We reported previously that Judge Bruce Reinhart, who signed the search warrant to raid Mar-a-Lago, had previously worked as a consultant for Jeffrey Epstein’s employees. After he had left the U.S. attorney’s office that was prosecuting Epstein, he helped them obtain immunity agreements from the government.
It gets worse. It turned out that the judge had withdrawn himself from the Trump-Clinton lawsuit, citing a statute regarding impartiality.
The undersigned Magistrate Judge, to whom this above-styled cause was assigned, hereby recuses and refers the matter to the Clerk of Court to be reassigned pursuant to 28 U.S.C. Reinhart wrote the following in his order of recusal for Trump v. Clinton.
The magistrate’s recusal statute states, in part, that a judge “shall be disqualified himself in any proceeding where his impartiality might reasonably be questioned”, and then discusses the different circumstances that could lead to such concerns.
These include “a personal bias, prejudice or knowledge concerning a party” or prior work in a legal capacity for a party to the case.
The judge does not specify further his reasons for recusal in the order.
This naturally raises questions about Trump’s signing of the search warrant. Was there any personal bias? Did he ever work for the Clinton team? Is there any ongoing issue that could have prevented him from recusing himself in the Trump-Clinton case?
This wasn’t the only thing. Reinhart had at least one Facebook posting that criticized Trump, citing Robert Reich, a Clinton official.
While I usually ignore tweets from the President-elect, this one is something that I don’t mind. John Lewis has probably done more to “make America great,” than any other living citizen. My son and I went to Selma last August to see the Edmund Pettus Bridge. It was there that he learned about the sacrifices required to live in a democracy. John Lewis is an example of that spirit. He is a hero to me, even though I have never met him.
Robert Reich, thank you for expressing what many Americans feel: “John Lewis is America’s conscience.” Donald Trump isn’t morally strong enough to kiss John Lewis.
Or, Joseph Welch asked Joseph McCarthy: “At last, have you lost any sense of decency?”
He is not exactly objective.
Reinhart donated $1,000 to Barack Obama (2008) and $500 to Jeb Bush (2015) to further clarify the objectivity question.
All of this raises a question about Trump’s judicial actions.
