New Trump Lawyer Joseph diGenova Has Lots to Say About Many Things

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Joseph E. diGenova of Washington's diGenova & Toensing appears for then-U.S. Attorney Ron Machen's investiture in 2010. Photo by Diego M. Radzinschi/THE NATIONAL LAW JOURNAL [/caption] As President Donald Trump ramps up his public attacks on the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, he is planning to bring on a new lawyer who has a clear appetite for criticizing prosecutors, including those working under Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Indeed, no one could accuse Joseph diGenova, a former U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, from shying away from the spotlight or pulling punches. DiGenova of Washington's diGenova & Toensing, has long been a face on Sunday talk shows. Appearing on Fox News in January, diGenova pushed a theory that the U.S. Justice Department and a group of FBI agents sought to frame Trump. “There was a brazen plot to illegally exonerate Hillary Clinton and, if she didn’t win the election, to then frame Donald Trump with a falsely created crime,” diGenova said then. He added: “Make no mistake about it: A group of FBI and DOJ people were trying to frame Donald Trump of a falsely created crime." DiGenova is expected to join former Hogan Lovells partner Ty Cobb and John Dowd in advocating for Trump as pressure from Mueller mounts. Trump's lawyers recently turned over documents to Mueller's prosecutors in an effort to narrow the scope of any interview with the president, the Washington Post reported Monday. Jay Sekulow, another lawyer on Trump's team, said in a statement that diGenova was joining Trump's legal team later this week, according to media reports. "I have worked with Joe for many years and have full confidence that he will be a great asset in our representation of the president," Sekulow said in the statement. DiGenova wasn't reached for comment Monday. "If you do your job and do it well, unfortunately you're going to have people criticizing you," diGenova reportedly said in 1986. "The criticism is loudest when you're doing your job the best." Here's a snapshot of some of diGenova's wide-ranging commentary and other career moments. During the Clinton administration, diGenova made the case that presidents can be indicted. “On its face, there doesn't seem to be any reason why the president can't be held liable for violating the law,” diGenova wrote in a 1997 op-ed for the Wall Street Journal. “One can roam through the criminal statutes—indeed through the Constitution itself—and nowhere find an addendum stating that a certain act is unlawful, except when committed by the president of the United States." Later in the piece, in which he derided legal scholars for arguing the president is “above the law,” diGenova said it wasn’t just possible to indict a president. For the country, he wrote, it could even be beneficial. “Nobody should underestimate the upheaval that a prosecution of the president would cause,” he wrote. “But we went through it once before, in Watergate, and survived. The nation, in fact, could conceivably benefit from the indictment of a president. It would teach the valuable civics lesson that no one is above the law. As an appeals court told Mr. Clinton in the Paula Jones case, the Founders created a presidency, not a monarchy.”

“I’m a great fan of prosecutors, but …” In 2009, the Justice Department under Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. abandoned the public corruption case against the late U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska amid claims of prosecutorial misconduct. A week after a jury found him guilty of lying on Senate financial disclosure forms to conceal hundreds of thousands of dollars in gifts and home renovations, Stevens lost his 2008 re-election bid by fewer than 4,000 votes. DiGenova joined the chorus of criticism about the Stevens prosecution. In 2009, diGenova told The Associated Press that the scandal-tainted prosecution of Stevens showed that prosecutors suffer from “a lack of supervision.” “I’m a great fan of prosecutors, but the department and the U.S. attorneys offices in my opinion have been out of control,” diGenova said. Using language reminiscent of his more recent rhetoric about the Russia probe, diGenova added that the Stevens case was, “in essence, a framing of a senator.” DiGenova said about the Stevens case, which was filed in July 2008: “That doesn’t mean he’s pure as the driven snow, but they were going to convict him no matter what. They changed the balance of power in the United States Senate. That ought to be a crime.”

DiGenova, a Reagan-era U.S. attorney in Washington, bounced around Washington law firms for a bit. In 1991, he joined the Washington office of Manatt, Phelps & Phillips. That move came after a stint at Hopkins & Sutter. At Manatt, diGenova and wife Victoria Toensing were leading a white-collar practice. The couple founded diGenova & Toensing in 1996, according to her LinkedIn page. Toensing has represented former Trump campaign co-chairman Sam Clovis and Erik Prince, the founder of the security contractor Blackwater, who also served as an informal adviser to Trump. DiGenova & Toensing also reportedly represent Mark Corallo, a former spokesman for the Trump legal team.

DiGenova, a regular legal commentator, got into a televised spat years ago with Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz over the federal prosecution of Jonathan Pollard. Dershowitz, appearing in 1998 on Geraldo Rivera's talk show, assailed diGenova, a former U.S. attorney, for allegedly filing a "perjurious affidavit" in support of the case against Pollard. DiGenova responded: "Alan, if you'll just shut up for a minute—I know that's hard for a pompous Harvard professor. You are an offensive, lousy guy for saying something that's absolutely untrue on national television." Dershowitz had charged that diGenova's office unfairly exaggerated Pollard's security risk. Pollard was released from custody in 2015 after 30 years in prison. When Pollard was released, diGenova did not hide his dissatisfaction. “I don’t think there’s any doubt that the crime merited a life sentence, given the amount of damage that Mr. Pollard did to the United States government,” diGenova told the New York Law Journal. “I would have been perfectly pleased if he had spent the rest of his life in jail.” Read more: Paul Manafort Boosts Defense, Hiring Epstein Becker & Green's Richard Westling Meet the Lawyer Representing Fired FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe Memo to Trump: What Not to Expect From Robert Mueller Cobb Describes Role, Says He Took Job With 'Rocks in My Head and Steel Balls' Former Skadden Associate Pleads Guilty in Mueller Probe