There are some practical realities that we need to face. Rudy Giuliani actually does have a point when he recently said that Mueller probably will not indict Donald Trump because that is against long standing DOJ protocol for the sitting White House Resident.
“All they get to do is write a report,” Giuliani told CNN. “They can’t indict. At least they acknowledged that to us after some battling, they acknowledged that to us.”
That echoed comments, noted by CNN, from Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein earlier this month.
“The Department of Justice has in the past, when the issue arose, has opined that a sitting President cannot be indicted,” Rosenstein said, noting he was speaking generally. “There’s been a lot of speculation in the media about this, I just don’t have anything more to say about it.”
“The Justice Department memos going back to before Nixon say that you cannot indict a sitting president, you have to impeach him,” Giuliani added to CNN. “Now there was a little time in which there was some dispute about that, but they acknowledged to us orally that they understand that they can’t violate the Justice Department rules.”
Giuliani said that while Trump’s team believed the indictment of a President to be unconstitutional, “I don’t think you’re ever going to confront that because nobody’s ever going to indict a sitting president.”
Now in fairness Judge Napolitano has thrown cold water on Giuliuani over this saying there are two OLC memos one saying a President can’t be indicted from the Clinton era and another one, from the Watergate Investigation, saying that he can. Also Orrin Hatch says that Trump can be indicted after he leaves the Administration even if Mueller doesn’t do it himself. Former acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal has said that Special Counsel rules — which he himself wrote in 1999 — allow for Mueller to seek an exception from current DOJ rules by asking for one from Rod Rosenstein. He also pointed out that if Trump can’t be indicted, he can’t be incriminated and therefore he may not be able to legally plead for 5th Amendment protections against self-incrimination if he’s is interviewed or subpoenaed by Mueller.
But let’s for the sake of argument give Rudy the benefits of doubt since Mueller is more likely to side with caution and agree that under current rules that the DOJ can not indict Trump, and that there is no requirement that the final report generated by Mueller be shared with Congress, it is to be provided to the DOJ — in this case to Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein — who will then determine if that report will be shared with the public in redacted form to protect security and confidentiality concerns for ongoing investigations.
After six guilty pleas — including Paul Manafort’s former son-in-law Jeffrey Yohal who is now a cooperating witness — at least 16 outstanding indictments and 3 criminal trials currently in progress by the Mueller investigation to date, there is little reason to believe that a final report will be ready before the 90 day cut-off of August 8th prior to the November 2018 elections, which is just 2 and ½ months away from now. [Yes, I know DOJ guidelines are 30 days before an election but we all know that our elections are more than 30 days long.]
Particularly when there are additional investigations and or indictments connected to Campaign Analytica and Michael Cohen which will take even more time.
I would be very surprised to see a final report by mid-August even if Mueller does work out some way to interview or subpoena Trump for testimony, so we have to admit that final Mueller report will probably not be available before the election and that it won’t in and of itself have a direct effect on the mid-term elections and the make-up of congress.
I admit it’s possible Mueller might produce an earlier report but if he did so between August and October it will certainly be a partisan campaign issue whether what he produces should drive forward Impeachment hearings. Republicans already want to make this case and use it against Democrats as simply being bitter sore losers over the 2016 election. Depending on Mueller to help us take back Congress or the White House is a mistake since his mandate in regards to elections is essentially to “do no harm”, and even if he did produce an early report it just might energize the deplorable hordes to charge to the polls in protest of the “Witch Hunt.”
With or without a report, if Democrats are going to take back the House or the Senate they’re going to have to do it on their own, on their own merits, and not on the basis of any criminal issues connected to the Trump administration.
Considering the blatant gaslighting and bullshit that has been coming from Devin Nunes and his four Muskateers of mendacity, Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio, Mark Meadows of North Carolina, Matt Gaetz of Florida and Ron DeSantis, also of Florida, who've been openly aided and abetted by Speaker Paul Ryan in their attempt to generate more F.U.D. about the FBI and Mueller investigation — there is literally zero chance that a GOP led Congress would ever Impeach Trump no matter what any investigation might turn up.
For example Gaetz has sent a letter to the AG Sessions at DOJ requesting the investigation and prosecution of Hillary Clinton, James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Loretta Lynch, Dana Boente, Sally Yates, Peter Strzok and Lisa Page so it’s not like he and his ilk are going to take a report that includes material from any of these persons seriously.
