodward arrived at the conference room, he was seated across from several prosecutors working on the investigation, including the chief of the counterintelligence section, Jay Bratt, who explained that they wanted Nauta to cooperate with the government against Trump, the letter said.
Nauta should cooperate with the government because he had given potentially conflicting testimony that could result in a false statements charge, the prosecutors said according to the letter. Woodward is said to have demurred, disputing that Nauta had made false statements.
Bratt then turned to Woodward and remarked that he did not think that Woodward was a “Trump guy” and that “he would do the right thing”, before noting that he knew Woodward had submitted an application to be a judge at the superior court in Washington DC that was currently pending, the letter said.
The allegation, in essence, is that Bratt suggested Woodward’s judicial application might be considered more favorably if he and his client cooperated against Trump. The letter was filed after Trump’s lawyers submitted a motion on Monday seeking grand jury transcripts, because of what they viewed as potential misconduct.
The news will come as a major blow to the Biden Justice Department as they continue their spurious case against Donald Trump. The Justice Department has thus far refused to comment.
