Now that US Attorney General Jeff Sessions has recused himself from any investigations regarding the 2016 presidential campaigns, the man who gets to decide whether to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate President Donald Trump's pre-election dealings with Russia is an appointee of Barack Obama.
When the attorney general is recused from an investigation, oversight of that investigation ordinarily falls to the department's deputy. But currently, there is no deputy attorney general — Sessions is the only Trump nominee who has been confirmed to any position in the Justice Department.
The job of deputy attorney general is currently being done on an acting basis by Dana Boente, the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, who was nominated to that position by Barack Obama.
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He is apparently so little known to Sessions’ team that he is referred to in Sessions’ recusal letter as “Dane Boente”.
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Despite the misspelling, Sessions’ recusal letter delegates to Boente all functions from which he has recused himself. This includes the attorney general’s power to appoint a special prosecutor in the event that a criminal investigation is warranted and would present a conflict of interest if pursued by Justice Department litigators.
Dana Boente, acting deputy attorney general, gets to decide whether a special prosecutor should probe Russia’s involvement in the 2016 election. Photo: Bloomberg
