Leaving Donald Trump in a room with any prosecutor is a nightmare for his legal team.
And this time, his lawyers won’t be able to jump in front of the train.
When Trump made a tweet openly admitting that he had knowledge of Flynn’s lying to the FBI, one of his legal team flung himself onto the resulting dumpster fire.
No lawyer worth his or her salt would let a client like Trump go in for an interview. A person with knowledge of the Mueller investigation who asked to remain anonymous told me that Trump is the kind of client who would “humiliate you and destroy you because he just can’t follow directions.”But it’s not just Trump’s reality-free rambling that has Trump’s team looking for a way to find some alternative, any alternative, to a face-to-face meeting between Trump and Mueller. It’s the topic of the proposed discussion that really has them chewing off their own limbs.
One person familiar with the discussions said Mr. Mueller appeared most interested in asking questions about the former national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, and the firing of the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey — not the broader question of possible collusion with Russia. Those topics signal an interest in whether Mr. Trump tried to obstruct justice.Mueller wants to ask Trump about his attempts to obstruct the investigation. It’s the the kind of question where Trump has previously had only one response — obstruct harder. Questioning Trump on the general topic of the Russia investigation leaves Trump room to rail, complain, and profess his ignorance. Asking him about the actions he’s personally taken to fire Comey, draft memos about ‘adoption,’ and heap dirt on the FBI gives Trump very little room to run.
And this time, his lawyers won’t be able to jump in front of the train.
When Trump made a tweet openly admitting that he had knowledge of Flynn’s lying to the FBI, one of his legal team flung himself onto the resulting dumpster fire.
While Trump denied pressuring Comey, one of his lawyers said he drafted the tweet in question and made a mistake. Attorney John Dowd told USA TODAY that Trump did not know for sure Flynn had lied to the FBI, only that the Justice Department had raised questions about his comments regarding his contacts with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.The idea that one of Trump’s lawyers stepped in to make this clear confession of obstruction is itself one of the most blatant lies of the whole affair. And when Dowd was caught out in his lie about emailing the proposed tweet, he lied again by claiming he’d made a phone call to dictate the tweet.
But even though Donald Trump’s lawyers are willing to take actions that might easily get them disbarred — if not jailed — in order to save their client, a real live meeting with Mueller won’t allow much room for their protection.
The legal team is doing what they can to limit the scope and length of any interview, and it’s likely that Mueller will agree to keep this discussion relatively brief — with the distinct possibility of more discussions in the future. Those later discussions could include being deposed at length for the Grand Jury, a process that had Bill Clinton answering live questions, on camera, for almost five hours. The charges that got Clinton impeached in the House — perjury and obstruction. That’s it. Not one thing about any “underlying crime.”Indeed, even Trump’s own star-studded legal team seems acutely aware that allowing Trump to be interviewed by the special counsel is a recipe for disaster. In all the reporting about Mueller’s interest in interviewing Trump, there’s an unease among the sources, all of whom are almost certainly lawyers, in the very thought of Trump being alone in a room with Mueller.
Of course, Trump could fess up. A decade ago, when Trump was deposed in a defamation case, he admitted to lying 30 times.
Trump had brought it on himself. He had sued a reporter, accusing him of being reckless and dishonest in a book that raised questions about Trump’s net worth. The reporter’s attorneys turned the tables and brought Trump in for a deposition.
For two straight days, they asked Trump question after question that touched on the same theme: Trump’s honesty.
...Thirty times, they caught him.But to be honest this time, Trump would be admitting to obstruction. Even if Trump behaves himself sensibly, there seems no way that his statements won’t end up confirming that he tried, on multiple occasions, to press the FBI into dropping one or more aspects of their investigation. The whole thing seems like sending a balloon into a needle factory.
… Trump would presumably be questioned about his intent and purpose in undertaking the following actions, which have been unearthed by dogged reporting: Directing his White House counsel to urge his attorney general not to recuse himself so that he could continue to protect Trump from the probe. Demanding Comey’s loyalty and pressing him to drop the probe into Flynn. Firing Comey when that loyalty was not forthcoming. Writing an unsent letter firing Comey that reportedly mentioned the Russia probe in the first sentence, then demanding a memo from the deputy attorney general that cited Comey’s treatment of Hillary Clinton’s emails, which Trump cited as a pretext for the firing before admitting that the Russia probe was, indeed, the motivation, something he boasted about to Russian visitors.Admitting all that is the good outcome. The best that Trump’s team can hope for.
Plus there’s the Trump Tower meeting. Trump personally composed an excuse for that meeting that he knew not to be true, and distributed that lie from Air Force One. The things he did to and about Comey might be excusable if his team can generate some plausible way in which Trump was not motivated by pure self interest. The note he created to protect everyone involved in that meeting — which includes, at a minimum, Donald Jr, Jared Kushner, Paul Manafort, and Ivanka — isn’t forgivable, not under any definition of the presidential role.
At the other end, Trump can deny his role in pressuring Comey, forcing the FBI director out, or crafting an excuse for his campaign team’s meeting with Russian representatives. That would put Trump in a position not just for more obstruction charges, but compound them with perjury.
Obstruction and perjury. Sound familiar?
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