'Whole year of nothing': DOJ insiders slam own department's probe of Trump's Jan. 6 links

CNN published a lengthy report Monday focused on the United States Department of Justice's failures to hold President-elect Donald Trump to account for his role in inciting the deadly January 6th riots at the United States Capitol.

In particular, CNN reported that some members of the DOJ believe that the department "wasted" a full year "chasing ghosts" after they had received tips that Trump had met with leaders of the Proud Boys shortly before the riots erupted.

While these leads ultimately did not pan out, some of the lawyers involved in investigating them told CNN that they would have been derelict in their duties had they not gone after them.

Other DOJ officials, however, said that the department could have focused more on running an investigation much like the one former special counsel Jack Smith did that led to criminal charges against Trump for conspiracy to defraud the United States.

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“They wasted time, they were not strategic. It was a whole year of nothing,” one former DOJ official told CNN. “And they waited so long they ended up helping Trump in the primary and dividing the country.”

What's more, two former DOJ officials said that investigators had already uncovered enough evidence against Trump to level charges against him a full year before Smith officially indicted him in 2023.

Had that occurred, it's conceivable that a trial for Trump's efforts to illegally remain in power after losing the 2020 election could have occurred before the 2024 election, as it would have provided significant extra time for the United States Supreme Court to render a ruling on presidential immunity.