What If a Democratic House Votes to Impeach Kavanaugh?

U.S. House of Representatives chambers.

One of the most alarming things about the Republican rush to confirm spoiled rich white boy Brett Kavanaugh is that by refusing to do a proper investigation of allegations against him, they are setting the stage for a Democrat controlled House of Representatives - something I personally pray comes to pass - to launch a real and credible investigation which could very well turn up damning corroborating testimony.  Should that happen, a move to impeach Kavanaugh would be likely and the Supreme Court would be thrown into chaos and decisions rendered that swung on Kavanaugh's vote would be lose legitimacy.   One would think that Senators Flake, Collins and Murkowski - and others - would want to avoid this potential situation not to mention that they votes for Kavanaugh would become everlasting embarrassments.  Sadly, Mitch McConnell has no such worries about morality or the view of history as he has demonstrated time and time again.  A piece in Politico looks at the likely scenario that could play out next year.  Here are excerpts:

The FBI’s supplemental background check of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh has just been completed. . . . What we do know is that the background check, which was supposed to examine all credible allegations of sexual assault made against Kavanaugh, has made matters more complicated. For reasons that aren’t completely clear—either the Senate’s actual request for supplemental information was narrower than promised, or the White House directed the FBI not to pursue certain leads—many senators are worried that the Republican-guided FBI investigation won’t be sufficient to quell concerns about the judge’s fitness to serve on the Supreme Court. If the investigation has been as superficial as some reporting suggests—despite calls from GOP Senators Jeff Flake, Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins for it to be thorough—and if Kavanaugh does manage to squeak through, Democrats are not likely to let it go. Indeed, it is entirely possible—no, likely—that, if they win control of the House in November, the new majority party will consider articles of impeachment against Kavanaugh before his seat on the high court is warm. The course of such a proceeding has the potential to be so perilous and unpredictable that wavering Republican senators should consider that possibility before casting their votes to put Kavanaugh on the court in the first place. Facts that come to light in impeachment could come back to haunt senators who vote to support him. The Constitution contemplates removal from office of judges on the same terms as are available against any federal official—terms that are by now familiar because they’re so frequently mentioned against Trump. Under Article II, Section 4: “The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.” In all cases, the House investigates and votes on articles of impeachment, and any articles that receive a majority vote are then passed along to the Senate. That body then conducts a trial, and a supermajority of two-thirds is required for removal of the officer.

Although there have been only a tiny number of impeachment proceedings against federal judges at any level since the Constitution was ratified, those that have taken place have laid down significant markers that can help us understand the possibilities in this case.

[T]he cases involving trial and appellate federal judges point in a direction that would be worrying for Kavanaugh if he’s installed as a justice—and if wrongful conduct is then found. Significantly, three of the four most recent impeachments— all of which led to convictions—were for perjury. In the other case, Samuel B. Kent, a district court judge from Texas, became the first federal judge impeached for sexual assault, and for obstructing justice in being untruthful about his conduct. He was convicted and sentenced to 33 months in prison, but refused to resign (apparently for reasons having to do with his pension). In 2009, he was impeached by the House, but resigned before the Senate could conduct the trial that certainly would have convicted him.

Will a newly energized Democratic majority in the House have the stomach for impeachment? Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has demurred, but Jerry Nadler, the current ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, wasn’t nearly as coy. When asked whether, if he assumed the chairmanship of the committee, he’d consider impeachment, he had this to say: “We would have to investigate any credible allegations of perjury and other things that haven’t been properly looked into before.”

So hearings seem inevitable, but whether the committee would actually take the extraordinary step of beginning impeachment proceedings will likely depend on a few factors yet to come into focus. The real or perceived lack of thoroughness of the FBI investigation would be the most obvious trigger. [H]earings will likely follow—and then, possibly, impeachment, depending on what’s turned up. And, as Nadler suggested, the committee could also look into whether Kavanaugh committed perjury during the hearings; for instance, text messages have surfaced suggesting that he knew of Ramirez’s potential allegations before the New Yorker told her story. He testified, though, that he learned of the accusations only when the story came out. State governments might also decide to conduct hearings, which could funnel into any action the House decides to take. And if any new sexual misconduct allegations surface after he’s seated, we’re back to square one.

But while Kavanaugh should be worried about impeachment proceedings, so too should GOP senators who vote to confirm him in the first place. If further interviews with some of the same witnesses that the FBI could have, but did not, question corroborate any of the assault allegations, Kavanaugh could land back in the Senate for a trial, where those senators who voted for him would find themselves in a tough spot for pushing him through in the face of unanswered questions.

We may or may not learn what the FBI actually did, but it’s likely the last chapter in this depressing saga has yet to be written.

Unfortunately, I will not be holding my breath to see Republican senators do the right thing and vote "no," tomorrow.  It will be up to Democrats to conduct the investigations that the White House and the likes of Mitch McConnell deliberately thwarted. 

Are Brett Kavanaugh’s Lies Finally Catching Up With Him?

As we wait for the renewed FBI investigation of sexual misconduct allegations against Trump nominee, Brett Kavanaugh to deliver its findings, the news media reports are increasingly underscoring that Kavanaugh has been lying to the Senate Judiciary Committee. Between statements by Kavanaugh's college roommate that flat out states that Kavanaugh lied about his frequent and excessive drinking to new stories about email sent by Kavanaugh in his efforts to contact would be witnesses to do damage control before additional allegations became public, it is increasingly clear Kavanaugh's persona presented to the Senate Judiciary Committee is a fraud.  Indeed, countless Americans who watched the hearings are now first hand witnesses to the series of lies.  A piece in New York Magazine looks at Kavanaugh's cascading series of lies.  Here are article highlights: 

When the second sexual-assault allegation came out against Brett Kavanaugh, I predicted Republicans would pull his nomination. I was wrong. Kavanaugh managed to rally the Republican base like a seasoned politician, changing the question from the specifics of the allegations into a broader cultural war, in which Kavanaugh is a stand-in for every conservative who feels unfairly maligned by smug progressive elites (i.e, every conservative).

