As chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Illinois Senator Dick Durbin announced in a letter to the Justice Department that the committee is opening a formal investigation into pressure put on the Southern District of New York by then-president Donald Trump to indict political enemies like former Secretary of State John Kerry.

Rachel Maddow on MSNBC read from the letter, which instructs the Justice Department to hand over its documents and communications between Main Justice in Washington, DC and the SDNY offices relating to specific investigations and prosecutions.

The investigation was prompted by a report last week in the New York Times based on a book by former US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Geoffrey Berman, who served from January 2018 to June 2020.  In his new book, Berman alleged that senior members of the Justice Department pushed for him to stop, initiate or alter investigations to meet political ends.

In one instance, political appointee Edward O’Callaghan, who worked at DOJ as the principal associate deputy attorney general reportedly pushed for the prosecution of Greg Craig, White House Counsel during the Obama Administration, for a violation of the Foreign Agents Registration Act.  Berman said he would not pursue the case, so Main Justice sent it to the US Attorney for Washington DC, who prosecuted Craig; Craig was ultimately acquitted of all charges in a trial.

In another instance, O’Callaghan pushed SDNY to remove references to “Individual-1,” the term used to represent Donald Trump, in the sentencing filings for Michael Cohen, Trump’s lawyer who arranged hush money payments to two women Trump had affairs with.