Steve Bannon had until recently managed to stay out of the glare of the expanding investigation into whether Trump or his team worked with Russia on its interference in the 2016 election. | Mark Wilson/Getty Images Bannon sticks with same lawyer for Mueller probe

Former White House strategist Steve Bannon has retained lawyer William Burck to represent him for an upcoming interview with special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigators, according to a person familiar with the arrangement.

Burck, a former senior attorney in the George W. Bush White House, is already representing him with respect to the House Intelligence Committee’s investigation.


At first, Burck just signed on with Bannon for the House probe. But that arrangement changed as Bannon’s legal exposure grew — with the special counsel reportedly issuing a subpoena last week to the former Trump aide to appear before the grand jury and then negotiating that into a private interview.

Burck has other clients in the Russia probe. He’s serving as the lawyer to both former White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, who met with Mueller’s team last October, and White House counsel Don McGahn, who sat for a special counsel interview in November.

According to the person familiar with Bannon’s situation, Mueller’s team had no objection to Burck working for three different clients who have all received requests to be interviewed. Mueller spokesman Peter Carr declined comment when asked about Burck’s arrangement.

While lawyers in corporate settings often will represent multiple employees at the same time, some legal experts say Burck could face potential conflicts if his clients’ interests diverge at any point.

POLITICO Playbook newsletter Sign up today to receive the #1-rated newsletter in politics Email Sign Up By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

“It’s a risky and unusual situation,” said Elizabeth de la Vega, a former assistant U.S. attorney from the Northern District of California. But she added that if Mueller’s team has indeed signed off on the arrangement “that would certainly lessen the risk.”

Burck isn’t the only lawyer now with this dilemma. Former Trump legal spokesman Mark Corallo has hired the husband-wife attorney duo of Victoria Toensing and Joseph diGenova in anticipation of requests for interviews by Mueller and Congress. Toensing, a former Reagan Justice Department deputy assistant attorney general, is also representing Sam Clovis, a Trump 2016 campaign official who reportedly met with Mueller’s investigators in October.

Bannon earlier this week upset House Russia investigators when he cited White House instructions in declining to answer questions from both Republicans and Democrats about his work for the Trump administration, during the post-election transition and any conversations with the president after being fired from the White House in August.

Lawmakers issued Bannon a subpoena on the spot, but Bannon still refused to answer their questions. On Thursday, Burck told the House Intelligence panel’s leaders that his client would come back for another deposition — perhaps at the end of the month — after they reach an agreement with the White House that doesn’t raise executive privilege concerns.

Bannon had until recently managed to stay out of the glare of the expanding investigation into whether Trump or his team worked with Russia on its interference in the 2016 election. But the former Trump strategist, who earlier this month stepped down from his job as executive chairman of Breitbart News after feuding with the president, has become an anticipated witness to discuss his work leading the Republican’s presidential campaign during the final months as hacked Democratic emails roiled the race.

At the White House, Bannon worked with national security adviser Michael Flynn, who pleaded guilty in December for lying to the FBI about his contacts with foreign officials, and he also has said he opposed the president’s controversial firing of FBI Director James Comey, which led to Mueller’s appointment.

Bannon’s interest to investigators also extends to comments he made in journalist Michael Wolff’s book “Fire and Fury,” including remarks that triggered complaints from the president about the 2016 meeting at Trump Tower with Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr., son-in-law Jared Kushner and Russian operatives.

In the book, Bannon is quoted calling the meeting with a Russian lawyer who promised dirt about Hillary Clinton as “treasonous” and “unpatriotic,” though he later said in a statement he was trying to criticize Paul Manafort, the former Trump campaign chairman who was also at the meeting and who has since been indicted by Mueller for money laundering and failing to register as an agent to a foreign government.