Sticking with Kavanaugh made no sense, and still makes no sense. Sometimes people do things that make no sense, though. And Republicans may well decide Kavanaugh’s confirmation is a symbolic battle in the kulturkampf that overrides any cost-benefit analysis. That is certainly what the public posturing by the Republican Party, as epitomized by Lindsey Graham, seems to indicate. But there are real signs of weakness beneath the public bravado.

A pair of weekend reports from Axios’s Jonathan Swan conveys the White House’s outward-facing stance. According to administration officials, Kavanaugh is “too big to fail,” because “[t]here’s no time before the [midterm] election to put up a new person.” And if Democrats win a Senate majority, Trump would allegedly prefer to keep the seat vacant rather than compromise with Democrats. . . . . but the position makes absolutely no sense.

If Kavanaugh fails, there might not be enough time to confirm a new justice before the elections, but there will certainly be enough time to confirm one before a new Senate takes over. There are almost two months between the elections and the new Senate. Yes, it would look ugly for Republicans to rush through a new justice after an election that gives Democrats a majority. . . . But this would never stop them from going ahead. The entire Republican caucus, including Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, blatantly violated historic norms by holding a Supreme Court spot vacant through all of 2016 just to give their party a chance to fill it.

Unless the Trump administration is completely ignorant, it is broadcasting threats in order to shore up Republican support for Kavanaugh. Republicans senators may want to pull the damaged nominee and replace him with an equally conservative justice who was never accused of raping anybody, but the White House is shouting that the alternative is getting nobody at all. And why would they make such non-credible threats? Because they’re worried about getting the votes.

That worry also comes through in some of the other reporting. Republicans directing the Kavanaugh fight “conceded [it] to be an uphill battle in which time is not on their side,” reports Politico, also citing a person involved in the battle who puts the odds of confirmation at 50 percent.

The FBI investigation into Kavanaugh is now the key source of uncertainty. Multiple news outlets have reported over the weekend that the White House has dictated limits on the investigation. . . . If the White House chokes off the FBI investigation — or, more precisely, if wavering Republican senators allow the White House to do so and decide to treat an ersatz probe as legitimate — then Kavanaugh might be safe. But the fact that the administration is attempting to strangle the FBI is itself a sign of concern. And the fact that the FBI is obviously leaking about White House interference shows that at least somebody within the Bureau wants to conduct a legitimate investigation.

And what is there to turn up? Potentially a lot. Kavanaugh’s testimony was, at best, wildly misleading.  You can find detailed accounts of Kavanaugh’s train of lies here, here, here, and (most thoroughly) here. Would it matter if this is proven? Senator Jeff Flake said on 60 Minutes it would . . . .

This substantially increases the peril Kavanaugh faces. And Trump’s press conference remarks seemed to signal a willingness to cut Kavanaugh loose if the investigation turns up more damning evidence.

The issue of Kavanaugh’s lying is one his conservative defenders have only barely begun to acknowledge. It is probably the central weakness in his candidacy at the moment. Kavanaugh wrote his opening statement the night before his testimony. It was intended to rally his party with red-meat partisan rhetoric, and lead directly to a rapid vote in a flourish of tribalistic emotion. It was not intended to survive a week of close factual scrutiny by the media or potentially the FBI.

Republicans have already prepared a fallback position that Kavanaugh’s underlying offenses happened a long time ago and should not disqualify him. It will be interesting to watch them develop a defense of his perjury.

“The logical implication of a ‘no’ vote is that a man with a flawless record of public service lied not only to the public but to his wife, his children and his community,” writes Kimberly Strassel today. “Any Republican who votes against Judge Kavanaugh is implying that he committed perjury in front of the Senate, and should resign or be impeached from his current judicial position, if not charged criminally.”

Well, yes. Kavanaugh has told many, many lies. This doesn’t make him a “sociopath.” Kavanaugh probably believes he did terrible things as a boy, but grew up to be a man who treats women respectfully. . . . He also calculated that any partial defense would come unraveled, and settled from the outset on a stance of total denial. This is why he has told lie after lie after lie.

But now Kavanaugh is caught in those lies. He is worried that two Republicans senators might decide they’d rather vote for a justice who hasn’t flagrantly perjured himself. And this fear has legitimate basis.

Kavanaugh Proved Himself Unfit for The Supreme Court or Any Court

Between traveling to Charlottesville for an alumni committee meeting yesterday morning and then a Hampton Arts fundraiser gala last evening, I never had an opportunity to post.  I did listen to non-stop political coverage while driving to Charlottesville Friday evening and then returning to Hampton. The conclusion I reached even before we find out what the farcical one week FBI "investigation" reveals is that Brett Kavanaugh is unfit for a position on the Supreme Court or, in my view, any court.   First, I truly suspect that he is guilty of the allegations against him.  Second, he's already lied repeatedly in testimony before the Senate - and not just about sexual assault allegations.  Perhaps most disturbing, during his hearing on Thursday afternoon, Kavanaugh confirmed that he utterly lacks the temperament and disposition and lack of bias so needed by judges on the bench.  Had a woman, gay or minority nominee acted as petulant and aggressive during what is basically a job interview - which, therefore, involves NO issue of due process - they would have been immediately deem unqualified.  Sadly, that same standard doesn't apply to spoiled, rich white males in the eyes of the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee.  A column in the Washington Post looks at all of these failings of Kavanaugh.  Here are excerpts: 

The unprecedented Supreme Court confirmation process for Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh has surfaced three problems (at least).

