Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III and his team of a dozen-plus lawyers and investigators have proven stealthy in their wide-ranging Russia probe. They have surprised the White House with one indictment after another, and summoned President Trump's confidants for lengthy interviews. In the case of former campaign chairman Paul Manafort alone, court filings show, they have collected more than 400,000 documents and 36 electronic devices. 
 
 Mueller and his deputies are, in the fearful word of some Trump loyalists, "killers." 
 
 Trump's response, by contrast, is being directed by John M. Dowd, the president's personal lawyer retired from a large firm who works essentially as a one-man band, and Ty Cobb, a White House lawyer who works out of a small office in the West Wing basement, near the cafeteria where staffers get lunch. 
 
 Dowd and Cobb, along with attorney Jay Sekulow, serve not only as Trump's lawyers but also as his strategists, publicists, therapists and — based on Dowd's claim that he wrote a controversial presidential tweet — ghostwriters. 
 
 When Mueller requests documents, they provide them. When Trump reacts to new twists in the Russia saga, they seek to calm him down. When he has questions about the law, such as the Logan Act or Magnitsky Act, they explain it. And when the president frets that Mueller may be getting too close to him, they assure him he has done nothing wrong, urge him to resist attacking the special counsel and insist that the investigation is wrapping up — first, they said, by Thanksgiving, then by Christmas and now by early next year. 
 
 As lawyers for the world's highest-profile client, Dowd and Cobb have come under scrutiny for their every move and utterance — and the criticism has been harsh. 
 
 Many in the Washington legal community chide them as being indiscreet, error-prone and outmatched. They say public blunders — such as Dowd and Cobb casually chatting about their legal strategy on the patio of a downtown Washington steakhouse in September within earshot of a reporter — suggest a lack of discipline. 
 
 Critics also question why, seven months into Mueller's investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election, they have not assembled a battalion of lawyers as President Bill Clinton had when he was being investigated by independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr. And some Trump loyalists, spoiling for a fight, say the president's lawyers should be combative rather than cooperative with Mueller. 
 
 "There certainly have been gaffes," said Alan Dershowitz, a criminal defense attorney and Harvard Law School professor who has won praise from Trump for his television appearances defending a president's constitutional prerogative to fire his FBI director. 
 
 "These are not the kinds of things that one would expect from the most powerful man in America, who has a choice of anybody to be his defense counsel," Dershowitz said. "Well — almost anybody," he added, saying that he is not interested in the job. 
 
 [Trump’s legal team faces tensions — and a client who often takes his own counsel] 
 
 
 
 Lawyer Ty Cobb, left, in 2004 and Jay Sekulow, in 2015. The two, along with John Dowd, are representing President Trump in the Russia probe, serving as his strategists, publicists and therapists. (AP photos/AP photos) 
 
 This portrait of Trump's legal team and defense strategy is based on interviews with more than two dozen White House officials, lawyers and other people connected to the Russia probe, most of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject. 
 
 The chorus of criticism may be growing louder, but Trump is not singing along. By most accounts, the president is satisfied with his representation — and talks to Cobb several times a day — though advisers say he has occasionally discussed bringing on new lawyers. 
 
 Trump, 71, connects with Dowd, 76, and Cobb, in his mid-60s, as contemporaries. He appreciates their no-nonsense old-school style, and likes that neither appears on television, believing their absence from the airwaves deprives what he calls the Russia "witch hunt" of oxygen, according to Trump's advisers. 
 
 A former Marine Corps captain, Dowd has a gruff demeanor and has proven able at times to cool Trump's temper and convince him of the virtues of pragmatism over pugnacity, aides said. 
 
 Some Trump advisers dismiss Cobb's predictions that the Mueller probe is nearing its conclusions as misleading happy talk, but the president has internalized it as reality. One reason for Trump's faith is his belief that his lawyers are plugged in. Cobb tells him he is in frequent, and sometimes daily, contact with the special counsel's office, according to people familiar with the dynamic. 
 
