1 big thing: The politics of “collusion delusion” (Axios, Saturday, 3/23)
What’s all this I hear about the Mueller investigation?
Robert Mueller, Director of the FBI from 2001-2013, was appointed by Rod Rosenstein, Deputy Attorney General for the United States Department of Justice, as Special Prosecutor to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 US election. A special prosecutor is appointed when there might be a conflict of interest in the normal prosecuting authority, here the Department of Justice.
Why didn’t the Attorney General, the cabinet secretary in charge of the Department of Justice, appoint him himself?
Rosenstein was acting in place of Attorney General Jeff Sessions because Sessions had recused (removed himself from the chain of command because he had a conflict of interest) himself since he had been present at several meetings attended by Russian representatives while he himself was acting as a surrogate for the Trump Campaign.
President Trump was furious that Sessions recused himself, often offering the opinion that that it was Sessions’ job to protect him. The Special Prosecutor appointment was triggered by Trump’s firing of FBI Director James Comey, which he admitted on TV and in a private meeting with Russians, had been to get the investigation of his relationship with Russia off his back.
How did that work out for him?
Not great. Instead of taking Russia off the agenda it triggered a two year investigation that resulted in199 criminal charges, 37 indictments or guilty pleas, and 5 prison sentences. Among those caught in the net were Trump’s campaign manager and his personal attorney, both sentenced to jail time. You can see the Axios timeline here.
That’s a lot of legal activity. What does it all mean?
If you take a big step back and look at the indictments the Mueller report has produced over two years, its depth and reach has been damning for the Trump administration. Trump himself has kept up a steady stream of tweets condemning what he calls a “witch hunt’ and claiming that Hillary Clinton is the real person to have colluded with Russia. But the slow drip, drip of indictments has left people wondering whether Mueller has shown all his cards in real time and conducted his investigation in plain view or whether there was more to come.
While we do not know what the report says (and it is up to the new Attorney General, William Barr, to decide if who will find out) the Special Prosecutor’s office has said there will be no more indictments. Trump’s supporters claim that that means he is not guilty of colluding with the Russians but his detractors are determined to find out what the report has to say.
What is collusion?
Collusion is the act of secretly conspiring with others with an intent to deceive. Critically, collusion is not necessarily a crime. We know the Russians hacked into our systems and used social media to try to influence the election. What we do not yet know is whether anyone in the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians to impact the election, although there is circumstantial evidence that some members may have done so. Presumably, that information is in the Mueller report. It would not have necessarily have resulted in indictments since it is not technically illegal.
Is that the only problem for Trump? Not exactly. One issue that has caught presidents before him, including Nixon and Clinton, is obstruction of justice. When a president finds himself under investigation his temptation is to batten down the hatches and protect himself. Nixon went so far as to actively cover up his role in the Watergate break-in, leading to the often repeated truism that sometimes, its not the crime that gets you so much as the cover up.
Did Trump obstruct justice? And, if he did, does it rise to the level of criminal behavior?
That is another issue that Mueller will report on. Again, we have seen bits of circumstantial evidence but until Mueller releases his report and the Department of Justice makes it public, if it does, we won’t know. Many people think they know, but that is not the same as having legal evidence. And that is what the Mueller investigation is for.
So what happens?
Since they are not sure they will get access to the report, Democratic members of the House of Representatives, tasked by the Constitution with oversight of the executive branch, plan to try to find out themselves, some going so far as talking of asking Mueller to testify in front of Congress. Because we are so polarized – that is split along party lines — this is likely to turn into a partisan fight(the red team versus the blue team) rather than one that is focused on getting at the truth.
Axios by Mike Allen
With Robert Mueller’s delivery of his report, and word from the Justice Department that he would have no more indictments, President Trump’s legal team believes the immediate threat to the presidency has passed.
- “Sounds like it’s over for us but of course it’s not over until it’s over,” Rudy Giuliani, one of Trump’s lawyers, texted me. “Cautious optimism. Still watchful waiting.”
No one named “Trump” will be indicted by the special counsel.
- But remember that, as Axios has outlined, what Mueller revealed in the course of his investigation was “highly damning and highly detailed.”
- And remember that Trump’s campaign chairman is behind bars, perhaps for life, and his longtime political fixer is going to prison.
- And numerous other federal state investigations are picking up steam.
