Page:CTRL0000034600 - Transcribed Interview of Richard Peter Donoghue, (Oct. 1, 2021).pdf/133

133 [2:38 p.m.]


 * BY

The meeting ended—you said 2-1/2 hours—close to 9 o'clock at night by this point on January 3rd?

Yeah. It's after 9:00. I think it was about 3 hours total.

Where'd you go next?

We walked out of the Oval Office. We went up to the box where we'd stored all our phones. We were removing them, and Jeff Clark said something to the effect of, "Look, gentlemen, I know we were all in there advocating what we thought was best for the country, so no hard feelings." And no one responded. We just looked at him. He took his phone, he turned, and he walked out.

We went briefly up to the White House Counsel's Office and then headed back to DOJ headquarters.

So it's fair to say, a sense of relief? You and Mr. Cipollone, Mr. Rosen, Mr. Philbin in that office felt like you had averted a negative outcome?

Yes, very much so.

Did you take steps then to reassure the assistant attorneys general that you had spoken with earlier that afternoon about the outcome?

When we got back to the Department, we had a quick conference call with them to let them know just generally how it had gone, that there was a long meeting in the Oval Office, that there would not be leadership change, and that we should all just focus on the work come Monday morning.

All right.

A couple of phone calls later that night. Does the President call you directly after