 Over Thanksgiving at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla., Trump boasted to friends that Cobb was "brilliant" and that he was certain Mueller would soon exonerate him. 
 
 Cobb declined to comment, and Dowd responded to an email inquiry with two words: "No, thanks." 
 
 White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said, "The president is happy with his legal team." 
 
 Cobb works as a White House lawyer whose salary is paid by the government, and his duty is to the office of the presidency, whereas Dowd and Sekulow are employed by Trump and represent him personally. Dowd and Sekulow enjoy attorney-client privilege, but Cobb does not — meaning that Mueller could seek access to Cobb's notes or ask to interview him about his interactions with the president. 
 
 [Trump lawyer John Dowd brought down Pete Rose. Almost 30 years later, they’re still fighting.] 
 
 Mark Corallo, a Justice Department official under President George W. Bush, served as spokesman for Trump's legal team earlier this year. Corallo is no longer involved, but he praised Dowd and Cobb as "titans." 
 
 "They've been at the top of their profession and were on the shortlist of the top 10 attorneys you would call if you got your knickers in a twist," Corallo said. He added, "One thing I like is Cobb and Dowd are of the same generation as the president. They are contemporaries. There is a comfort that comes with being able to talk with somebody who shares your experience in the world." 
 
 Still, there have been moments of tension. Last Tuesday, anxiety ran high early in the morning because of a report out of Germany that Mueller's office had subpoenaed Deutsche Bank for records related to the transactions of Trump and people close to him. 
 
 Trump was unnerved, but his lawyers tried to soothe his irritation and scrambled to determine whether the report was accurate, aware that if Mueller were digging into Trump's finances, he would be crossing a red line the president had publicly set, according to three people familiar with the discussions. After the lawyers consulted with the special counsel's office, Sekulow issued a statement that afternoon saying that Trump's team had confirmed there was no subpoena for Trump's records. 
 
 The Trump administration's key people in the Russia investigation — including the president's son, Donald Trump Jr., and son-in-law, Jared Kushner — are represented by different attorneys. But some of the various lawyers, along with Dowd and Cobb, cooperate by sharing information on regular conference calls about questions their clients have been asked and documents they have turned over. 
 
 Witnesses in Mueller's probe and their lawyers have reported back to Cobb and Dowd that the special counsel's team has asked detailed questions about Trump's May firing of James B. Comey as FBI director, leading them to believe that Mueller may be gathering evidence of obstruction of justice, according to one witness. 
 
 But Cobb and Dowd have told Trump he has no vulnerability, officials said. Dowd went so far as to posit last week to Axios that a president cannot obstruct justice because of his constitutional powers as the chief law enforcement officer — an interpretation that was mocked by some legal scholars. 
 
 [A bold new legal defense for Trump: Presidents cannot obstruct justice] 
 
 On Dec. 2, Trump tweeted that he fired Michael Flynn as national security adviser in part because he had lied to the FBI — an admission that could become evidence in an obstruction investigation. Dowd claimed he drafted the tweet, and fellow lawyers privately said they could not believe a statement so careless was written not by the impulsive president but by his lawyer. 
 
 One of Trump's advisers told the president that weekend: "The first job of a lawyer is to shut up. The second job of a lawyer is to keep their client's mouth shut. I don't know why they're tweeting and talking and trying to explain the tweet," according to someone with knowledge of the conversation. 
 
 People close to the Trump legal team argue that additional lawyers could result in a more proactive and careful approach. "It's amazing the stress and magnitude of representing the president of the United States," said one person familiar with the inner workings. "You'd have to be super human to do it alone. You've got 16 of the best lawyers in the country going up against you." 
 
 For Trump, being under the glare of a legal investigation is familiar territory. A real estate developer and reality-television star before becoming a politician, he has spent much of his professional life enmeshed in litigation. 
 
 When Mueller's Russia investigation began in May, Trump hired as his lead attorney Marc Kasowitz, a litigator from New York with a brawler reputation who had represented Trump and his companies off and on for years in divorce, bankruptcy and other proceedings. 
 
