John Dean sits with his wife, Maureen, waiting to testify before the Senate Select Committee on Watergate in 1973. MUELLER REPORT RE EFFORTS TO INFLUENCE WITNESSES WITH PARDONS ( PP. PRINTING OFFICE, 1974); AND SPECIAL COUNSEL ROBERT S. MUELLER, III, REPORT ON THE INVESTIGATION INTO RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE IN THE 2016 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, VOLUMES I AND II (WASHINGTON, D.C: GOV. Speaking of Betty Gilpin, John Dean is practicing his testimony, and Mo is advising him. Armed with newspaper articles indicating the White House had possession of FBI Watergate files, committee chair Sam Ervin asked Gray what he knew about the White House obtaining the files. that Nixon's motivation for preventing Dean from getting immunity was to prevent him from testifying against key Nixon aides and Nixon himself. He had only a limited attorney-client privilege when interacting with the President and advisors and the privilege belongs to the Office in any event. White House Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman later claimed that Nixon appointed Dean to take the lead role in coordinating the Watergate cover-up from an early stage and that this cover-up was working very well for many months. The program also includes one of the few current day public figures who can fully understand what Dean went through Trumps former longtime attorney Michael Cohen, who went to prison for tax evasion and campaign finance violations. . WATERGATE: I am aware of no evidence that Nixon was involved with or had advance knowledge of the Watergate break-in and bugging, or the similar plans for Senator McGovern. The Mueller Report, like the Watergate Road Map, conveys findings, with supporting evidence, of potential criminal activity based on the work of federal prosecutors, FBI investigators, and witness testimony before a federal grand jury. Using Altemeyer's scholarly work, he contends that there is a tendency toward ethically questionable political practices when authoritarians are in power and that the current political situation is dangerously unsound because of it. He later became a commentator on contemporary politics, a book author, and a columnist for FindLaw's Writ. Bob, as a leading legal scholar, was asked to chair an ABA commission to reconsider the ABAs Code of Professional Conduct in light of the Watergate scandal. In July 1970, he accepted an appointment to serve as counsel to the president, after the previous holder of this post, John Ehrlichman, became the president's chief domestic adviser. In the 2022 TV mini-series Gaslit, Dean was played by Dan Stevens. He shares his story in the series "Watergate: Blueprint for a Scandal." It . Granted immunity, Dean laid out in stunning detail and intricacy how the President not only knew . But even then your point is that even then you couldnt do it. You cant look at Watergate today without looking through the lens or at least a filter of the Trump presidency, Dean said. Anchors Robert MacNeil and Jim Lehrer provided summaries, commentary, and interviews to supplement each broadcast. A former key witness in the Watergate investigation that brought down President Richard Nixon says indictments are on their way to Donald Trump. John Dean's statement to the House Judiciary Committee on June 10, 2019, as prepared for delivery. John Dean, the White House counsel to President Richard M. Nixon who was once dubbed the "master manipulator" of the Watergate scandal by the FBI, predicts former President Donald Trump may finally be about to face some serious consequences. The president lauded his efforts. John W. Dean (center) with his wife, Maureen, and John's lawyer, Charles N. Shaffer, in 1974. And that destroys the case.. President Richard Nixon speaks on the White House lawn prior to his trip to China in 1972. WATERGATE: President Trump repeated efforts to have Attorney General Sessions reverse his recusal un-recuse himself to take control of the Special Counsels investigation parallels President Nixons attempt to control the FBI investigation through his former White House Counsel John Ehrlichman. And I hasten to add that I learned about obstruction of justice the hard way, by finding myself on the wrong side of the law. He said he had found information via the Nixon tapes that showed what the burglars were after: information on a kickback scheme involving the Democratic National Convention in Miami Beach, Florida. Yet events in both 1972 and 2016 resulted in obstruction of the investigations. Trumps demands for unyielding loyalty from staff and statements such as asking Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to find 11,780 votes that would overturn the result of the 2020 presidential election in the state rival what was heard on Nixons tapes, but were delivered with far less discretion. The words Nixon used were strikingly like those uttered by President Trump. (See Separation-of-Powers Principles Support the Conclusion that