Trump ally Kerik will meet with special counsel ‘in about a week,’ attorney tells CNN
By Aaron Pellish, CNN
(CNN) — Former New York Police Commissioner Bernie Kerik will meet with special counsel Jack Smith in the coming days to discuss efforts taken by former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani to investigate potential election fraud in the wake of the 2020 election, Kerik’s attorney said Sunday.
The attorney, Timothy Parlatore, who has also previously represented Trump, said in an interview with CNN’s Paula Reid that the special counsel’s office will meet with Kerik and his lawyers “in about a week” and will “get into … the core” of the intentions behind Trump and Giuliani’s unfounded claims of voter fraud.
“We have a meeting scheduled in about a week with the special counsel’s office to talk about a lot of the efforts that the Giuliani team was taking at the time to investigate fraud, and that’s really going to get into, you know, the core of whether they can charge somebody with having corrupt intent,” Parlatore said.
CNN has previously reported on Kerik’s intention to meet with the special counsel’s office.
Kerik’s meeting comes after he turned over documents to the special counsel’s office connected to the debunked voter fraud claims made by Trump and Giuliani, including affidavits claiming widespread “irregularities” and shoddy statistical analyses claiming proof of “fraudulent activities.”
Kerik worked alongside Giuliani in the weeks after the 2020 election to search for evidence of fraud that could have shifted the results of the election in Trump’s favor. Kerik had previously shielded some documents from Congress and federal investigators on attorney-client privilege grounds before he ultimately turned over the documents earlier this month.
Parlatore said it would “imbecilic” and “incredibly stupid” for the special counsel to issue an indictment against Trump before meeting with Kerik, arguing a rushed indictment would play into an argument Trump has repeatedly made on the campaign trail – that the multiple investigations targeting him constitute election interference.
“When you have something like this, to bring an indictment before you’ve finished your investigation, for whatever reason they may choose to do it, it feeds directly into the Trump campaign narrative about this all being, you know, about election interference. And so I think it would be incredibly stupid for them to go forward with indicting before they finish their investigation,” Parlatore said.
The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2023 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