 In the early weeks of the Mueller probe, the hard-charging Kasowitz would scurry in and out of the Oval Office and the adjoining dining room in what aides described as a running — and at times frenzied — commentary with Trump about all things Russia. 
 
 But Kasowitz had scant experience in Washington and with investigations like Mueller's. After he caused a kerfuffle by sending an expletive-laced and disparaging email to a stranger who had criticized him, Kasowitz departed the Russia legal team. He continues to represent Trump in some other matters. 
 
 [When Trump goes looking for a media brawl, this feared lawyer steps in] 
 
 Trump tried to hire or has considered hiring more than a half dozen top litigators to help manage the Russia probe, including William A. Burck, Mark Filip, Emmet Flood, Robert J. Giuffra, Ted B. Olson and Brendan V. Sullivan Jr., according to several people with knowledge of the president's deliberations. For various reasons, none took the job. 
 
 "If you're the president of the United States, typically the top lawyers are lining up to pitch you," said one person close to the White House and familiar with the legal team's dynamics. "Here, you have the opposite." 
 
 Bob Bauer, who was President Barack Obama's White House counsel, said in assessing the Trump legal team: "Some people may want to blame the lawyers, but my principal question is, 'How do you represent a client like Trump?' And at what point do these lawyers decide they're so hemmed in, so compromised by his behavior, his impulses, his tweets, that they just can't represent him effectively?" 
 
 The face of the legal team has been Sekulow, who has deep ties to the Christian right, though he has adopted a lower profile since the spring and summer when he was a frequent television presence. 
 
 Cobb, who had been a partner at Hogan Lovells, enjoys a reputation as a seasoned white-collar advocate whose last high-stakes legal case involving Washington politics was in the 1990s. Dowd has been a higher-profile criminal defender and represented Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) during a 1990 ethics investigation into whether McCain had improperly intervened in a savings and loan probe. He is perhaps best known for representing the commissioner of baseball in the late 1980s and producing the "Dowd Report," a document that resulted in Pete Rose's lifetime suspension from the sport. 
 
 Dowd was widely perceived by other lawyers to be in the twilight of his career, having formally retired in 2015 from Akin Gump, where he had worked since 1990. 
 
 Dowd lost one of his most recent big cases when his client, hedge fund manager Raj Rajaratnam, was convicted in 2011 on insider trading charges in New York. Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney prosecuting Rajaratnam, reflected on facing Dowd in that trial in an episode last week of his podcast, "Stay Tuned with Preet." 
 
 "John Dowd said a lot of — how shall I put it? — ludicrous, silly things," said Bharara, who was fired as U.S. attorney two months into the Trump administration. 
 
 At one point, Dowd was filmed swearing at and flashing his middle finger at reporters covering the trial. It garnered him unflattering press coverage — but it was the kind of dramatic move that a client like Trump could see as an attribute. 
 
 Sari Horwitz and Tom Hamburger contributed to this report. ||||| President Trump Donald John TrumpHouse Republicans push Mulvaney, Trump to rescind Gateway funds Pruitt spent K flying aides to Australia to prep for later-canceled visit: report Rosenstein told Trump he is not a target of Mueller probe: report MORE is adding prominent white-collar attorney Joseph diGenova to his personal legal team, the latest sign of an increasingly aggressive stance toward special counsel Robert Mueller Robert Swan MuellerSasse: US should applaud choice of Mueller to lead Russia probe MORE’s investigation. 
 
 The White House insists that there are no plans to fire Mueller. But Trump’s own tweets and his decision to hire diGenova — a former U.S. attorney who has attacked the FBI and Department of Justice (DOJ) in conservative media outlets — are the latest signs that the president is moving to discredit Mueller’s probe. 
 
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 The confrontational posture comes as Mueller’s investigation has reportedly extended to Trump’s personal business empire, and as the White House and the special counsel negotiate the parameters of a potential interview. 
 