He’s called for the DOJ and FBI to essentially be “purged” of — you guessed it — Democrats [although most of the above people are in fact, Republicans or Center-Right Democrats.]
With GOPers like this and Nunes around the Congress isn’t going to do a single thing about Trump’s incompetence, bigotry or crimes against the American people and our environment. If not for these people Trump’s fate would already been sealed just based on what is publicly known and Impeachment hearings would be absolutely guaranteed. Although as I’ve said before, Dems should still wait until the Mueller report is delivered because that will likely cement all the critical elements of this together definitively.
Now assuming that the House does turn Democratic this November and there is a subsequent final report from Mueller soon after it is possible that there could be a Impeachment case made against Trump on a variety of grounds.
Conspiracy for personally authorizing George Papadopoulos to meet with foreign leaders and governments, including the Kremlin and Putin, in violation of the Logan Act and Sanctions on Russia over their annexation of Crimea would be the very first issue.
George Papadopoulos has already pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his meeting with a Kremlin-linked Russian academic who promised “thousands of emails” that would hurt the Clinton campaign, but the just-reported comments from Politico would be the first time Papadadoulos's work had a direct link to Trump himself, rather than lower-level campaign staffers.
Marianna Kakaounaki, an investigative reporter for the Greek newspaper Kathimerini, said Papadopoulos told her that Trump called him personally after he was hired to the campaign in March 2016. Trump later met with Papadopoulos one-on-one, when the aide told Trump about his ongoing efforts to set up a meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, Kakaounaki said.
Similar offers for Trump to meet Putin during the campaign were provided via oligarch Alexander Torshin via Sessions aide Rick Dearborn and from Rob Goldstone to Trump’s assistant Rhona Graff.
After London profession Joseph Mifsud told Papadopoulos that Russians had “thousands of Hillary’s emails” and previewed what a public dump of those emails might look like he had an affirmative obligation to notify the FBI or else be potentially charged with Misprision of Felony, as would anyone else who he told or otherwise found out including Carter Page who was told during his visit to Moscow by Kremlin Official Igor Divyekin that “Russia had compromising materials on Hillary Clinton” and Don Jr. who was promised “dirt” on Hillary by Natalia Veselnitskaya.
No one in the Trump campaign did so. [Even though apparently it appears there may have been one “informant” inside the campaign who did go to the FBI — and it’s telling that Trumpster response to the is to call this person “a spy” when in reality, they followed the law.]
Jeff Sessions knew about the emails and “dirt” on Hillary two months before they were released by Wikileaks because Papadopoulos has admitted as much.
Jason Wilson, a computer engineer who lives in Chicago, told ThinkProgress that Papadopoulos said during their conversation that “Sessions encouraged me” to find out anything he could about the hacked Hillary Clinton emails that Mifsud had mentioned.
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After some conversation about the city and their marriage, Wilson turned the topic to the Russia investigation, asking Papadopoulos whether he thought Wilson would be disappointed when all the facts came out. Papadopoulos responded that things were “just getting started” and emphasized Sessions’ role, particularly his connection to Papadopoulos’ contacts with Mifsud.
In an interview last December with ABC News, Mangiante said that Papadopoulos was “constantly in touch with high-level officials in the campaign.” Speaking on Friday with ThinkProgress, Mangiante said that Sessions was one of the officials in contact with Papadopoulos. “[Sessions] talked with George,” Mangiante said. She declined to provide further details.
Papdopoulos puts both Trump and Sessions right at the center of their campaigns attempts to access and benefit from the Russian’s cybercrime and block the FBI — as later shown by Trump’s attempts to protect Michael Flynn — from discovering the truth. Russia implemented a CyberWar against America and Trump’s people when they were informed of it didn't try to stop it, they covered it up and tried to take advantage of it — which is the very definition of giving “aid and comfort” to the enemy.
This is a point made by former GOP representative in the Daily Beast who argues that Trump may have already committed Treason.
“Under the Constitution an individual commits treason if the nation is at war and the person provides aid and comfort to the enemy,” former Rep. Tom Coleman (R-MO) wrote in an editorial for The Daily Beast. “This is an impeachable offense, committed by word or deed. It’s one that individuals need to start grappling with seriously because it is not some far-fetched liberal fantasy to conclude that Donald Trump may have committed treason.”
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“In fact,” he continued, “the case is fairly simple to make.”
