If Kavanaugh’s writings on special counsel investigations really influenced Trump’s decision to nominate him, then Trump is a bigger fool than I have imagined. Kavanaugh’s writings on the subject don’t clarify all of his views on the subject of the Mueller investigation. But they clarify certain big things, and those things are really not good for Donald Trump. Noah Feldman writes that “Properly understood, Kavanaugh’s expressed views actually support the opposite conclusion” than the one to which many knees are jerking. Feldman is exactly right. In some respects, he actually understates the case…

To me, however, the far more salient fact is that Kavanaugh has articulated a vision of a legitimate and appropriate investigation under our constitutional scheme and that it looks so much like the Mueller structure—and that he believes that the president of the United States has no common-law privileges before such an investigation. That is bad news for President Trump if Kavanaugh gets confirmed and finds himself ruling on any number of Mueller-generated questions.