Almost immediately after Ryan Wesley Routh was taken into custody, a robust investigation into the apparent assassination attempt targeting Donald Trump got underway involving the Secret Service, the FBI, and the Justice Department. Two days later, however, the public learned of a separate, parallel investigation.
The New York Times summarized the dynamic nicely:
Usually, after a deadly emergency or an event that could have become one, the governor of the state where it happened somberly pledges to support the agency investigating it however he or she can. This is not quite what happened in Florida after the apparent attempted assassination of Donald Trump on one of his golf courses over the weekend. Instead, after the F.B.I. announced it was investigating the incident, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, a Republican, announced that his state would do its own research on what had happened.
Just so we’re all clear, it would make perfect sense for the far-right governor to examine how well state and local law enforcement responded to the developments, looking for areas of possible improvement.
But that’s not what DeSantis has in mind. Rather, the Republican suggested federal law enforcement is not to be trusted, so the state of Florida will launch a parallel probe to collect its own set of facts.
“In my judgment, it’s not in the best interest of our state or our nation to have the same federal agencies that are seeking to prosecute Donald Trump leading this investigation,” DeSantis said at a press conference, suggesting that the criminal charges pending against the former president necessarily calls into question the FBI’s ability to investigate what transpired on Sunday.
As the Times’ report added, “It is not uncommon for state and federal investigators to conduct parallel inquiries after a major event — but it is uncommon for state leaders to publicly impugn federal investigators in the process.”
Complicating matters, DeSantis wasn’t alone: Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah wrote on an online message that read, “Don’t trust the feds. Florida should investigate.”
Or put another way, federal leaders are publicly impugning federal investigators, too. It’s the sort of wildly unwarranted tactic that has a corrosive effect on public confidence related to their own government.
As for DeSantis’ efforts, former federal prosecutor Dan Gelber told The Bulwark’s Marc Caputo that the governor’s approach could interfere with a federal investigation and actually make it harder to build a case against the defendant.
“If you have competing agencies investigating, it can taint the whole process and be a wet dream for the defense,” Gelber said. “Turf battles are a thing in law enforcement investigations. They happen all the time. But to have them instigated by a governor is just nuts. … DeSantis is a former federal prosecutor and a JAG officer. He should know better. And he should know the law better.”
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