Former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti explained the political gamesmanship behind Trump-allied attorney Kory Langhofer’s contention that special counsel Bob Mueller illegally obtained tens of thousands of emails from President Donald Trump’s White House transition team.

Mariotti said that the accusations — like the rest of the right-wing attacks on Mueller — are just Trump supporters “playing politics” and attempting to ink the waters around the probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election — the topic Trump and his boosters most want to avoid.

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In a series of tweets, Mariotti said that the way Trump’s defenders are flailing is “a bad sign for them.”

1/ Today @axios reported that Mueller obtained tens of thousands of emails from the General Services Administration, which possessed them. https://t.co/jDB0fDlMJZ — Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 16, 2017

3/ Now Trump’s team has written a letter to Congress, complaining that some of the materials were “susceptible to privilege claims.” So what does this mean? — Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 16, 2017

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5/ What *is* unusual here is that Mueller obtained emails from GSA even though he could have obtained (many of) the same emails from lawyers for the Trump Transition. — Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 16, 2017

7/ That’s because the defense team would review the emails, take out the ones that are not relevant, sort the emails, and put them in a format could be useable by Mueller. — Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 16, 2017

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9/ One reason comes to mind. Mueller was concerned that he wouldn’t receive all of the emails if he obtained them from the Trump team. That’s surprising and suggests that he has reason to distrust Trump’s team. — Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 16, 2017

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11/ I doubt that’s why Mueller obtained emails from GSA because any good lawyer would have reviewed the emails with their client anyway prior to an interview. Either the defense lawyers were incompetent or they weren’t surprised as they’re letting on. — Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 16, 2017

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13/ If that happened here, it would mean a federal judge found that there was good reason to believe that a crime was committed and the emails contained evidence of a crime. — Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 16, 2017

15/ If Mueller obtained a privileged email, the defense would be able to exclude it as evidence at trial. Typically all that happens is that the defense raises the issue with the prosecutor, and if the prosecutor agrees it is privileged, they return the privileged document. — Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 16, 2017

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17/ Instead of sending a letter to Mueller, the attorneys sent a letter to Congress. Why? Probably to try to feed the growing effort to fire Mueller and/or try to discredit him to Congressional Republicans. — Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 16, 2017

19/ The biggest conclusion I’d draw from their letter is that they’re concerned about Mueller’s investigation and are doing whatever they can to discredit it. Their claims themselves are weak and are meant to persuade people who know nothing about criminal investigations. /end — Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) December 16, 2017