The question of whether he sexually assaulted women in high school and college is the main event, and the FBI is now investigating, according to The Post, Deborah Ramirez’s claim that Kavanaugh exposed himself to her during a party at Yale University when he was allegedly drunk.
The second is genuine concern as to whether he was telling the truth and the whole truth under oath — with regard to his acquaintances, sexual innuendos in his yearbook and, most of all, his drinking. These are small matters, his defenders insist; but, whether big or small, his slippery responses have spawned a cottage industry in ferreting out them all. I have no doubt some enterprising attorney will document and then submit an account to the Bar, to the new Democratic majority (if they win a majority in at least one house and look ready to pursue impeachment) and even to the FBI.
However, here I want to focus on what may be the most significant issue — whether Kavanaugh’s “big reveal” that he is an angry partisan who thinks Democrats conspired to get him — now disqualifies him to sit on any court, let alone the Supreme Court.
The “politicization” of the court, as many call it, didn’t start with Kavanaugh. . . . . the GOP became a right-wing, radical party that eschewed long-held principles such as truth, humility, decorum and respect. Republicans radicalized, and with no filibuster to sift out the political operatives from the judges, we get Kavanaugh’s nomination.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but should not Kavanaugh recuse himself from every case involving a left-leaning group that is part of the conspiracy he decried?
As he yelled at Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee, it was not hard to imagine that he would be less than evenhanded if they were a party in litigation. “With his unprecedented attacks on Democrats and liberals, Kavanaugh must now likely broadly recuse himself from matters including those groups,” says ethics guru Norman Eisen. “It may wipe out a substantial portion of his docket should he be confirmed. We have a rule of thumb in government ethics: When recusals are so broad that the nominee can’t do his job, then maybe he shouldn’t be confirmed to the position. It is time to consider that question here.”
“[T]here is a very strong argument that Kavanaugh’s intemperate screed attacking liberal groups and spinning conspiracy theories when he testified on Thursday afternoon now requires him to recuse in any case where such groups appear before the Court of Appeals on which he sits.” Tribe continues, “For him to remain on a three-judge panel that sits in judgment on any legal claim affecting such a group would obviously create at least the appearance of a conflict of interest and probably an actual conflict.”
In other words, we would be expecting a fierce partisan to recuse himself (for excessive partisanship), so the high court wouldn’t appear to be simply a political machine. That’s a poor bet, and even if Kavanaugh recused himself from some cases, each and every Supreme Court decision would come with an asterisk. The Supreme Court’s legitimacy, already fraying, would be decimated. The more than half of the country that didn’t vote for Donald Trump understandably would think the court’s 5-to-4 decisions stemmed from political bias.
In 2006, when Kavanaugh was up for a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, the American Bar Association became concerned that he was unduly rigid and impervious to persuasion. That prompted the ABA to reduce his rating from “well qualified” to “qualified.” . . . had Kavanaugh had a scene like the one we saw Thursday the ABA would have rated him “unqualified.” It should reexamine its rating based on new evidence.
Putting a judge on the Supreme Court who expressed hatred and resentment toward a wide swath of the Democratic Party would shred whatever is left of the court’s intellectual integrity.
It’s inconceivable someone so biased, someone who vowed revenge (“What goes around, comes around,” he shouted), could be elevated to the Supreme Court.

Biased and bigoted judges discredit and undermine the legitimacy of the courts.  Worse yet, they harm litigants when they ignore the facts and constitutional principles in favor of their own prejudices.  A host of litigants would have no chance of justice if Kavanaugh is confirmed to the Court.  If the man had honor and decency, he would withdraw his nomination. Of course, he will not since he has no honor or decency.

Susan Collins Finds Herself Targeted in 2020 for Support of Kavanaugh

As a former Republican of many years, I am continually disgusted by the moral bankruptcy that now defines the GOP, lies, deceits, hatred of others, and support for Trump, a man devoid on any morality and decency now define the party  One of the few Republican senators who has avoided a full embrace of the reprehensible has been Susan Collins of Maine.  Now, however, with her apparent support of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, Collins seems poised to join the rest of her amoral party.  Not surprisingly, many of her constituents are up in arms for numerous reasons, not the least of which is Kavanaugh's likely perjury before the Senate Judiciary Committee.  Add to that his disturbing views of women's rights, abortion, the unrestrained power of the presidency, and the deference he would give to special rights demanded by Christofascists, and there is clearly grounds for a revolt against Collins if she votes for Kavanaugh.  (A New York Daily News piece which I cannot access since I am in the UK currently also indicates that Kavanaugh was accused of sexual misconduct).  Here are highlights from the Washington Post:

Exceptional dangers require exceptional and sometimes unusual responses.  This was the spirit animating the volunteers at a phone bank here Tuesday night. They were asking citizens to urge their state’s popular Republican senator, Susan Collins, to oppose the confirmation of Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.

And if they found a sympathizer, they took an additional and, for some, a controversial step: Asking for a commitment to contribute to a fund that would be activated against Collins (her term is up in 2020) if she votes to confirm Kavanaugh.

