It’s been over six months since former Special Counsel Robert Mueller delivered his report on Russia’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election to U.S. Attorney General William Barr, and the storied attorney is again the subject of daily headlines.

The announcement Tuesday that Mueller is returning to Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr as a partner is the exception; it’s a story of Mueller’s own making. The others—“Trump may have lied to Mueller, House Democrats say,” “Trump Pressed Australian Leader to Help Barr Investigate Mueller Inquiry’s Origins,” to cite two from just Monday—owe to the intensified scrutiny around President Donald Trump’s use of high-level diplomacy on behalf of his own personal political objectives as the House begins its impeachment inquiry.