Congress May Validly Prohibit Corrupt Obstructive Acts Carried Out Through the Presidents Official Powers, MUELLER REPORT, PP. The hearings, recorded by the National Public Affairs Center for Television (NPACT), were broadcast each evening in full, or gavel to gavel, by PBS stations across the nation, so that viewers unable to watch during the day could view the complete proceedings at home. We respect each other. The book claimed Dean had learned about the operation from his wife. After Comeys testimony to Congress on May 3, 2017, in which he declined to answer questions about whether the President was personally under investigation, the President decided to terminate Comey. Dean is known for his role in the cover-up of the Watergate scandal and his subsequent testimony to Congress as a witness. [1] His family moved to Flossmoor, Illinois, where he attended grade school. Dean is now the last man standing from that era, He is the last connection between this nation's authoritarian past and present. Copyright 2008 NPR. When Colson relayed President Nixons positive response, Hunt pled guilty and the so-called Cuban American defendants followed his lead and pled guilty, as well. This revised plan eventually led to attempts to eavesdrop on the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C., and to the Watergate scandal. II, P. Former White House Counsel John Dean's testimony in the Watergate investigation helped topple Richard Nixon's presidency. Brownell, K. (2020). Featuring New Interviews with John Dean, Bob Woodward, Carl Bernstein . It also led to the creation of the PBS NewsHour.. "[35][36], In February 2018, Dean warned that Rick Gates's testimony may be "the end" of Trump's presidency. Desperate mountain residents trapped by snow beg for help; We are coming, sheriff says, Newsom, IRS give Californians until October to file tax returns, Californias snowpack is approaching an all-time record, with more on the way, Column: A transgender patients lawsuit against Kaiser is a front for the conservative war on LGBTQ rights, Silent Coup: The Removal of a President,, Nixon hated PBS, but his Watergate scandal gave the fledgling network a major hit, From Chris Rock to the SAG Awards. untenable at some point. [Emphasis added.]. Every and the District of Columbia have adopted a version of these rules. I never dreamed I would have to live in this bubble, Dean, 83, said in a Zoom interview from his Beverly Hills home. For those of you who lived through Watergate, his name is synonymous with the political intrigue of the 1970s. [17] Dean failed to recall any conversations verbatim, and often failed to recall the gist of conversations correctly. A Woman's View of Watergate, which came out in 1975, and I will highlight a few moments. President Nixon's aide John Dean is sworn in before the Senate committee conducting hearings on the Watergate break-in and the conduct of the Nixon administration, on June 1, 1973. Well, John Dean has a new book. The point is: Richard Nixon knew he could not use his pardon power, unrestricted as it is in Article II, for the improper purpose of gaining the silence of witnesses in legal proceedings. Dean has been particularly critical of the party's support of Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump, and of neoconservatism, strong executive power, mass surveillance, and the Iraq War. [24] Also in 2006, Dean appeared as an interviewee in the documentary The U.S. vs. John Lennon, about the Nixon administration's efforts to keep John Lennon out of the United States. According to Dean, modern conservatism, specifically on the Christian Right, embraces obedience, inequality, intolerance, and strong intrusive government, in stark contrast to Goldwater's philosophies and policies. Mr. McGahn has expressed concern about being caught between two branches of government in responding to this Committees subpoena for his documents and testimony. After we settled the case, I started agreeing to do television, Dean said. Later Nixon worked directly with Henry Petersen, the top Justice Department official in charge of the Watergate investigation, once I had broken with the White House. Shortly after Watergate, Dean became an investment banker, author and lecturer based in Beverly Hills, California. I began by telling the president that there was a cancer growing on the presidency. In the 1999 film Dick, Dean was played by Jim Breuer. . In June 1973, as a young lawyer on Capitol Hill, I watched White House counsel John Dean testify before Sen. Sam Ervin's Watergate Committee from the row of seats behind the senators. II, P. 52), and McGahn is the only witness that the Special Counsel expressly labels as reliable, calling McGahn a credible witness with no motive to lie or exaggerate given the position he held in the White House. (MUELLER RPT, VOL. No one has sought to control this narrative more than former White House Counsel John Dean. Shortly after the Watergate hearings, Dean wrote about his experiences in