Daniel Levin has spoken to members of President Donald Trump’s defense team on several occasions but has not officially signed on. | AP Photo Trump's legal team approached former Mueller chief of staff to join

President Donald Trump’s lawyers approached Daniel Levin, a former chief of staff to special counsel Robert Mueller, to join the president’s personal legal team amid the growing probe into his campaign’s potential ties with Russia.

Levin, a Washington lawyer who worked for Mueller at the FBI, has spoken to members of Trump’s defense team on several occasions but has not officially signed on, according to people familiar with the talks. Whether he will sign on “remains up in the air,” one person said.


Levin declined to comment Wednesday. Mark Corallo, a spokesman for the president’s lead lawyer Marc Kasowitz, also declined to comment.

Trump has not been accused of any wrongdoing. But with investigators gearing up for a wide-ranging probe that may include questions of whether the president tried to obstruct justice by firing former FBI director James Comey in May, his lawyers are looking for counsel familiar with Mueller and how he runs investigations.

Corallo, the spokesman, previously worked with Mueller in the federal government. And Levin has long been friends with Mueller, working as his chief of staff in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and later coordinating the 9/11 Commission. Levin also worked at WilmerHale, where Mueller worked, before moving to White and Case.

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“He’s the first person in and the last person out, that’s the reason everyone claims he is the gold standard,” Levin said of Mueller to CNN last month.

The president has grown obsessed with the investigations, calling them a “witch hunt” and periodically attacking the investigators. He frequently calls his lawyers while reading news reports and watching TV.

Trump has already recruited John Dowd, a longtime Washington lawyer who has defended politicians, to join his longtime New York personal attorney Kasowitz and Jay Sekulow, a prominent conservative lawyer.