Wainstein indicated that he received a grand jury subpoena signed by DiGenova — and exchanged emails with him — just hours before he resigned. The subpoena called for Brennan to appear before a grand jury in Fort Pierce, Florida on October 15, the defense lawyer said.
DiGenova’s departure —which took some members of his team by surprise— appears to have followed tension over whether some charges should be filed quickly, perhaps in advance of the midterm elections.
In an interview last week, diGenova, who served as U.S. attorney in Washington under President Ronald Reagan, suggested he opposed moving that quickly, believing it could sacrifice the investigation’s thoroughness.
“I take my time when I bring cases,” diGenova told POLITICO. “Whatever the facts show, they show. However long that takes to do it properly, it takes. Sometimes it takes longer than some people want, and they want things done faster, and that’s just not possible sometimes. So, as a result, there are disagreements about timing, and that happens all the time in the Department of Justice.”
A Justice Department spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wainstein’s account. In a Newsmax interview last week, Attorney General Todd Blanche praised diGenova for coming “out of retirement to help us” but was vague about the reasons for his departure.
“He worked very hard for the administration,” Blanche said. “He resigned and I’m not going to get to the reasons why. Those are his to talk about. But there’s an ongoing case in Florida. There’s been some press about it….We have great prosecutors there working on not only this case but other cases as well. And people leave all the time for all kinds of reasons.”