The campaign is spearheaded by Mainers for Accountable Leadership and Maine People’s Alliance, and it has outraged Collins, a consensus seeker who issued an unusually sharp retort: “Attempts at bribery or extortion will not influence my vote at all.” The organizers were unapologetic. “The idea of Susan Collins attacking an effort by 35,000 small-dollar donors as bribery is politics at its worst,” Marie Follayttar Smith, the Accountable Leadership group’s co-director, said in a statement. “We absolutely have the right to prepare to unseat her given everything Judge Kavanaugh would do on the Supreme Court to make life worse for Maine women.”

[T]here is this irony: Kavanaugh himself is, as the legal scholar Richard Hasen wrote recently in Slate, “deeply skeptical of even the most basic campaign-finance limits.”

It is one of a host of ways in which Kavanaugh would likely push the Supreme Court well to the right, because he would replace retired justice Anthony M. Kennedy, a more moderate conservative.

For the activists here and for many others around the country, the fears around Kavanaugh’s nomination begin with abortion rights. But the catalogue is much more extensive, reflecting the broad array of concerns of the activists mobilizing against him.

Ben Gaines worried that Kavanaugh would look for ways to side with President Trump in a dispute over special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation. Dini Merz has the same apprehension, and also mentioned Kavanaugh’s views on “corporate power” and “religion and its role” in American life.

Follayttar Smith spoke of the likelihood Kavanaugh would roll back environmental regulations and the Affordable Care Act. Susie Crimmins saw him as “dismantling government in its role of protecting the marginalized.” Louise Lora Somlyo felt that Kavanaugh had not been candid in his testimony before the Senate. Collins is an unusual Republican who has, by turns, both gratified and infuriated liberals in her state. Alicia Barnes, a Navy veteran, said Collins “had our backs” during the campaign by LGBTQ groups to end the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy; Smith spoke of the appreciation across the state for Collins’s vote to defend the Affordable Care Act.

But Collins’s later vote for the Republican tax cut was a reminder of how often she has been loyal to her party’s leadership, and Bill Nemitz, a veteran columnist for the Portland Press-Herald, wrote a passionate column last weekend suggesting a vote for Kavanaugh would be a breaking point.

With Senate Democrats now sharply questioning whether Kavanaugh has been misleading (or worse) in his testimony, Collins would have a path to oppose him, and she has said that if he has not been “truthful, then obviously that would be a major problem for me.”

But there is a larger issue of hypocrisy that incites aversion to Kavanaugh. Repeatedly, Republican presidential candidates promise (usually indirectly, but, in Trump’s case, directly) they will nominate justices who would challenge Roe v. Wade and, more generally, toe a conservative line.

Once they are nominated, however, these would-be justices pretend not to hold the views they hold. And when skeptics point out their obvious evasions, defenders denounce these objections as purely partisan.

The affable Collins is now confronting the backlash to this long history of doublespeak.

The Supreme Court Will Make Trump Talk

Throughout his real estate career - and seemingly his entire life - Donald Trump has always demonstrated two traits: he lies incessantly and he views himself as above the law, the latter being evidenced by his questionable mob ties and cosiness with Russian mobsters, not to mention his repeated disdain for municipal and federal laws that get in his way.  Now, with the Mueller investigation apparently headed towards a showdown, Mueller's trump card - no pun intended - is to secure a federal grand jury subpoena for Trump to testify.  Given Trump's endless lying, nothing poses a bigger danger than Trump before a grand jury with no legal counsel at his side. The likelihood of perjury occurring is, in my view, almost guaranteed and would open yet another phase for prosecution of Trump.  Thus, the question becomes whether or not Trump can be forced to testify.  A piece in New York Magazine suggests that, if given the opportunity, the U.S. Supreme Court would rule that Trump must testify (and likely cause his own undoing in the process).  Here are article highlights:

Rudy Giuliani may have just made the case for why Robert Mueller, the special counsel getting to the bottom of Russia’s role in the last presidential election, has a real need to speak with Donald Trump. And it has everything to do with the president’s state of mind during a key moment under the microscope: the firing of James Comey, the former FBI director.

“He fired Comey because he would not, among other things, say that he was not a target of the investigation,” Giuliani told Fox News’ Sean Hannity late on Wednesday. . . . . So he fired him, and he said ‘I’m free of this guy.’”

United States v. Nixon, the landmark Supreme Court case that forced President Richard Nixon to comply with a prosecutorial subpoena to turn over the Watergate tapes, is still good law. And of all the important principles the decision stands for — beyond precipitating the fall of a sitting president — one that rises to the top is the American public’s interest in the fair and impartial administration of justice. The court system must be able to get a full picture of the facts of a criminal investigation. “To ensure that justice is done,” Chief Justice Warren Burger wrote for an 8-to-0 court, “it is imperative to the function of courts that compulsory process be available for the production of evidence needed either by the prosecution or by the defense.”

Nixon is controlling law for the Mueller investigation. And in light of reporting this week that the special counsel still has a keen interest in interviewing Trump — and an apparent willingness to rely on compulsory process — there is a distinct possibility that Mueller may go to court and invoke Nixon if [Trump] the president doesn’t cooperate, either voluntarily or in the face of a valid subpoena. That’s the kind of momentous confrontation that no doubt would quickly make its way to the Supreme Court, which so far has seemed willing to treat Trump just like any other president, rather than carve out Trumpian exceptions to presidential powers that may bind later chief executives.

Even if he’s not a target, courts may still determine that Trump is required to give the evidence that’s asked of him — especially in a probe where he may hold the key to many of its mysteries. “The need to develop all relevant facts in the adversary system is both fundamental and comprehensive,” the Supreme Court said in Nixon. “The ends of criminal justice would be defeated if judgments were to be founded on a partial or speculative presentation of the facts.”