 “It shows they’re taking this very seriously and recognize that it’s not going away any time soon, and that the stakes are just climbing higher,�? said former U.S. Attorney John Wood. 
 
 DiGenova has been a fixture in the Washington, D.C., legal community for years. He is married to Victoria Toensing, who represents an informant at the center of the Uranium One investigation being conducted by Republicans in Congress. 
 
 Like Trump, diGenova has a harsh assessment of former FBI Director James Comey James Brien ComeyJustice to provide access to Comey memos to GOP lawmakers Judge questions whether DOJ gave Mueller too much power Justice Dept inspector asks US attorney to consider criminal charges for McCabe: reports MORE. DiGenova has described Comey as “the dirtiest cop in America�? and accused him of destroying the FBI’s reputation with his “bizarre personal behavior.�? 
 
 The New York Times first reported on diGenova’s hiring, and in that story highlighted his past claim that the Justice Department had framed Trump by “creating a false crime�? of collusion. One prominent legal figure described diGenova to The Hill as “a wild card.�? 
 
 DiGenova joins a team of Trump’s personal lawyers who have freely attacked the special counsel, breaking from the more reserved stance the president’s White House legal team has taken up to now. 
 
 Trump attorney Jay Sekulow is a frequent guest on Fox News’s “Hannity,�? where he has railed against alleged corruption at the FBI and DOJ and demanded a second special counsel investigate what he describes as irregularities in the separate investigations into Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham ClintonJustice to provide access to Comey memos to GOP lawmakers Justice Dept inspector asks US attorney to consider criminal charges for McCabe: reports 'Homeland' to drop Trump allegories in next season MORE and Trump. 
 
 On his Monday radio show, Sekulow detailed the chain of events he said wrongly led to the special counsel investigation of Trump and called out individuals at the DOJ and FBI by name for alleged anti-Trump bias. 
 
 “You have to look at the totality of circumstances here and ask yourself, what is happening?�? Sekulow said. 
 
 Sekulow’s remarks came one day after another of Trump’s personal attorneys, John Dowd, sent Washington into a frenzy by calling for an end to the special counsel. 
 
 Dowd publicly pressured Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein Rod Jay RosensteinRosenstein told Trump he is not a target of Mueller probe: report Justice to provide access to Comey memos to GOP lawmakers Judge questions whether DOJ gave Mueller too much power MORE, who is overseeing the special counsel because Attorney General Jeff Sessions Jefferson (Jeff) Beauregard SessionsAppeals court rules against Trump effort to hit 'sanctuary cities' Justice Dept inspector asks US attorney to consider criminal charges for McCabe: reports Poll: Almost two-thirds of Texas voters support legal recreational marijuana MORE recused himself, to “bring an end to alleged Russia Collusion investigation�? that he said had been “manufactured�? by Comey and former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe Andrew George McCabeJustice Dept inspector asks US attorney to consider criminal charges for McCabe: reports James Comey and Andrew McCabe: You read, you decide GOP lawmakers demand Sessions investigate Clinton, Comey MORE, whom Sessions fired on Friday night. 
 
 Dowd said the entire special counsel investigation was “based upon a fraudulent and corrupt dossier�? compiled by British spy Christopher Steele and paid for in part by Democrats, including the Clinton campaign. 
 
 That statement preceded a round of blistering tweets from the president, in which Trump vented his frustration with Mueller and singled him out for criticism by name for the first time. 
 
 Trump accused Mueller of stocking his team with Democrats and said the special counsel was a “witch hunt�? that was rife with “massive conflicts of interest.�? 
 
 The White House quickly sought to throw cold water on the notion that Mueller’s firing was immanent. 
 
 “There are no conversations or discussions about removing Mr. Mueller,�? deputy press secretary Hogan Gidley said Monday. 
 
 Ty Cobb, who leads the president’s White House legal team, issued a similar statement. 
 