a series of books and toured the United States to lecture. After John Dean gave his historic 1973 testimony on the Watergate scandal that eventually brought down the Nixon White House, he wanted to move on with his life. The Jan. 6 committee's hastily scheduled hearing for Tuesday "better be a big deal," said a key Watergate scandal figure. Again, McGahns testimony about these events, which are described in detail in the Mueller Report, are important for Congress to understand and, as noted later, claims of executive privilege or attorney-client privilege have been waived (because of disclosure of the Mueller Report authorized by President Trump, and the so-called crime-fraud exception to all privileges). Dean had originally been a proponent of Goldwater conservatism, but he later became a critic of the Republican Party. [29], Dean's 2007 book Broken Government: How Republican Rule Destroyed the Legislative, Executive and Judicial Branches is, as he wrote in its introduction, the third volume of an unplanned trilogy. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Dean was the first administration official to accuse Nixon of direct involvement with Watergate and the resulting cover-up in press interviews. [5], Dean was employed from 1966 to 1967 as chief minority counsel to the Republicans on the United States House Committee on the Judiciary. The targets of the hacking were the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign, from which information was stolen and released to harm the Clinton campaign and in turn would help the Trump campaign. Dean served as White House Counsel for President Richard Nixon from July 1970 until April 1973. On their second break-in, on the night of June 16, hotel security discovered the burglars. Cognition, 9(1), 122. At first, he shredded incriminating files. He admitted supervising payments of "hush money" to the Watergate burglars, notably E. Howard Hunt, and revealed the existence of Nixon's enemies list. [37][38], In September 2018, Dean warned against Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation to the United States Supreme Court,[39][40][41] a main concern being that the appointment would result in "the most presidential-powers-friendly court" in modern times. And by early February 1974, this Committee formally commenced impeachment proceedings.) He received a Juris Doctor (J.D.) A few specific examples of the Mueller findings and the Watergate parallels (HEADER CITES ARE TO VOLUME II): MUELLER REPORT RE MICHAEL FLYNN (PP. An obstruction of justice conviction prevented the former White House counsel from practicing law in Washington, D.C., and Virginia. The turning point came with the testimony of former White House counsel John Dean, whose weeklong account of Nixon's . I met with Kutak and his commission to provide my own insights. April 6, 1973: White House counsel John Dean begins cooperating with federal Watergate prosecutors. The Watergate hearings were produced by the National Public Affairs Center for Television (NPACT), public televisions Washington hub for national news and public affairs programming. Haldeman and Chief Advisor for Domestic Affairs John Ehrlichman, two of President Nixons closest advisors, who denied there was any White House wrongdoing; Alexander Butterfield, a former minor White House aide who revealed the existence of a secret audio tape-recording system that documented Oval Office conversations; and Rep. Barbara Jordan, a freshman member of the House Judiciary Committee, whose eloquent opening statement at the impeachment proceedings resonated throughout the hearing room and the nation. Dean had had suspicions that Nixon was taping conversations, and he tipped prosecutors to question witnesses along this line, leading to Butterfield's revelations. Nixon vigorously denied all accusations that he had authorized a cover-up, and Dean had no corroboration beyond various notes he had taken in his meetings with the president. Five men are arrested while trying to bug the Democratic National Committee's headquarters at the Watergate, a hotel and office building in Washington, D.C. A day later, White . By April 15, Nixon tried to tell me he was kidding about finding $1 million in hush money to pay the burglar defendants to maintain their silence. He resides in Beverly Hills, California. [11], On March 22, 1973, Nixon requested that Dean put together a report with everything he knew about the Watergate matter, inviting him to take a retreat to Camp David to do so. Yes, Dean and Mo are still married. Dean has written several books related to Watergate and the overreach of presidential powers. II, p. 1 that one of the reasons the Special Counsel did not make charging decisions relating to obstruction of justice was because he did not want to potentially preempt [the] constitutional processes for addressing presidential misconduct. The report then cites at footnote 2: See U.S. CONST. devanne villarreal parents, 2022 fantasy football rankings non ppr,