The ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, has announced an investigation into the Trump administration’s prosecution of a former Olympian who was accused of vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.
A felony charge against David Hearn was recently dropped by the U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro.
She contradicted President Donald Trump’s repeated allegations that vandalism was to blame for paint peeling and floating around in the pool.
“Given all of this newly discovered information, it is difficult to attribute the widespread damage to the Reflecting Pool to vandalism, let alone to establish that fact beyond a reasonable doubt,” she said in a court filing.
Raskin on Tuesday sent a letter to Pirro and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, who has supported the president’s claims related to vandalism.
“Did the United States Attorney’s Office for D.C. in fact maliciously prosecute an American citizen it knew to be innocent with a felony charge carrying a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison?” Raskin asked. “Did the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) deliberately mislead prosecutors to cover up a ‘botched’ renovation by a company awarded a dubious $15 million insider no-bid contract?”
Raskin presented a long list of questions related to the prosecution and sharply criticized the president’s earlier claims about what a great job the contractor would do.
“President Trump’s ‘highly sophisticated’ and slapdash paint job didn’t even last 100 days, much less a century,” Raskin said.
Trump still upset with Pirro
Trump has been highly critical of Pirro for dropping the case against Hearn and summoned her to the White House last week after complaining that she “folded like an umbrella.”
Pirro reportedly is upset with Burgum for not providing her office with information that could have prevented the embarrassment of bringing a high-profile indictment, only to drop it.
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The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that the White House is asking the Justice Department to reconsider bringing a charge against Hearn.
Legal experts say that would be highly unusual, given how thin the original case was against Hearn, a former Olympic canoeist, who denied vandalizing paint in the pool.
Charges against several others, who faced misdemeanor charges, were also dropped.
The White House reportedly wants to see if Hearn could be charged with a misdemeanor instead of a felony, which would not require a grand jury.
As for Raskin’s request for more information about the case, he’s asked that the administration provide documents related to Hearn’s prosecution and why he was charged with a felony by Aug. 25.
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