 “The President is not considering or discussing the firing of the Special Counsel, Robert Mueller,�? Cobb said in a statement. 
 
 The White House position has long been that it is cooperating with Mueller in the hopes that he would conduct a swift investigation that clears the president of wrongdoing. 
 
 Cobb had been hopeful that the special counsel would wrap by the end of 2017 or in early 2018. 
 
 The White House legal team believes it has finished providing the thousands of internal documents the special counsel requested. Cobb’s team has been in a holding pattern, even as media reports indicate that Mueller’s probe has expanded to include everything from the Trump Organization to Jared Kushner Jared Corey KushnerTillerson believes Kushner was responsible for rumors of ouster: report The danger in firing Rod Rosenstein Relations with Latin America sour under Trump MORE’s business dealings to a private meeting with a Russian official at an exclusive island resort in the Indian Ocean. 
 
 Still, Robert Ray, the former independent counsel for the Whitewater investigation during the Clinton administration, says that as long as Cobb is in charge of the White House legal team, any notion that there has been a change in legal strategy is overblown. 
 
 “Ty Cobb has been the constant fixture here,�? Ray said. “There’s no indication anything has changed until he’s no longer in the loop. There is still a sense that they’re operating under the principle that the White House will cooperate and hand over the relevant witnesses and documents to try to bring this to a close. There will always be a political atmospherics and outside lawyers joining or leaving, but there haven’t been any fundamental changes.�? 
 
 Mueller still has the confidence of lawmakers on Capitol Hill, with several Republicans warning Trump against firing him on Monday. 
 
 Mueller, a Republican, was confirmed in a 98-0 vote to lead the FBI in 2001 under George W. Bush and by a 100-0 vote when Barack Obama Barack Hussein ObamaJudge rules against Trump administration in teen pregnancy prevention case Parkland student rips Obama for essay on shooting survivors Obama pens Time 100 entry for Parkland survivors MORE asked him to continue in the role in 2011. 
 
 “I think there would be a number of unintended consequences [if Trump were to fire Mueller] and I’m not going to speculate what those are,�? said Sen. John Cornyn John CornynSenate confirms Trump’s pick to lead NASA DOJ denies reports judicial nominee once called illegal immigrants 'maggots' Overnight Energy: Trump NASA pick advances after drama | White House office to investigate Pruitt's soundproof booth | 170 lawmakers call for Pruitt to resign MORE (R-Texas). 
 
 Even Fox News host Sean Hannity, who is friends with Trump and pillories Mueller every night on his top-rated cable show, sought to dampen speculation that the special counsel would be fired. 
 
 Hannity made a rare appearance on the morning show “Fox & Friends,�? a program that the president is known to watch, and offered a word of caution about Mueller. 
 
 “If I was advising the president, I’d say, let this investigation go forward. We’re probably coming to the end of it, if I had to render a guess, and it would be in his best interest 
 
 probably not to comment,�? Hannity said. 
 
 “All the president was saying was, this [special counsel investigation] should never have been. This never should have happened,�? Hannity continued. “I would argue we’re 
 
 getting to the end of the process. There’s not going to be any firing of Mueller.�? 
 
 The president saw the segment and tweeted out praise for Hannity shortly after it was over. ||||| John Dowd (pictured) had been spearheading negotiations with Special Counsel Robert Mueller for a potential interview with the president, while Jay Sekulow handled public communications. | Richard Dew/AP Photo Trump’s Russia probe lawyer John Dowd resigns The departure comes amid a larger shakeup of the legal team handling the Mueller investigation. 
 
 John Dowd resigned Thursday as President Donald Trump’s lead lawyer for the Russia investigation amid a wider shakeup of Trump’s legal team that raised new questions about Trump’s strategy for dealing with special counsel Robert Mueller. 
 
 Dowd stepped down just days after he issued a statement calling for Mueller’s probe to be shuttered, which he first attributed with his title as the president’s lawyer and then backtracked to say he was speaking only for himself. 
 