That’s precisely the state of affairs with a number of unresolved strands of the Russia investigation. We don’t know Trump’s frame of mind or what he knew when he fired Mike Flynn. We don’t know if he ever learned during the campaign that two of his family members and his campaign chairman wanted to obtain “dirt” on his rival from Russians during a meeting in Trump Tower. Or the reason he dictated the White House response to news reports revealing that the meeting took place. Or what he meant when he told NBC News’s Lester Holt that he dismissed Comey on account of “this Russia thing.” And what about his reported comments to Russian officials in the Oval Office, one day after Comey’s firing, that getting rid of the FBI director relieved “great pressure” from his presidency?

These are all open questions that are critical to Mueller and that only Trump can answer. And notice how all of these queries are far more focused than the broad, open-ended questions that Trump’s legal team leaked to the New York Times this week — not even Fox News’ Howard Kurtz buys the spin that these disclosures came from Mueller’s side.  . . . .[the] suggestion — that he [Mueller] remains on a never-ending fishing expedition — is just red meat for Trump’s base and a tactic to discredit Mueller’s work. Getting Trump’s direct testimony for a narrower set of interrogatories is Mueller’s way of tying up loose ends.

If Mueller can show that he has, as Nixon observed, a “demonstrated, specific need for evidence,” he’ll get it. The republic, the separation of powers, and the office of the presidency won’t crumble. The opposite may be true if the courts and the office of the special counsel are stonewalled by Trump and aren’t allowed to do their job.

Personally, I hope Mueller seeks a subpoena and soon.  It is far past time to put Trump in a box where he must testify and where, if he lies - a near certainty in my view - he will make matters far worse for himself.  I suspect Mueller already has information and evidence that he can use to catch Trump in his near certain lies.  Get out the popcorn.  

What Robert Mueller Already Knows

Image credit: Jasjyot Singh Hans

Despite the constant lies and shrieks of "fake news" coming out of the White House, the indictments handed down to date and the growing desperation on Donald Trump's part to stop the Russiagate investigation suggest that there is fire beneath the smoke seen to date. Add the list of questions Mueller may want to ask Trump - a list seemingly leaked by the White House itself or White House staff - and while the word "collusion" isn't used, some of the questions certainly dance  closely around the topic.  Add to this the rumor that Mueller may subpoena Trump - a situation which might force Trump to testify and, given his proclivity for lying - and set the stage for future perjury charges.  Remember Bill Clinton's lie under oath that set his impeachment in motion?  Lying about having sex with a woman pales in comparison to interacting with a hostile foreign government to throw a U.S. presidential election.  As an editorial in the New York Times notes, Mueller likely knows and can document the true answer to questions to be asked of Trump.  He also no doubt knows that Trump will lie under oath about those very issues just like he lies about virtually everything else. Here are editorial highlights:

The 49 questions that the special counsel, Robert Mueller, hopes to ask President Trump as part of the yearlong Russia investigation suggest that Mr. Mueller knows a great deal more than he’s letting on — and he hasn’t even gotten to the follow-ups yet.

After the questions, which were published by The Times on Monday, were provided to Mr. Trump’s legal team in March, John Dowd, the president’s lead personal lawyer at the time, urged him to avoid sitting for an interview with Mr. Mueller. When Mr. Trump said he intended to anyway, Mr. Dowd resigned.

Reading through the list, it’s clear why Mr. Dowd was so concerned. Federal investigators don’t like being lied to, and Mr. Trump has a marked tendency to say things that aren’t true. If he agrees to speak with Mr. Mueller’s team, he will have to answer some very basic questions about what he knew, when he knew it and what motivated some of his most shocking and inexplicable actions over the past year.

To name just a few: When and why did you decide to fire James Comey, the F.B.I. director, who was leading the Russia investigation at the time? What did you mean when you told NBC’s Lester Holt that you fired Mr. Comey because “this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story”? Did you try to persuade the attorney general, Jeff Sessions, to protect you from the investigation? Did you secretly promise to pardon Michael Flynn, the former national security adviser who has pleaded guilty to lying to federal investigators about his communications with the Russian ambassador?

The questions are a reminder of just how aberrant this White House has been. No prior president so openly assaulted the rule of law or undermined the integrity of the law enforcement community.

It may unnerve Mr. Trump, who has spent his life skirting the law and avoiding full accountability, but this is how the law works. Without saying a word publicly, Mr. Mueller and his team of experienced investigators are showing America how a government premised on the rule of law is supposed to function. The process may seem slow, but that is out of diligence and caution. Its fundamental purpose is truth-seeking — unlike, say, the embarrassing obfuscations of the Republican leaders of the House Intelligence Committee, who last week absolved Mr. Trump and his campaign of any wrongdoing in a 250-page report that reads more like a work of fantasy than a government investigation.

Obstruction of justice is itself a federal crime — see, for example, Section 1505 of Title 18 of the United States Code — regardless of whether prosecutors can establish an underlying offense. Mr. Trump and his defenders mock it as a “process crime,” but the rule of law breaks down if people can interfere, with impunity, in law enforcement’s efforts to do justice. Don’t forget that both presidents who have faced impeachment proceedings in the past few decades, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton, were accused of obstructing justice.

Mr. Mueller appears to have at least some evidence of an underlying offense. That is the implication of about a dozen of his questions, including the most surprising of all: Was Mr. Trump aware of any efforts by his campaign, and specifically by his former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, to seek Russia’s help in winning the 2016 election?

