A legal expert claimed to have uncovered a "clear admission" by President Donald Trump's Department of Justice that it broke the rules to help convicted sex criminal Ghislaine Maxwell get into a minimum security prison.
Liz Oyer, a former Obama administration pardon attorney, argued in a new Substack essay that Trump's DOJ deliberately changed long-standing Bureau of Prisons policies on inmate classifications, thereby allowing Maxwell to communicate directly with the Attorney General's office. She described the change as "highly sus," given how closely Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and Maxwell seemed to work together to facilitate the transfer.
"In doing my research for this post, I came across what sure looks like a clear admission that rules were broken," Oyer wrote, adding that the Change Notice associated with the new Bureau of Prisons policy was "pretty incredible" to read.
"It empowers the Attorney General 'to designate or redesignate the place of a prisoner’s imprisonment' at his discretion. In other words, the AG can simply direct BOP staff to place a specific prisoner in a specific facility—without regard for any of the established rules," Oyer surmised. "That means that Blanche now has the authority to send Maxwell to any prison in the country (if this holds up against legal challenges). He could potentially even transfer her to home confinement or a halfway house in the community."
"The Change Notice adds, oddly, that BOP 'may also facilitate communication or correspondence between the inmate and the Office of the Attorney General.' The idea that a federal inmate would need to communicate directly with the Office of the Attorney General is what my teen would call 'sus.' Highly sus," she added.
Oyer also argued that these policy changes may raise the stakes for Blanche's upcoming confirmation hearings in the Senate.
"Senators of both parties should want to know the truth about what has happened here before voting on Blanche’s nomination," Oyer wrote. "What it looks like is Todd Blanche cut a corrupt deal with Ghislaine Maxwell to protect Donald Trump. It looks like Blanche abused his position as Deputy Attorney General to give preferential treatment to a convicted child sex trafficker. It looks like he plans to keep doing that. And it looks like he is furiously weaving a web of lies to cover it up."