On Tuesday, Hope Hicks spent some time with the House Intelligence Committee. It’s not possible to describe what Hicks delivered as “testimony,” as it mostly consisted of applying the same broad-brush, unsupported claim of privilege that Steve Bannon used in stonewalling the committee two weeks earlier. But Hicks did admit one little thing.
Hope Hicks, the White House communications director, told House investigators on Tuesday that her work for President Trump, who has a reputation for exaggerations and outright falsehoods, had occasionally required her to tell white lies.
Hicks is saying that her job—her job as White House communications director—requires her to lie. But don’t worry, they’re only little lies. About small things. Because it’s only the White House. It’s not as if she’s working in a role where every statement can generate a giant impact on the nation and the world.
She did declare that she hasn’t lied about anything concerning the Russia investigation, an area where her truthfulness is apparently assisted by an unwillingness to say anything at all pertinent to the Russia investigation. She also refused to point out any other member of Trump’s team who had engaged in these delightful little “white lies.”
What kind of white lies does Hicks tell … well, there’s no telling.
The idea that anyone should trust Hicks’s assessment of white lies verses serious lies is absurd. Her statement would be an appalling admission from the person running the White House communications team if we weren’t so accustomed to the president himself spreading falsehoods on a daily basis.
Of course, Trump has been setting an example on “white lies” for a long time—such as his lies about the Central Park Five and how they should be executed for a crime they didn’t commit. That’s a very white lie.
Hicks’s definition of her position as one that called on her to regularly lie would likely baffle Jen Psaki. If you don’t know Jen Psaki, she was communications director for the last two years of the Obama administration, during which time she made zero headlines by not telling lies of any shade. In fact the only controversy of her time in the White House was … nope, there was no controversy.
But admitting that she lied as part of her day job was the least controversial part of Hicks’s appearance before the House. The more important fact is that she adopted the growing idea of privilege that was first trotted out to fend off specific questions, expanded massively in testimony by Jeff Sessions, and brought into full bloom by Steve Bannon.
Under Trump’s view of executive privilege, the executive not only has a right to block answers to specific questions, but an unquestioned right to review anything asked of any member of his staff about any action. At any time. Including before he was the executive. It’s a view of privilege that makes calling any Trump official in to testify akin to taking a day off.
The idea is to refuse to answer questions because the White House might invoke executive privilege at a later date, without formally doing so. As Bannon’s attorney relayed questions to the White House counsel, he refused to answer questions about the transition, the White House, or even his discussions with Trump after his firing. While he was testifying voluntarily, Democrats and Republicans on the committee agreed to subpoena him on the spot. Bannon still refused to talk, and lawmakers have been mulling whether to hold him him in contempt ever since.
And there’s the real issue. While in theory Trump could invoke executive privilege, in theory the House doesn’t recognize any privilege. Not executive. Not attorney-client. Not doctor-patient. Not even the privilege of the confessional. Short of invoking a Fifth Amendment claim against self incrimination, if the question is asked, it must be answered, or the House can bring a charge of contempt.
Except it won’t. No matter how hard the committee’s nose is tweaked—and Bannon was seriously obnoxious in demonstrating contempt—Congress is not about to use the only tool that might change the outcome. It’s not as if Congress doesn’t know how to hold someone in contempt. They actually did so as recently as 2016. In that case they called on the carpet Bryan Pagliano over questions about that most serious matter … Hillary Clinton’s email server. Pagliano was held in contempt even though he actually had invoked his Fifth Amendment rights. But Pagliano’s real punishment for this was both zip and diddly, as it resulted in no indictment. The last person to actually face jail time for contempt of Congress did so in 1983.
So Sessions, Bannon, Hicks, and anyone else that the House calls to testify can rest comfortably on the fact that they can say whatever the hell they want, or keep quiet about whatever they want, and the consequences will be negligible.
And Hicks in particular was handled with the softest of kid gloves. After her charming admission that she told “white lies” from the White House, and her refusal to answer any substantive questions, Representative Adam Schiff moved that the committee subpoena Hicks, as it had Bannon. Republicans refused.
Republicans claimed Hicks is different than Bannon because she is currently working in the White House, and answered some of their questions about the transition — though only after it was pointed out that she’d already discussed the topics before the Senate Intelligence Committee. There were many significant topics she wouldn’t go into, such as the drafting of a misleading statement from Donald Trump Jr. on his meeting with Russians during the campaign. Discussions about the statement reportedly left Mark Corallo, the former spokesperson for Trump’s legal team, with concerns that Hicks was considering obstructing justice.
Of course, Republicans didn’t have a problem subpoenaing people who worked at the White House when they were named Eric Holder or Susan Rice. Maybe they were just joining in the spirit of Hicks’s white lies.
Hicks’s refusal to answer, and the Republicans refusal to do a damn thing about it, is a showcase of the pointless nature of the House investigation, which has always made sure of stopping short of actual discovery. A year in, it seems evidence that the whole purpose of the House investigation is to serve as a toothless source for quotes Sarah Sanders can use on any given afternoon.
But Robert Mueller also doesn’t recognize executive privilege and he still seems to understand how to write out charges. Charges the grand jury has been excellent at translating into indictments.
They’ll get a chance to weigh in on the exact color of Hicks’s lies.