[I]t’s worth noting that as far back as August 2017, CNN reported that American intelligence services had intercepted communications among suspected Russian operatives discussing conversations they claimed to have had with Mr. Manafort, in which he requested their help in damaging Hillary Clinton’s election prospects.

Whatever information he has, Mr. Mueller, like any seasoned prosecutor, does not ask questions unless he already knows the answers. Whether or not Mr. Trump decides to talk to him, the rest of us will know, too, soon enough.

Kathleen Parker: We’ve Seen this Before. It Ended with Impeachment.

Trump appointee, U. S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman
 who headed the FBI raid on Michael Cohen 

As I have noted before, I am of an age where I clearly remember the Watergate saga that led to Richard Nixon's resignation from the presidency to avoid impeachment, not to mention the Whitewater investigation that in turn led to the Monica Lewinsky debacle and Bill Clinton's impeachment.  It would seem that history is barreling down a path to repeat itself since Donald Trump and his sycophants - not to mention Fox News viewers - seemingly learned nothing from the prior political disasters.   In a column in the Washington Post, conservative (an a one time Republican) reminds all of us that we have seen this "movie" before and it will likely not end well for Trump and will damage the country in the process.  Here are excerpts:

We’ve seen this movie before.  It would seem but a matter of time before Trump the president of the United States is asked a question under oath and gives a false answer. A lie, in other words. In the prequel, starring Bill Clinton, impeachment followed.

When the FBI, after a referral from special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, raided the offices and hotel room of Trump attorney Michael Cohen , the thud of the other shoe dropping sent ripples along Pennsylvania Avenue, down the Mall and over the Potomac River into Northern Virginia, where more than a few veterans of earlier political wars probably grimaced at what could come next.

No one should feel good about what’s happening now.

This isn’t to say the raid wasn’t necessary or proper — it was ordered not by Mueller but by the office of the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. But it shows that we’ve reached a point that apparently made it necessary. The timing, given world affairs, couldn’t be worse.

 

As President Trump himself pointed out amid lamentations of a witch hunt, “We’re talking about a lot of serious things.” Indeed, we are, especially as concerns the dire humanitarian situation in Syria, where President Bashar al-Assad reportedly executed a chemical attack on civilians, including children, near Damascus.

 

Trump risks the plausible perception, given history and his often impulsive decision-making process, that he would strike to create a distraction from the personal chaos surrounding him. Back to the prequel, you’ll recall Clinton’s 1998 missile strikes in Sudan, where a pharmaceutical factory was destroyed, as well as simultaneous strikes in Afghanistan. According to U.S. intelligence, the Sudan facility was part of Osama bin Laden’s empire and was believed to be a chemical weapons site, which turned out not to be so.

 

Recall, too, that Starr’s original mandate was to investigate an allegedly questionable land deal in Arkansas known as “Whitewater.” But, well, one thing led to another, and you know the rest. Sexual relations did take place in the Oval Office, but Whitewater was a bust. And the 9/11 Commission concluded that the rationale for the bombings had been credible given information at the time. My, but history does seem to enjoy repeating itself.

 

As for the alleged Mueller “break-in” — Trump’s characterization — the perps were FBI investigators, not burglars, who came equipped with a warrant approved by a judge. Also, Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein personally approved the raid, even though he wasn’t required to do so.

Of this much one can be fairly certain: The agents knew what they were after and were convinced that Cohen wouldn’t voluntarily hand it over. Whether Cohen’s $130,000 payment to the porn actress Stormy Daniels can be shown to have been an illegal “campaign donation” — or that he violated banking laws — remains to be seen. But he’s now in the grip of the Justice Department — and possibly Mueller — and soon it could behoove Cohen to become a witness in the special investigation.

It has been observed that most movies end with a repetition or variation of the opening scene. Increasingly, this plot seems to be foreshadowing a day when Trump, exposed and possibly impeached, is shown going back up the down escalator — alone, perhaps, but glad to be home.

What is remarkable is that every individual who authorized the FBI raid - despite Trump's lies - was a Republican and/or Republican appointee.  Two having been appointed by Trump himself.  Fox News may lie and say it is a Democrat witch hunt, but the hunters were all Republicans.  I hope they nail Cohen's ass and Trump's as well.

Mueller: Trump Is a Subject of his Investigation

Special counsel Robert Mueller told Der Trumpenführer's attorneys that while Trump is not currently a "target" of Mueller's investigation, he is, in fact, a "subject" of the investigation.  That equates to a reality that Mueller doesn't yet have enough to file criminal charges against Trump, but that matters could be edging closer to targeting Trump.  Either way, one does NOT want to be a subject of this type of investigation, although this reality seemingly has not fully registered with the mental midget in the White House.  One can only hope that Trump does submit to an interview with Mueller and his team since, in my view, the chances of Trump not engaging in lies is slim to none.  And once he lies to the investigators, Trump will have opened a new avenue for criminal or perjury charges.  The Washington Post looks at the current situation.  Here are excerpts:

Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III informed President Trump’s attorneys last month that he is continuing to investigate [Trump] the president but does not consider him a criminal target at this point, according to three people familiar with the discussions.

In private negotiations in early March about a possible [Trump] presidential interview, Mueller described Trump as a subject of his investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. Prosecutors view someone as a subject when that person has engaged in conduct that is under investigation but there is not sufficient evidence to bring charges.

The special counsel also told Trump’s lawyers that he is preparing a report about [Trump's] the president’s actions while in office and potential obstruction of justice, according to two people with knowledge of the conversations.

Mueller reiterated the need to interview Trump — both to understand whether he had any corrupt intent to thwart the Russia investigation and to complete this portion of his probe, the people said.

