Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner were reportedly viewed as potential “problems” in the early days of the Mueller probe. President Donald Trump's lawyers feared the pair because they “talked openly” about the details of the probe, according to a new book.
The Special Counsel investigation, more commonly known as the Mueller probe, was conducted by special prosecutor Robert Mueller and lasted for almost two years from May 2017 until March 2019. The probe investigated supposed Russian interference in the 2016 presidential elections and supposed links between Russian officials and Trump associates.
According to the book “A Very Stable Genius,” Donald Trump’s legal team was concerned about Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner because they “talked openly” about details of the then ongoing probe, Newsweek reported. The book is co-authored Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker who are both Washington Post journalists.
Some members of the legal team felt uncomfortable with the trend that it led them, which included Jay Sekulow, Mark Corallo, John Dowd, and Michael Bowe, to meet at the Washington offices of Marc Kasowitz's law firm on June 13, 2017. “As they settled into a work pattern with the president, the lawyers increasingly saw Kushner and Ivanka Trump as problems,” the book claimed.
“The discomfort is with the kids always being there and talking about the case with other people in the White House, which makes everybody a witness,” Mark Corallo, Donald Trump’s former spokesman, told the authors.
One of the topics being discussed during the June 2017 meeting was whether or not the couple should be in the White House. Understandably, none of the lawyers wanted to be the person to inform Donald Trump of their concerns fearing that Ivanka and Jared would eventually know, which could lead to some problems later on.
“Some of the lawyers were wary of staking out a position,” Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker wrote on the book. “They wanted to maintain their standing with the president, and they figured that whatever they advised Trump to do about the kids, he would share with Kushner and Ivanka, and then they would be 'roadkill,' as one of the advisers put it.”
According to the book, to was John Dowd who stood by Ivanka and Jared Kusher and tried to convince his colleagues to just let the matter drop. “But Dowd defended Kushner and Ivanka, stressing that Trump relied on them and the lawyers shouldn't get involved,” the authors wrote.