 Story Continued Below 
 
 “I love the president and wish him well,” Dowd said in an email to POLITICO. 
 
 Dowd, a prominent Washington white collar defense attorney with a prickly demeanor, signed on as a personal attorney to the president last June and recently had been spearheading negotiations with Mueller for a potential interview with the president. 
 
 But the 77-year old attorney had grown increasingly frustrated by his work for Trump, according to a source familiar with the Trump legal team strategy. Dowd was particularly upset to learn on Monday that Trump had decided to hire Joseph diGenova, another bulldog lawyer and scandal veteran to help with his Russia response. 
 
 Trump had also been gauging interest from other prominent attorneys, including former George W. Bush Solicitor General Ted Olson, who recently turned down an offer from Trump by citing conflicts with his law firm. 
 
 Trump’s legal team has long been riven by a debate about how Trump should handle Mueller’s investigation in both political and legal terms. Dowd had preached a confrontational approach, warning Trump of the risks of speaking to Mueller—at the risk of perjuring himself—and calling in a Saturday morning statement on the Justice Department to “bring an end” to its “manufactured” Russia probe. 
 
 Asked Thursday at a China trade event at the White House whether he was still willing to speak to Mueller, the president responded, “Yes, I would like to.” 
 
 Given the recent addition of the combative diGenova to Trump’s team, it is not clear that Dowd’s departure will substantially impact its overall strategy. 
 
 
 
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 Dowd had previously been known best for representing Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) during the Keating Five Scandal, and for leading a Major League Baseball investigation of gambling allegations surrounding baseball great Pete Rose. 
 
 Jay Sekulow, who has been handling public communications and research on constitutional issues for the Trump legal team, declined on Thursday to answer questions about how the president’s attorneys would be organized going forward. 
 
 “John Dowd has been a valuable member of our legal team and we will continue our ongoing cooperation with the office of special counsel regarding this inquiry,” Sekulow said in a statement to POLITICO. 
 
 Trump’s legal team has seen remarkable flux, particularly given the stakes for a president who could potentially face impeachment or even indictment over allegations that his campaign colluded with the Kremlin and that he has sought to obstruct justice. Trump insists that such charges have been manufactured by political partisans. 
 
 The president originally tapped his longtime personal lawyer Marc Kasowitz to represent him in the Justice Department’s Russia probe, which Mueller has led since shortly after Trump fired FBI Director James Comey last May. 
 
 But the New York-based Kasowitz stepped down last summer amid concerns he wasn’t best positioned to tangle with a Washington scandal. 
 
 While the president continues to speak with Kasowitz, he has mainly relied on Dowd and Sekulow to manage the Russia probe for him as an individual. Washington lawyer Ty Cobb runs the White House’s official response to the investigation with a team of about five aides who draw taxpayer salaries. 
 
 The changes to the Trump legal team are seen as a bad omen for Cobb, who has been urging cooperation with Mueller. In an interview on Wednesday, former Cobb law partner Robert Bennett called for Cobb to resign in order to preserve his professional reputation. 
 
 “I hope my friend Ty Cobb will leave the team. He’s not helping himself or his reputation,” Bennett said. 
 
 Cobb did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 
 
 Trump has recently been frustrated with his lawyers, who had been giving him a steadily changing series of target completion dates for a Mueller probe that has only appeared to widen in recent weeks to include allegations, seemingly unrelated to Russia, that a consultant for the governments of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates worked with a top GOP fundraiser. 
 
 On Saturday, Trump tweeted that “the Mueller probe should never have been started,” insisting that “there was no collusion and there was no crime” and branding the investigation a “WITCH HUNT.” It was the first time Trump had specifically mentioned Mueller by name on Twitter — something his lawyers have counseled him to avoid doing. 
 
 This week he hired diGenova, a fierce critic of the Russia investigation who earlier this year told Fox News that Trump had been framed by the Justice Department and FBI “with a falsely created crime.” 
 