Mueller’s description of [Trump's] the president’s status has sparked friction within Trump’s inner circle as his advisers have debated his legal standing. [Trump] The president and some of his allies seized on the special counsel’s words as an assurance that Trump’s risk of criminal jeopardy is low. Other advisers, however, noted that subjects of investigations can easily become indicted targets — and expressed concern that the special prosecutor was baiting Trump into an interview that could put [Trump] the president in legal peril.

Trump’s chief counsel, Jay Sekulow, and Dowd declined to comment for this report. White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders referred questions to White House attorney Ty Cobb.

Mueller’s investigators have indicated to [Trump's] the president’s legal team that they are considering writing reports on their findings in stages — with the first report focused on the obstruction issue, according to two people briefed on the discussions.

Under special counsel regulations, Mueller is required to report his conclusions confidentially to Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein, who has the authority to decide whether to release the information publicly.

“They’ve said they want to write a report on this — to answer the public’s questions — and they need [Trump's] the president’s interview as the last step,” one person familiar with the discussions said of Mueller’s team.

Trump’s attorneys expect [Trump] the president would also face questions about what he knew about any contacts by his associates with Russian officials and emissaries in 2016, several White House advisers said. [Trump's] The president’s allies believe a second report detailing the special counsel’s findings on Russia’s interference would be issued later.

[Trump] The president has privately expressed relief at the description of his legal status, which has increased his determination to agree to a special counsel interview, the people said.

[L]egal experts said Mueller’s description of Trump as a subject of a grand jury probe does not mean he is in the clear.

Under Justice Department guidelines, a subject of an investigation is a person whose conduct falls within the scope of a grand jury’s investigation. A target is a person for which there is substantial evidence linking him or her to a crime.

Trumps Attorneys: Refuse Russiagate Inquiry Interview

Apparently realizing that their client is a pathological liar and likely has something to hide - perhaps a very great deal to hide - Donald Trump's attorneys are telling him to refuse to be interviewed by Robert Mueller's Russiagate investigation team.  No doubt Trump's attorneys have visions of charges of lying to the FBI and/or damaging admissions.  Of course, should Trump refuse to voluntarily agree to the interview, he could find himself facing a grand jury subpoena which could set the stage for contempt charges if he ignores the subpoena or perjury charges if he lies under oath.  Another option is for Trump to appear before the grand jury and invoke the 5th Amendment and refuse to testify.  The political fallout of such an action, however, would be the assumption in the minds of many - perhaps a great majority - Americans that invoking the 5th Amendment is tantamount to an admission of guilt.  A piece in the New York Times looks at the tightening noose around Trump.  As Richard Nixon learned, even the occupant of the White House is not exempt from a grand jury subpoena,  Here are article highlights:

Lawyers for President Trump have advised him against sitting down for a wide-ranging interview with the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, according to four people briefed on the matter, raising the specter of a months long court battle over whether the president must answer questions under oath.

His lawyers are concerned that the president, who has a history of making false statements and contradicting himself, could be charged with lying to investigators.

Mr. Trump’s decision about whether to speak to prosecutors, expected in the coming weeks, will shape one of the most consequential moments of the investigation. Refusing to sit for an interview opens the possibility that Mr. Mueller will subpoena the president to testify before a grand jury, setting up a court fight that would dramatically escalate the investigation and could be decided by the Supreme Court.

Rejecting an interview with Mr. Mueller also carries political consequences. It would be certain to prompt accusations that the president is hiding something, and a court fight could prolong the special counsel inquiry, casting a shadow over Republicans as November’s midterm elections approach or beyond into the president’s re-election campaign.

The lawyers and aides believe the special counsel might be unwilling to subpoena the president and set off a showdown with the White House that Mr. Mueller could lose in court.

One of the few voices arguing for cooperating with Mr. Mueller is Ty Cobb, the White House lawyer whom Mr. Trump also brought on to deal with Mr. Mueller’s investigation. Since Mr. Cobb was hired in July, he has argued that the White House should do everything possible to cooperate with Mr. Mueller’s investigation.

Others close to Mr. Trump have also cautioned him against a freewheeling interview. Marc E. Kasowitz, the president’s longtime personal lawyer from New York who initially dealt with the special counsel after Mr. Mueller took over the Russia investigation last May, has also consistently said that the president should not agree to the interview.

Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker and an informal adviser to Mr. Trump, echoed that advice.   “The idea of putting Trump in a room with five or six hardened, very clever lawyers, all of whom are trying to trick him and trap him, would be a very, very bad idea,” Mr. Gingrich said last month on “Fox and Friends.”

Richard M. Nixon refused to turn over to the special prosecutor investigating him tapes of incriminating conversations with aides. The matter eventually went before the Supreme Court, which ruled in 1974 that the president, like every American, was not above the law and had to comply with the special prosecutor’s request.

“The upshot of the Nixon tapes case was that any president is going to have an extremely hard time resisting a request from a law enforcement officer,” said Neal K. Katyal, an acting solicitor general in the Obama administration and a partner at the law firm Hogan Lovells. . . . . running away from a prosecutor isn’t consistent with faithfully executing the laws.”

Mr. Trump’s penchant for bravado has been a factor that his lawyers must contend with. The president has bragged to some aides that he would be able to clear himself if he talked to Mr. Mueller’s team.

When pressed, he also said he would be willing to be questioned under oath. Questioning by Mr. Mueller would not be under oath, though lying to federal investigators is a crime.

Privately, people close to the president have conceded that assuring Mr. Trump that the investigation would end by a certain date was primarily aimed at keeping him from antagonizing Mr. Mueller on his Twitter feed or in interviews.

