The Garland Justice Department never knew what the shot was
By 
Blind faith in anything, a New Jersey poet once said, can get you killed:
Ex-special prosecutor Jack Smith’s legal team was expecting to file the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case in the nation’s capital. But in an attempt to play the case by the book, Smith surprised them by opting to file in Florida instead, where the case would have a one in six chance of landing in Judge Aileen Cannon’s courtroom, reported The Washington Post’s Carol Leonnig and Aaron C. Davis in their book, Injustice
“Are you all fucking insane?” David Raskin, a federal prosecutor who had worked on the case, blurted out in a Justice Department hallway at the time, according to the Post.
Smith believed then that filing in Florida could place the case on firmer legal footing, reducing the possibility that the most egregious charges could be overturned down the line. Smith further trusted that even if the case was randomly assigned to Cannon, they would be able to prove Trump was guilty by sheer volume of evidence.
“I’m not worried about Florida,” Smith told Justice Department officials while presenting his decision.
“No Trump nominee could ignore the requirements of the law” is an absolutely amazing thing to believe in the century in many ways defined by Bush v. Gore, and yet. It’s hard not to conclude that he venue shopped for Aileen Cannon in part because he was more concerned with convincing himself about the impartiality of Trump judges than with winning the case.
But at least all this slow-walking and self-sabotage led to forbearance in kind from Trump, right?
Trump has since rejiggered the Justice Department in his image, leveraging its heft to prosecute his own perceived political enemies, including New York Attorney General Letitia James and former special counsel James Comey. His next target is California Senator Adam Schiff.
And needless to say this all ultimately hangs on Biden — when he went with Garland over Doug Jones he knew what he was getting, and got it.