Court Battles

Mueller to teach law school class on special counsel investigation

Former special counsel Robert Mueller and senior staff members from his investigation into Russian election meddling in 2016 will teach a law school class on their probe at the University of Virginia School of Law. 

The school announced that Mueller, an alumnus, will participate in the class, which will be formally taught by Aaron Zebley and two other former senior members of Mueller’s team. The class will “offer an inside look at the role of special counsel” and be taught in the fall.

“The course will focus on a key set of decisions made during the special counsel’s investigation. Instructors will talk about the legal and practical context for those decisions in a discussion format, and walk through the challenges and trade-offs when making decisions in a high-profile investigation,” the school said. 

“I was fortunate to attend UVA Law School after the Marine Corps, and I’m fortunate to be returning there now,” Mueller said in the announcement. “I look forward to engaging with the students this fall.”

Zebley, a top staffer in the investigation and a former chief of staff of the FBI, said the course would rely on public records to try to explain why certain actions were taken and why others were not.

Mueller’s probe was launched in 2017 to investigate Russian meddling in the 2016 race and allegations of collusion between Moscow and the Trump campaign. His investigation was broadly maligned by then-President Trump as a “witch hunt.”

His probe concluded that there was no evidence to show that Trump’s campaign colluded with Moscow to aid its interference attempts, though his report was unable to reach a conclusion regarding whether the then-president obstructed justice. 

Mueller has since been tight-lipped over his probe and has receded from the public eye.