Trump needs to testify and if he lies (something that I view as a foregone conclusion), he needs to be charged with crimes and removed from office.  

Mueller Zeros in on False Trump Tower Meeting Narrative

Hope Hicks - Trump's accomplice in obstruction of justice?

Barely a day goes by without another revelation that bolster the case of obstruction of justice by Donald Trump, a/k/a Der  Trumpenführer,  and his circle of sycophants who are reminiscent of band of liars and misfits that  Hitler surrounded himself with.  And let's be clear, the constant excuse that some of Trump's minions and henchmen were "naive" or "inexperienced" simply doesn't fly.  First they had legal counsel available who they could have consulted.  Secondly, if one is going to hold important positions, then it behoves what to get their shit together and make one's self competent. Now, the New York Times has broken a story that strongly suggests that Trump and/or White House communications director Hope Hicks sought to obstruct justice and hide information from investigators.  Conduct that is might pass in a privately held real estate company with a long history of shady practices (such as dealings with mobsters) simply doesn't fly once one moves into the White House.  Here are highlights from the Times story:

Aboard Air Force One on a flight home from Europe last July, President Trump and his advisers raced to cobble together a news release about a mysterious meeting at Trump Tower the previous summer between Russians and top Trump campaign officials. Rather than acknowledge the meeting’s intended purpose — to obtain political dirt about Hillary Clinton from the Russian government — the statement instead described the meeting as being about an obscure Russian adoption policy.

The statement, released in response to questions from The New York Times about the meeting, has become a focus of the inquiry by Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election. Prosecutors working for Mr. Mueller in recent months have questioned numerous White House officials about how the release came together — and about how directly Mr. Trump oversaw the process.

Mr. Mueller’s team recently notified Mr. Trump’s lawyers that the Air Force One statement is one of about a dozen subjects that prosecutors want to discuss in a face-to-face interview of Mr. Trump that is still being negotiated.

The revelation of the meeting was striking: It placed the president’s son and his top campaign officials in direct contact with a Russian lawyer who promised damaging information on Mrs. Clinton, and an email to the president’s son emerged saying that the information was part of Russia’s effort to help the Trump campaign.

What is already clear is that, as Mr. Trump’s aides and family members tried over 48 hours to manage one of the most consequential crises of the young administration, the situation quickly degenerated into something of a circular firing squad. They protected their own interests, shifted blame and potentially left themselves — and the president — legally vulnerable. The latest witness to be called for an interview about the episode was Mark Corallo, who served as a spokesman for Mr. Trump’s legal team before resigning in July. Mr. Corallo received an interview request last week from the special counsel and has agreed to the interview, according to three people with knowledge of the request. Mr. Corallo is planning to tell Mr. Mueller about a previously undisclosed conference call with Mr. Trump and Hope Hicks, the White House communications director, according to the three people. Mr. Corallo planned to tell investigators that Ms. Hicks said during the call that emails written by Donald Trump Jr. before the Trump Tower meeting . . . . “will never get out.” That left Mr. Corallo with concerns that Ms. Hicks could be contemplating obstructing justice, the people said.

Early on the morning of Friday, July 7, reporters from The Times approached White House officials and lawyers with questions about the Trump Tower meeting a year earlier. The reporters said The Times was preparing a story revealing that the meeting with the Russians had taken place, and asked the White House for more information about its purpose.

The president and senior White House officials were in Germany . . . . citing the time difference and conflicting schedules. They scheduled a conference call with the reporters for early the next morning.   The call never happened, so the Times reporters submitted a list of 14 questions about the meeting to the White House and to the lawyers of the Trump campaign aides who attended the meeting. Among the questions: What was discussed, and what did the attendees think was going to be discussed?

President Trump’s aides received the list midflight on Air Force One on the way back from the summit meeting and began writing a response. In the plane’s front cabin, Mr. Trump huddled with Ms. Hicks. During the meeting, according to people familiar with the episode, Ms. Hicks was sending frequent text messages to Donald Trump Jr., who was in New York. Alan Garten, a lawyer for the younger Mr. Trump who was also in New York, was also messaging with White House advisers aboard the plane.

The president supervised the writing of the statement, according to three people familiar with the episode, with input from other White House aides. A fierce debate erupted over how much information the news release should include. Mr. Trump was insistent about including language that the meeting was about Russian adoptions . . . By early afternoon, The Times received a separate statement, from Jamie S. Gorelick, a lawyer at the time for Jared Kushner . . . It left nearly all of the questions unanswered — and seemed to put the onus on Donald Trump Jr. to answer them. Nearly four hours later, the statement that had been cobbled together aboard Air Force One was sent to The Times. The statement was in Donald Trump Jr.’s name and was issued by Mr. Garten.

Not long after, the news site Circa published a different version, saying that the June 2016 meeting had been set up “to discuss a Russian policy.” Mr. Corallo, the spokesman for the legal team, said in that story that the Russians had “misrepresented who they were and who they worked for.” He, along with the rest of the president’s legal team, was not consulted about Donald Trump Jr.’s statement before it was released.

The dueling statements, both of which withheld the true purpose of the meeting, created tension at the White House.  Accusations began flying that the botched response made an already bad situation worse. Ms. Hicks called Mr. Corallo, according to three people who relayed his version of events to The Times. She accused him of trafficking in conspiracy theories and drawing more attention to the story.

The conference call with the president, Mr. Corallo and Ms. Hicks took place the next morning, and what transpired on the call is a matter of dispute.

In Mr. Corallo’s account . . . he told both Mr. Trump and Ms. