Attorney General Merrick Garland’s mark on the Justice Department could come down to one case – Donald Trump’s election subversion prosecution that collapsed today under the weight of a long-standing DOJ policy against hauling a sitting president into criminal court.
The development will likely hurt Garland’s legacy, according to two political analysts who concluded on Monday that the attorney general’s failure to timely appoint special counsel Jack Smith to investigate Trump’s criminal matter wound up sullying the prosecution.
“I also think we need to take a look at how long it took Merrick Garland to appoint Jack Smith,” said CNN political analyst Ana Navarro. “It took him, what, almost two years to get this done. But for that, it could have been a very different result today.”
The remarks came Monday on CNN’s “AC360” during a discussion about the prospect of Trump weaponizing the federal government to seek retribution and revenge from his political detractors once he reemerges in the White House in January.
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Legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin echoed Navarro’s view while offering his perspective on how Garland will be remembered when he vacates his position as the country's top law enforcer.
“This case could have gone to trial,” Toobin said. “If this case had been brought promptly, the delay in naming Jack Smith at all and in the whole investigation at the higher level, is something that, you know, is going to be an important legacy of this administration."
Toobin noted that had prosecutors successfully secured a conviction against Trump in the Jan. 6 case, or the Mar-a-Lago classified documents action, he would have been facing “very long prison terms.”
“The magnitude of Trump's victory here is so enormous,” Toobin told viewers.
But, Navarro added, it was the American electorate who voted Trump back into the presidency that essentially pardoned him.
Watch the clip below or at this link.