Trump has been proven to have lied about Stormy Daniels. Trump earlier told the press “no” when asked if he knew about the $130,000 payment to Daniels to prevent her from saying she slept with him. In contrast, Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s new legal counsel, accidentally made several truthful admissions detrimental to his client this week, including that Trump knew about the payment.
The New York Times subsequently confirmed that Trump knew about the payment to Daniels months before he publicly denied it. Regarding the payment, Giuliani also asked us to “Imagine if that came out on Oct. 15, 2016, in the middle of the last debate with Hillary Clinton.” That clarifies that the payment was associated with the election. Because the payment was not reported as election spending, that makes it a crime.
Tragically for the country, this will have no effect on Trump’s supporters. Trump has made more than 3,000 false or misleading public claims during his Presidency and his rate of lying has now increased to nine falsehoods per day. Despite this, Trump’s approval ratings, though bad, have recently increased some.
Nor can we count on criminal prosecution. it is unlikely that a President can be criminally prosecuted while in office (although prosecution afterward would certainly be allowed). In fact, there’s a Justice Department policy against bringing charges against a sitting President. Trump also won’t be impeached and removed from office over a $130,000 campaign violation.
Still, Trump is girding for an impeachment battle. He fired attorney Ty Cobb, who urged cooperation with Special Counsel, and hired Emmett Bloom, an attorney who defended Bill Clinton during his impeachment process. Giuliani said this was part of Trump taking a more aggressive legal stance regarding the investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
As further proof, Trump said this week that he would be interviewed by Mueller only if it was fair. Given that Trump says there was no collusion between the Russians and his campaign and that the Mueller investigation is a “witch hunt”, it seems extremely unlikely that he will consider an interview with Mueller to be fair. Of course, we have zero reason to trust what Trump says regarding the Russians, and Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif, senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, says there is “ample evidence” of collusion. Trump’s attorneys, of course, have always been correctly concerned that Trump cannot talk to Mueller without perjuring himself.
With Trump’s more combative legal approach, Mueller likely will have to use a grand-jury subpoena to force Trump to answer questions regarding the investigation. While the courts have not ruled on whether such a subpoena could be enforced against a President, analogous prior case law indicates it can. Still, if Mueller subpoenas Trump and Trump contests, the court battle will take months.
Even then, at the end of his investigation, Mueller can only deliver a report to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein -- or to Rosenstein’s replacement. That recipient is not obligated to make the report public or even give it to Congress. One ploy for Trump would be to remove Rosenstein, who is overseeing the Mueller investigation, and see if Rosenstein’s replacement will either limit the investigation or suppress any resulting report.
In fact, Republicans in Congress threatened to impeach Rosenstein. Rosenstein replied that the Department of Justice would not be extorted. In response to that, Trump said that he might have to get involved in Department of Justice affairs.
Trump may not be willing to let the investigation be completed. Later in the week Giuliani asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions to shut down the Mueller investigation regarding Trump.
Of course, if a President can close an investigation against him or prevent the report about it from being released, he can take any illegal action and evade accountability. Then the key to our Republic – that no one, not even the President is above the law -- is destroyed and only a dictatorship with the trappings of democracy remains.