At his Wednesday afternoon press event with the long-suffering president of Finland, Donald Trump made it clear that the next round of Republican attacks on the impeachment inquiry is going to be claims that the whistleblower isn’t just a liar, but “colluded” with House Intelligence Chair Adam Schiff. In fact, Trump claimed—and repeated for those not paying attention—that Schiff had “helped write” the whistleblower complaint. Minutes later, the Republican National Committee followed up with claims that Rep. Schiff lied when he said that he had not spoken directly with the whistleblower.
Both Trump and the RNC based their attacks on an article from The New York Times that indicated that representatives of the whistleblower had shared information about the complaint with a House aide some days before filing the complaint, but some time after the whistleblower had expressed their concerns to the CIA’s chief legal counsel. In fact, the subject of the discussion wasn’t the details of the whistleblower’s complaint, but concerns about how it was being handled within the agency.
That aide did not take the whistleblower to meet Schiff. Instead, he followed guidelines established by the House for dealing with exactly such situations. Those guidelines stipulated that the aide should suggest that the whistleblower acquire an attorney to advise them. That’s what the whistleblower did. End of story.
The whistleblower didn’t talk to Schiff. Schiff didn’t have anything to do with the report. Schiff didn’t lie—but both Trump and the RNC absolutely did lie in their responses to the story.
In fact, Trump’s claims about Schiff’s authorship of the complaint demonstrated a lie in progress. Trump said he had just heard about the story, and was delighted to be asked about it. When first asked, he said it was possible that Schiff had had a hand in writing the complaint. The next time Trump brought it up, he just stated it as if it were fact, calling Schiff the author of the complaint. “That’s a big story,” said Trump. “He knew long before and helped write it, too. It’s a scam.”
Not only was this not some kind of sinister action that disqualifies the whistleblower, but it’s exactly the path that was followed by whistleblowers who brought complaints about Benghazi to Republican congressmen.
In most of his discussion of the Russia investigation, Trump spent his time attacking Robert Mueller, investigators, the FBI, and members of the intelligence community in order to tarnish their reputations and diminish their authority with the public. It’s clear that he is following the same script this time, and the RNC is following along eagerly.
Trump wants to make this inquiry about Schiff and other Democratic leaders in the House. However, they may be the only people not entangled in a disaster that includes Mike Pompeo, William Barr, and a growing cast of Trump’s Cabinet members and staffers.