She'll make the decision.

In my opinion.

Both sides submit names and the judge decides.

everyone will fight about the judges decision!! I just wish she would make the decision and be done with it!! I guess i do not understand the reasoning that more people involved would be better????

They could have subpoenaed them and let them hand over whatever documents they wanted and be done with it.

There should be no "special master" since Robert Mueller is already the Special Counsel. If this ties into the Russia investigation, which it very well might, then Mueller will want the evidence.

What he wanted? I sure as hell would not trust Cohen for anything! I believe Mueller did everything right. I just wish the judge would do what she believes is right. (make a decision)

Which is why this "special master" stuff makes zero sense.

The judge should let the prosecutors do their job and allow them to review their lawfully obtained evidence. Then if there is any evidence they decide to use which is subject to "attorney-client priviledge" or "executive priviledge", then the judge can just rule not to allow it to be introduced into the hearing, like a normal court hearing.

...would make it difficult to choose someone of Cohen's choosing?

to prevent priviledged evidence from being introduced into the court record. The judge makes these rulings and doesn't need outside help to do it. That's why she is a judge, we are supposed to trust her to do her job. But this administration fights the rule of law at every turn because it is always on the wrong side of the law. The judge should not be giving in to that. The only correct ruling here is no "special master - we are going to follow our established rule of law." There is no way to pick outsiders to make this determination, either side will be questioned as partisan. To even allow this should result in an automatic motion to appeal by the government. This is a bs exercise.

evidence in order to speed up the process of deciding what can be used at trial and what can't.

Has nothing to do with whether the warrant was legal or not.

The Special Master works for the court.

Think of the Special Master as a knowledgeable assistant to the judge helping to reduce their workload.

That is not the judge's job. The prosecutors do that and then the prosecutors can present the evidence they want to use and the judge rules on the admissability of that evidence. Asking the defense to participate in sorting through the seized evidence, either directly or indirectly, before it comes before a judge for a ruling does not seem right. That way important evidence could be discarded before the judge ever sees it. However this process will be organized the judge must be allowed to rule on every piece of evidence that is deemed priviledged by anyone but her.

That is the basic thing to understand. Sometimes, that makes it take longer and be more complex. The hope is that, in the end, justice is served.

If Hillary were in office I have no doubt there would be any number of investigations going on. All of them would actually be witch hunts. We would certainly want to ensure the process was fair and not run by people we believe were completely biased.

The appointment of the special master is one way to maximize the fairness and remove the argument from the defense that the people who decided what gets used and what doesn't were simply the prosecutors who wanted to win at all cost. We would expect no less if a President from our party was the accused.

I'm willing to bet neither side will be fully agreeable to the Judges final decision. ( I hope i'm wrong on this) This could become a mess!!

But, if we have learned anything from the past, it will be accused as being "rigged" from the beginning.

That is the manipulation that must be restrained.

...they are not going to choose someone like Robert Mueller.

of a "Master" is? They work for the court, not the Prosecution or Defense.

From: https://www.law.cornell.edu/rules/frcp/rule_53

I was not aware of it.

But, I could see how it could be manipulated and used to delay the process. Hopefully it will have some strict guidelines to prevent that?

faster (in this case).

Also if both parties can agree on the person to be appointed special master that means there won't be time consuming
challenges to that person's appointment by the judge.

We have not yet seen the evidence??



Although Mueller must have seen "something" in order to refer it to the Deputy Attorney General, who then referred it to the Southern District?

(1) Ivanka Trump,
(2) Jared Kushner,
(3) Melania Trump, or
(4) Barron Trump

per Trump's order?

If he wants the job.

Those are the types of choices we will be looking at, in my opinion.

A special master is a neutral person who acts as a judge for a specific, narrow task. Whoever is chosen will be someone who is demonstrably not biased toward or against either party. That person would definitely not be someone who has appeared on TV and offered an opinion about any aspect of the case or the parties involved. Chances are that if a special master is appointed that person will be someone who is a well-credentialed lawyer none of us has heard of.

"...who is demonstrably not biased toward or against either party."

"Should be..."

If not, why not?

...and that she is seeking advice from others. Because no one, not even judges, know everything.

But, she will have to be fair and understand that no matter whom she chooses, one side will say it is rigged and they cannot get a fair hearing.

There is no reason to believe this judge will make a decision that is unfair. Trump's people always claim that a judge's ruling that is not in his favor is rigged and unfair. So what?

I'm comfortable with this judge to make final ruling on her own! (no special master involved). What are your thoughts here? You think she would be right in that decision, OR could this mess up things and give appeal ( of here decision)advantage to Cohen?

just because of the sheer volume of the materials somebody - either the judge or the SM - is going to have to review. Federal judges have heavy caseloads and it would make sense to delegate the job to someone else. Apart from that consideration, I have every reason to believe the judge herself could decide on her own which documents are privileged. Judges always have to make decisions on the basis of the law and without having to consider whether one party will appeal or whine that the decision is unfair.

His position is to SLOW DOWN THIS PROCESS!!(that's his goal) That's why i feel the judge needs to make the decision, not special master.

It's the ultimate discretion of the judge to choose any of them, or none of them.

people would research the role of a special master.

...had some good descriptions of the job and it's limitations and under what types of circumstances a special master is called in. Made much of the chatter in this thread, superfluous really. You are correct

Each side can propose 4 attorneys as special master. If you propose 4 obviously biased people, then none of your proposed SMs will even be in the running any more. The judge will chose among your opponent’s suggestions. Experienced attorneys will propose respected members of the bar who they think will follow the law. The judge is not going to appoint somebody the judge doesn’t think well of. Your local mob attorney is not going to be appointed, nor a television personality. She might well appoint a retired judge.