Attorney General Bill Barr made John Durham, the US Attorney tasked with investigating the oranges origins of the Russia collusion investigation, a Special Counsel, giving Durham protections to complete his probe even after Trump leaves office, the Associated Press reports.

Barr said he made Durham a Special Counsel in October, although he made no public announcement of the appointment at the time.  As a Special Counsel, Durham will have specific authority to call witnesses as approved by the Attorney General and given specific parameters of the investigation.  The status also makes it harder for a President to fire Durham without cause.

According to the AP, in the October 19th appointment, Durham has been tasked “to investigate whether any federal official, employee or any person or entity violated the law in connection with the intelligence, counter-intelligence or law enforcement activities” relating to the initiation of the investigation of Trump campaign involvement with Russian government interference in the 2016 election.

Barr had reportedly pushed Durham to release a report on his investigation prior to the 2020 election in a transparent attempt to smear then Democratic nominee/now President-elect Joe Biden.  The pressure resulted in a long-time Durham aide, veteran federal prosecutor Nora Dannehy, to resign in early September, reportedly because of her concerns about political influence in the investigation.

Since then, sources say Durham has limited his investigation to the conduct of FBI agents who worked on the probe, known as Operation Crossfire Hurricane, the AP reports.

Like Robert Mueller, Durham will be limited in scope to specific areas of investigation and unable to expand that scope without explicit approval from the future Attorney General.

This ploy could also be used by Republicans in Congress to claim that whoever Biden names as Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General would have an inherent conflict of interest simply because they were nominated by Biden.  It will likely fuel the speculative, conspiracy-based conservative media machine for the first months of the incoming Biden administration.