 Trump’s free-wheeling style has worn on his lawyers. He’s ignored their advice to restrain himself on Twitter and disregarded their counsel that he not discuss details of the probe beyond his legal team. 
 
 poster="http://v.politico.com/images/1155968404/201803/1853/1155968404_5756709788001_5756676647001-vs.jpg?pubId=1155968404" true 
 
 Legal experts say those are reasons why Trump has struggled to attract the caliber of lawyer that has historically leapt to represent a sitting president. Olson, Robert Giuffra Jr. and Reid Weingarten were among the elite attorneys who declined job offers from Trump last spring, while former George W. Bush attorneys Bill Burck and Emmet Flood rejected overtures for the position ultimately accepted by Cobb. 
 
 “The notion of saying no to represent the president of the United States is kind of amazing,” said Bennett, a former personal attorney to President Bill Clinton. 
 
 Trump may not be done looking for lawyers. Flood met with the president earlier this month at the White House, though it’s unclear if that has led to a job offer. 
 
 The diGenova hiring came days after Dowd issued a Saturday morning statement calling for Mueller’s work to end. 
 
 “I pray that Acting Attorney General Rosenstein will follow the brilliant and courageous example of the FBI Office of Professional Responsibility and Attorney General Jeff Sessions and bring an end to alleged Russia Collusion investigation manufactured by McCabe’s boss James Comey based upon a fraudulent and corrupt Dossier,” Dowd told the Daily Beast, responding to Sessions’ decision the night before to fire Andrew McCabe, the former deputy FBI director. 
 
 Dowd initially said he was speaking in his official capacity as Trump’s lawyer. But he later retracted that statement, telling POLITICO he was commenting in his personal capacity. 
 
 It was one of several instances where Dowd raised eyebrows—and in some cases, drew ridicule—for his public commentary about the Russia probe. 
 
 Last December, Dowd took blame for a tweet posted on Trump’s account that appeared to admit Trump was aware that his former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, had lied to the FBI before Trump urged Comey to drop the Russia investigation. The tweet puzzled legal experts who said the admission could fuel an obstruction of justice case against Trump. 
 
 Dowd later argued that Trump could not be found guilty of obstruction of justice because of his role as chief executive under the Constitution, an argument that many legal experts disputed. 
 
 Both Dowd and Cobb also were embarrassed last summer after a New York Times reporter overheard them speaking about the Russia investigation at a Washington restaurant. 
 
 Dowd is well-known for his gruff manner, which was on vivid display outside a federal courthouse in 2011 when he told a CNBC camera crew to “get the fuck out of here” before giving the cameraman the middle finger. 
 
 Asked recently by POLITICO to comment on talks between the president’s lawyers and Mueller’s investigators, Dowd was only somewhat friendlier: “None of your business,” he said.
– There's plenty of speculation in DC about whether President Trump might fire special counsel Robert Mueller. But Mike Allen of Axios reports on another strategy being explored by the president's legal team: Appoint a second special counsel to investigate Mueller's investigation. The story suggests that Trump's attorneys trust Mueller himself but not others in the Justice Department. For example, they point to a Fox News story Monday detailing how the wife of a Justice Department official named Bruce Ohr worked for the company behind the infamous anti-Trump dossier that emerged during the election. Ohr was recently demoted for concealing his own meetings with the company, Fusion GPS. "The Department of Justice and FBI cannot ignore the multiple problems that have been created by these obvious conflicts of interests," Trump attorney Jay Sekulow tells Axios. "These new revelations require the appointment of a special counsel to investigate." It's not clear how likely this is to happen, but Attorney General Jeff Sessions has previously floated the idea of a second special counsel to cover a wide range of GOP concerns. Meanwhile, the Washington Post has a profile of Trump's legal trio: Sekulow (the TV presence), Ty Cobb (a White House attorney), and John Dowd (Trump's personal attorney). They "serve not only as Trump's lawyers but also as his strategists, publicists, therapists—and, based on Dowd's claim that he wrote a controversial presidential tweet, ghostwriters," per the Post.