The split-screen America ahead:
- Fox News’ Sean Hannity last night sported a “COLLUSION DELUSION” graphic.
- Over on MSNBC, Neal K. Katyal, acting solicitor general under President Obama, told Brian Williams: “Today what happened was the end of the beginning.”
Fox News is a media outlet that has consistently supported Trump. MSNBC’s evening programming is mostly from a liberal perspective and has highlighted both liberal and conservative critics of Trump.
The bottom line … There are two forms of “collusion delusion”:
- The Trump/Fox victory dance because no one new was indicted for collusion or corruption involving Russia — and therefore claims of “witch hunts” and innocence were vindicated.
- The bitter reality that this probe has spawned many others stretching far beyond Russia — so it’s delusional to think it simply ends with no collusion.
Be smart: The new defining question for American politics is: Will Democrats demand the nation stick to historical norms of proper presidential behavior, or will Mueller’s revelations be the new standard?
What does that mean?
Regardless of whether he is found to have colluded with Russia or to have behaved in a way that would cause Democrats to call for his impeachment (some already are), Trump has broken many of the norms (the unspoken, unwritten rules that keep the wheels of American democracy turning smoothly) of Americans politics: failure to disclose his tax returns, refusal to divest himself of his businesses, hiring his kids to work in the White House, carrying on diplomacy via Twitter, criticizing the press and threatening to lock up his political opponents. What Axios is calling “the defining question” is whether that behavior will become the new normal, or whether the Democrats will find a way to make the old rules stick.
2. The post-Mueller rush to nail Trump (Saturday (Axios, March, 23 2019)
Is Trump off the hook?
Not hardly. As we said above, hordes of Democrats are waiting in the wings to investigate him. Axios pointed out that the investigations now go way beyond the question of collusion.
Axios by Mike Allen
President Trump’s legal and political pursuers will hardly back off based on the Mueller report. Consider what else is ramping up:
- House Democrats, despite their leaders’ quest to slow things down, remain thirsty to begin impeachment proceedings. The House investigations are designed to make a maximum public splash and make the maximum amount of information public.
- The House Judiciary Committee is prepared to issue subpoenas to enforce its document demands sent to 81 people, agencies and entities tied to the president, including relatives, aides, friends and business partners.
- Of the 17 Trump and Russia investigations that Garrett M. Graff outlined in WIRED in December, only seven were by Mueller. The rest were by other state and federal entities that continue their work. And that was before Democrats took over the House and got subpoena power.
- Outside pressure will rise from Tom Steyer and other Democrats with big bank accounts and big platforms.
Be smart: Pelosi’s opposition to impeachment + Trump’s shield of no collusion indictments = The high likelihood his fate will be settled on Election Day.
Democrat Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House of Representatives, has said she does not think impeachment is the proper answer to Trump’s behavior unless it has crossed an unimaginable line. But the House of Representatives still has a constitutional duty to engage in oversight and there is a tension between the two.
Impeachment is the way the Constitution allows Congress to remove a sitting president: a vote is held in the House to Impeach and if it passes, a vote is held in the Senate to remove the president from office. Democratic President Bill Clinton was impeached for lying under oath about whether he had had an affair and obstructing justice, but not convicted by the Senate. It was a very disruptive time in American politics, and the American people reacted by giving Clinton one of his highest approval ratings the day he was impeached, signaling their frustration and impatience with the process.
Knowing this, Pelosi does not want to damage the chances that a Democrat may win the presidency in 2020 by making her party look like it is trying to undo the results of the 2016 election. Instead, if the Mueller report doesn’t reveal any unacceptable behavior, she would rather leave Trump’s fate to the voters.
Many people in her party are outraged by Trump’s behavior and want to proceed with impeachment hearings, actions that she is afraid may backfire the way the Republican effort to impeach Bill Clinton did.
Nonetheless, she stands behind the oversight activities that Congress is constitutionally obligated to engage in to keep an eye on the executive branch — holding hearings, issuing subpoenas, investigating questionable behavior, and pursuing leads about how Russia was able to infiltrate our electoral system as it did. It is possible that oversight and impeachment inevitably cross paths as the Democrats, frustrated by their years in the minority and many of them sent to Congress in 2018 to clean things up, throw themselves into their job with enthusiasm.
AmGov, Axios and the News 