Laying out claims agreed upon by the intelligence community and special counsel Robert Mueller, Coleman argued that Russia’s cyber-attacks during the 2016 presidential election “meet the international criteria of an armed attack and an act of war against the United States.”
As such, the increasingly suspicious interactions between Trump campaign officials and Kremlin-linked individuals deserve close scrutiny, the former Missouri congressman wrote.
“Did Trump assist Russia in its conduct of cyber war against the United States?” Coleman wrote. “Did the cumulative effect of the Trump campaign and Trump’s personal actions result in aiding and abetting a hostile nation? Did Trump’s actions rise to the level of giving aid and comfort to an enemy?”
I would the answer to all the above with a “Yes”, because “collusion” which is really just a polite way of saying “Treason”, has already been proven. The Russians attacked our nation in an attempt to try to help Trump, and in response Trump tried to accept that help and tried to cover for the Russians, then tried to pay them back by trying to lift sanctions.
In the early weeks of the Trump administration, former Obama administration officials and State Department staffers fought an intense, behind-the-scenes battle to head off efforts by incoming officials to normalize relations with Russia, according to multiple sources familiar with the events.
Unknown to the public at the time, top Trump administration officials, almost as soon as they took office, tasked State Department staffers with developing proposals for the lifting of economic sanctions, the return of diplomatic compounds and other steps to relieve tensions with Moscow.
It doesn’t matter if any of this succeeded, it only matters that they TRIED because nobody gets a pass for only attempted murder or attempted bank robbery. Attempted quid pro quo is still quid pro quo. Attempted Treason is still Treason. It’s the attempt that matters not the completion of the plot.
That’s already pretty bad and it’s only getting worse as we go along.
This very week Trump filed his latest financial disclosure forms which now includes payments to Michael Cohen of nearly $200,000, not just the $130,000 reimbursement for the Stormy Daniels payoff. None of these payments were included on his forms last year which has prompted the Ethics Office to make a criminal referral to the DOJ for “false statements” under 18 USC 1001, the same law that Flynn, Papadopoulos and Van Der Zwaan have all pleaded guilty to.
So for Trump personally there’s a potential argument for Treason for aiding and abetting Russia’s cyberwar, Conspiracy to cover it up, Misprision of Felony and FEC violations if he like Sessions or Don Jr. was ever told about the “dirt” and tried to get access to it as well as Obstruction of Justice for trying to stop Comey from investigating Flynn and Perjury by making false statements on an official document.
In the absolute worst case scenario for Trump personally he might be listed as an “Unindicted co-conspirator” on some or all the above in a final Mueller report just as Richard Nixon was in 1973. Unlike Nixon I have my doubts that Trump will cave even under weight of a devastatingly negative report and resign. The man can’t even admit that he’s balding, and raided his own doctor’s office when he revealed that he too Propecia — he’ll never admit that he should have never been in the White House in the first place.
Only if the House turns Democratic will there be a possibility that such a report will generate an impeachment, and only if the Senate is majority Democratic will there probably even be a trial for removal in the Senate. The Senate Intelligence interim report, unlike the House GOP report, did find collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia in their attempts to get Trump election — but that’s not enough IMO.
House Republicans investigating Russian interference ended their investigation last month, saying that Russia's government tried to influence the 2016 election but not to help Trump win the presidency. The House GOP's conclusion directly contradicted that of the entire U.S. intelligence community, but it was a big win for Trump. The president has been hesitant to acknowledge that Russia interfered on his part, ostensibly out of fear that doing so would undermine his win.
But now the Republican-controlled Senate Intelligence Committee, which released its own assessment Wednesday, is contradicting the House report, saying that Russia did try to help Trump win.
“Our staff concluded that the [intelligence community’s] conclusions were accurate and on point,” Sen. Mark R. Warner (Va.), the panel's top Democrat, said Wednesday in a joint statement with Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.).
That's a problem for Trump.
Even Senate Republicans have called out the House report.
“I’m not sure that the House was required to substantiate every conclusion with facts,” Burr told reporters last week, by way of explaining why the House report said Russia didn't help Trump. That's pretty pointed.
Legal experts slammed House Republicans' findings, too.
Their “assessment doesn’t pass the most basic smell test and is completely unmoored from reality,” Jens David Ohlin, a vice dean at Cornell Law School, told The Fix in April.
