Do Rosenstein and Mueller believe that not only their investigation but also their desire for secrecy take precedence over every other consideration, including the president’s capacity to govern domestically and conduct foreign policy in a dangerous world?

Andy McCarthy writes at National Review,

...by appointing Mueller without first establishing a basis to believe a crime warranting investigation had been committed, Rosenstein violated regulations that govern special-counsel appointments. By contrast, the grand jury has no such constraints — it can investigate pretty much anything. There is no proof hurdle — such as “probable cause” or “reasonable suspicion” — that has to be surmounted. In fact, a grand jury is free to investigate even if it just wants to satisfy itself that a crime has not been committed.

... a prosecutor who is using the grand jury has sweeping investigative authority. That includes broad subpoena power. There is a big difference, however, between the power to issue a subpoena to a person and the power to make that person testify.

Our law extends various privileges that relieve the privilege-holder of the obligation to provide evidence. Best known is the privilege against self-incrimination — a person never has to testify against himself. But there are many others: husband-wife, lawyer-client, doctor-patient, priest-penitent, and so on.

So sure, a prosecutor can issue a subpoena requiring a witness (including a witness who may be a subject or target of the investigation) to appear before the grand jury. But that does not necessarily mean the witness must testify. If the witness has a privilege that would be infringed by the prosecutor’s questions, the witness may refuse to answer.

...no other government official’s responsibilities compare to the importance of the president’s.

There are thus very good reasons why Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein should step in and prevent Special Counsel Mueller from seeking to question the president. But I want to leave you with a different thought. How are we supposed to grapple with whether the president should be compelled to testify when we don’t know what Mueller is alleging? What crime does Mueller want to ask the president about? And if there isn’t one, why are we even talking about an interview, let alone a subpoena?

It has become ludicrous. The question of whether a prosecutor should be permitted to interview a president hinges on whether the president is a suspect. There is no public evidence that President Trump is. This raises the patent objection that he should not be asked to be interviewed under those circumstances. What we hear in response is, “How do you know he’s not a suspect?” But the reason we don’t know — other than the lack of evidence after two years — is that Mueller won’t deign to tell us, and Rosenstein won’t deign to comply, publicly, with regulations that required him to outline the basis for a criminal investigation.

That is not acceptable. In every other independent-prosecutor investigation in modern history — Watergate, Iran-Contra, Whitewater/Lewinsky — the president and the public have known exactly what was alleged. The prosecutor was able to investigate with all the secrecy the law allows, but under circumstances in which we all understood what was being investigated and why the president was suspected of wrongdoing.

We are entitled to nothing less. The President should direct Rosenstein to outline, publicly and in detail, the good-faith basis for a criminal investigation arising out of Russia’s interference in the election — if there is one. If he can’t, Mueller’s criminal investigation should be terminated; if he can, Mueller should be compelled to explain (unless Rosenstein’s disclosure makes it clear) why he needs to interview President Trump in order to complete his work.

If Rosenstein and Mueller are reluctant to do that, it can only be because they’ve decided that not only their investigation but also their desire for secrecy take precedence over every other consideration, including the president’s capacity to govern domestically and conduct foreign policy in a dangerous world. But secrecy is not the nation’s top priority. It’s long past time to lay the cards on the table.

Read more here.