For instance, in the United States, it would be very unusual for a president to reassign multiple cabinet secretaries to new positions, especially since a United States Cabinet member moved to a new position within the cabinet needs to be confirmed in the new role by the United States Senate—this alone is seen as a powerful deterrent against U.S. presidents initiating major cabinet reshuffles.
It’s not cited, though and since many cabinet reassignments are done by different presidents–e.g Minetta was Clinton’s commerce secretary, and Bush the younger’s transportation secretary–, you might be tempted to think that the reconfirmation process is because of ths change in administration. Not so.
Behold, Elliot Richardson. (who served at HEW, Defense, and then as Attorney General. The HEW–>Defense reshuffle occurred as part of Nixon’s second term; the Defense–> Attorney General reshuffle came in the middle of a term) He resigned rather than fire the Special Prosecutor…
Probably doesn’t even need to fire Sessions. Unless the recusal prevent Sessions from firing Rosenstein.
He can just have Sessions fire Rosenstein (I don’t see Sessions standing up to this). Then the staffer who becomes the acting Deputy Attorney General can be told to fire Mueller even before a new Deputy is confirmed.
Depending who becomes the acting Deputy, may need Sessions to fire a bunch of people before someone does it.
“One of the disputes was over whether Trump should sit for an interview with the special counsel. Trump has long wanted to do so, while Dowd advised against it.”
At this point, I hope he tries. It will make an obstruction of justice case against Trump significantly easier to prove. And with no good lawyers willing to represent him, and even terrible, crooked lawyers abandoning his dumb ass, he’d be fucked.
Let him tie his own noose. It’ll be fun to watch his bloated corpse sway in the breeze.
You do need a second Senate confirmation, but there is an exception for appointment of an Acting AG under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act. There would be a legal challenge, because it’s not clear that that law applies to vacancies created by a firing.
However, Trump has already arranged things so that he can follow the normal DOJ succession and probably still fire Mueller. If Sessions and Rosenstein were both fired, the new Acting AG would be US Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina, Robert Higdon. (This is because acting officials, like the current Associate AG, are skipped.) If Sessions stayed and Trump fired Rosenstein, Sessions could insert Solicitor General Noel Francisco into the line of succession, and he would become Acting Deputy AG, with authority over Mueller.
The president can fire a Deputy AG directly. The question is whether Congress would move to protect Mueller, possibly by bringing back the independent counsel statute.
And yet, impeachment would bring us President Pence. Right now we live in Bismarck’s Prussian Empire: the iron fist of despotism clothed in the velvet glove of incompetence. Impeachment may be ‘taking the gloves off’ under multiple metaphors.
Also, there remains from the Nixon administration some uncertainty about the ability of the Congress to legislate regarding the personnel of the Executive Branch. Under the ‘unitary Executive’ theory, the entire Branch serves at the pleasure of the President. It requires the Senate to confirm, but not to dismiss. The theory was never tested because Nixon resigned first.
What he can legally do, and what he will attempt to do are two different things. It is clear to me that he is going to attempt to fire Mueller. I suspect he is currently trying to find someone who will tell him he can do it. Eventually, he will exhaust all of those avenues, and he will attempt to just do it anyway. At that point, fecal matter will be hitting the mechanical ventilating device, and popcorn stock will go through the roof.
And it will be hilarious and bizarre to watch him try to fire someone who doesn’t work for him. He can also yell YOU’RE FIRED!! at the TV screen while CNN is on the air, and it’ll have as much effect.
