Donald Trump has another ally in his effort to smear special counsel Robert Mueller. Rep. Trent Franks, a member of the House Judiciary Committee, is echoing the nonsense Trump/Fox News/Breitbart claim that Mueller should step down because his relationship with James Comey is a conflict of interest.
“Bob Mueller is in clear violation of federal code and must resign to maintain the integrity of the investigation into alleged Russian ties,” Franks said in a statement.
“Those who worked under them have attested he and Jim Comey possess a close friendship, and they have delivered on-the-record statements effusing praise of one another.”
If everyone who’s praised both Mueller and Comey is ruled out of investigating Trump, that’s going to really thin the ranks of former high-level federal prosecutors eligible for the role. For that matter, many Republican members of Congress have praised both men.
It’s also a nonsense claim. Trump’s defenders are trying to create the perception of a conflict of interest since they haven’t been able to find an actual conflict of interest—or any other reason—to use to legitimately remove Mueller as special counsel. But, as Comey’s lawyer told Snopes:
Jim and Bob are friends in the sense that co-workers are friends. They don’t really have a personal relationship. Jim has never been to Bob’s house and Bob has never been to Jim’s house. … They’ve had lunch together once, dinner together twice, once with their spouses and once after Jim became FBI director so Bob could give him a run-down on what to look out for. [Bob] is not a mentor. He’s friendly, as colleagues are.
You’ve worked with someone for about a decade and he then succeeded you when you left your job. You’ve had lunch together once and dinner twice. Quick: Are you close friends?
Trump’s defenders are desperate, because it’s becoming more and more clear that having an experienced prosecutor like Mueller looking at his record could be a serious problem. But this conflict-of-interest-because-friendship claim shows just how little they’ve got—if there was a real problem with Mueller’s role, Trump and his friends would be shouting it from the rooftops. Instead, they’re going with this nothingburger to convince Trump supporters that nothing Mueller finds is valid.