Rolling Stone reports:

Right up until the day Donald Trump’s federal indictment was unsealed, the legal team tasked with defending him was engaged in petty internal feuds — including fights over TV appearances, accusations of disloyalty, and even a so-called “coup,” three people familiar with the situation, as well as others on or close to Trump’s legal defense, tell Rolling Stone.

The clashes were dramatic enough that Friday, hours before Trump’s federal indictment in the Mar-a-Lago documents probe was unsealed, top lawyers John Rowley and Jim Trusty abruptly resigned. The resignations followed last month’s departure of Tim Parlatore, another Trump attorney who decided he’d seen enough of the internal turmoil.

On the other side of the long-brewing conflict was Boris Epshteyn, one of the former president’s most prominent legal advisers. Epshteyn has overseen Trump’s various legal defenses — and also found himself the target of investigations: His cellphone was seized by federal authorities investigating the Trump team’s efforts to keep him in power after his 2020 election defeat.

Clashes with Epshteyn had Rowley and Trusty eyeing their exits for weeks before their departure, according to three sources familiar with the situation. They, like Parlatore before them, would often chafe at Epshteyn’s influence over their work. The duo often complained that Epshteyn was unqualified to oversee their defense of Trump, and, sources say, they were baffled by edits the adviser made to their legal work. At one point, Epshteyn inserted Trump’s dominance in the 2024 Republican primary into a draft of a court filing meant only for a judge.

“Why the fuck would a judge want to be bothered with that?” says one of the sources, summarizing the legal team’s frustrations at the time. [Continue reading…]