But even with all that the Senate reports still doesn’t point an incriminating finger directly at Trump himself and it will require 67 votes in the Senate to actually remove him from office if things get to that stage.
That is a very high bar, as it should be.
Meanwhile Trump’s constant drum beat of “Witch Hunt” has been having an effect which is intended to blunt the impact of any report or allegations ultimately generated by Mueller.
A shrinking majority of Americans say Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation of Russian election interference and possible links to Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign should continue, according to a poll released Tuesday.
The Monmouth University poll finds 54 percent of Americans saying the special counsel’s investigation should continue, with support down from 60 percent in March and 62 percent in July. A 43 percent minority says the investigation should end, up six points since March and 10 points since last summer.
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Separately, a Marist poll from April found 45 percent saying they thought the Mueller investigation was “fair,” down from a high point of 53 percent in February but similar to the 48 percent at the end of March. A still-smaller 30 percent said Mueller’s investigation was “not fair.”
Those numbers will probably not be better by early next year following the election which is when I would expect Mueller’s report to be delivered at the earliest. For Republicans those figures are even worse.
Washington (CNN)Six in 10 Republican voters now believe special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation is unfair, a dramatic 15-point swing over the last six weeks amid escalating attacks from President Donald Trump.
A broad 61% of GOP voters say Mueller's probe into potential coordination between the Trump campaign and the Russian government during the 2016 presidential election is not being conducted fairly, up from just 46% who said the same in early March, according to a new Quinnipiac University survey released on Thursday.
Only one in four GOP voters, 26%, said they believe Mueller is conducting his investigation fairly, dropping from 36% over the same span. Six months ago, Republicans were essentially evenly split on whether the probe was fair.
Our GOP brethren have swallowed the “Witch Hunt” Kool-Aid and they’re going back for seconds. Under those conditions the chance of getting 12-17 Republican votes to swing against Trump and remove him from Office are pretty damn slim even assuming the Democratic majority in both Houses.
I’m not saying reaching the goal is impossible, just saying that it’s highly, extremely unlikely even with the worst possible damning report from Mueller. And what’s worse is that if Trump is Impeached on a partisan basis without being actually being removed the entire effort will be seen merely as an attempted to smear and tar Republicans for political advantage, not an effort to protect the nation from the dangers of a “SadoPopulist”
However all of that is just how things look at this particular point in time and there could be several other guns to go smoking and shoes to come falling out of the closet over the next few months, but the fact remains is that a majority of the GOP is fairly dug-in on Trump. They’ve yoked themselves to him, and they aren’t going to let him go down without a bitter, no-holds barred death match of a fight even though all of his promises of economic prosperity are beginning to evaporate.
A study conducted by United Way based on data from 2016 found that 40 percent of American households are under financial duress—even people officially defined as living above the poverty line. That means that close to half of American families are having trouble covering basic expenses like rent, transportation or child care.
Since a mere 50 percent of Americans have anything invested in the stock market, it’s not clear that stock market gains will have help Americans who are struggling.
And despite the good news regarding job growth, the United Way study points out that 66 percent of Americans earned less than $20 an hour. In many parts of the country that is not enough to cover basic expenses.
Frankly with Trump’s chaotic foreign policy I think we might be looking at a significant economic downturn over the next year as the current signs are not nearly as good as Trumpsters like to claim, but again that’s speculative. There is a slim possibility that the house of wet cards that Trump has built his economic hopes upon will begin to wilt, possibly before the election but more likely after. If it happens before it may erode some of the strength of Trump’s support and make his removal more likely, if it happens after there’s a probably that the Trumpsters will try to spin it as being somehow the fault of Democrats who’ve had just about zero power for the last year and a half and all voted against his disastrous tax plan.
As easy as it is to obsess about Trump, we need to beat him by not becoming him, by not endlessly demonizing our opponents, no matter how much their eye-shadow leans toward a bright shade of Beelzebub.
We have to win back this country on our own merits, with our own ideas, our own policies — not just by sitting around and waiting for Trump to finally pratfall or Mueller to deliver him on a steaming platter. We have to give people something and some people who they can vote for, not just tell them who to vote against. The battle for America isn’t between Trump and Mueller, it’s been us and the Republicans who have enabled him and continue to prop him up.
Even under the best case scenario, Mueller is not likely to be America’s savior from Trump.
We forget that at America’s peril.