Attorneys for President Trump’s former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn Wednesday accused an ex-federal judge appointed to argue against the Justice Department’s bid to drop the case of engaging in a “flagrant personal and partisan assault.”
John Gleeson, a retired judge appointed to act as a friend of the court, last week accused Flynn of perjury. He also blasted the Justice Department, saying its efforts to abandon the case that accused Flynn of lying to the FBI about his conversation with the then-Russia ambassador to the United States as a “gross abuse of prosecutorial power.”
In response, Flynn lawyer Sidney Powell slammed Mr. Gleeson’s argument as a “smear.”
“The irony and sheer duplicity of Amicus’s accusations against the Justice Department now — which is finally exposing the truth — is stunning,” Ms. Powell wrote. “Amicus’s filing is a ‘wrap-up smear.’ It is an affront to the Rule of Law and a ranging insult to the citizens of this country who see the abject corruption in this assassination by political prosecution of General Flynn.”
“This court exuviated any appearance of neutrality when it unlawfully appointed Amicus as its own adversary to make the scurrilous arguments,” Ms. Powell continued.
Mr. Gleeson’s brief last week was an unrelenting legal attack on the Justice Department saying it was an “unconvincing effort” to hide a decision based solely on the fact that Flynn is a political ally of Mr. Trump.
But Ms. Powell clapped back at Mr. Gleeson in her filing Wednesday. She citing a Washington Post op-ed authored by Mr. Gleeson and published just before his appointment suggesting “improper political influence” was a factor in the decision to drop the charges against Flynn.
Ms. Powell also lambasted U.S. Judge Emmet Sullivan, who is overseeing Flynn’s case and appointed Mr. Gleeson. She said Judge Sullivan only appointed Mr. Gleeson because he lacked the authority to do anything else.
“This court exceeded its authority under the Constitution to solicit amici and to appoint an Amicus. That chosen Amicus has now engaged in a flagrant personal and partisan assault on General Flynn, Attorney General Barr, and the President of the United States,” she wrote.
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