WASHINGTON (AP) — An ally of President Donald Trump said Thursday that he has resigned from his post leading a Justice Department investigation into whether former law enforcement and intelligence officials conspired against the Republican president.
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The departure of Joe diGenova injects instant tumult into an investigation targeting former government officials who have scrutinized Trump over the last decade, including in connection with Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and his retention of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida.
“I did in fact resign,” diGenova told The Associated Press, calling it an “honor and a privilege” to serve Trump and the Justice Department.
Though diGenova declined to comment to the AP on the circumstances of his resignation, a person familiar with the matter who insisted on anonymity to discuss a personnel decision said the departure came amid mounting frustration from the Justice Department and White House over the pace and management of the probe.
In an interview later with The New York Post, diGenova responded to criticism of his management of the investigation by saying, “If you want indictments where there’s no evidence, you have an ethical problem.”
When reached again by the AP, diGenova said the comments were taken out of context, adding: “There’s plenty of evidence in all of these cases to prove the theories of prosecution. It just takes time to get there, and some people want to get there a little faster than others — and you can’t do that.”
The investigation has always been something of a tall order, aiming to present separate and unrelated inquiries of the president as part an anti-Trump conspiracy by law enforcement and intelligence professionals. Though promoted by the White House, and seized on by Trump supporters looking for accountability against what they see as “deep state” intelligence community actors, the conspiracy investigation has proceeded in fits and starts since its inception a year ago.
The 81-year-old diGenova served as the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia during the Reagan administration and for years has been a prominent Trump ally, including backing his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss and publicly and repeatedly claiming that the president was the victim of an intelligence community conspiracy.
He was brought back to the Justice Department in April and given the reins of the loosely defined investigation.
Five months later, no charges have been brought and it remains unclear whether any will be, or what information has been gathered to support any basis for the idea of a plot against Trump by the government officials who investigated him.
Investigators have sought interviews related to the 2022 FBI search that recovered classified documents from Mar-a-Lago and have also focused intensely on one of Trump’s chief grievances: a U.S. intelligence community assessment that Russia interfered on his behalf in the 2016 presidential election. The assessment has long infuriated the president, along with a Justice Department special counsel investigation into Russian election interference that shadowed him during his first term.
That special counsel investigation identified widespread Russian interference in the election but did not find evidence to prove a criminal conspiracy between Moscow and the Trump campaign. Multiple other government inquiries, including by the Justice Department inspector general, have identified significant errors and omissions in the FBI’s handling of the Trump-Russia probe but did not find evidence of criminal conduct by senior law enforcement officials.
The yearlong conspiracy investigation has hit stumbles before. Last April, a lead national security prosecutor in the investigation of former CIA Director John Brennan was replaced on the team after raising questions about the strength of the case. Days later, diGenova was sworn in.
Brennan has been investigated on allegations that he lied to Congress about the creation of the intelligence community assessment, which he and his lawyers have vigorously denied. In July, he sued the Justice Department for a court order requiring the preservation of all records from the investigation, forecasting plans to challenge any potential indictment of him on vindictive prosecution grounds.
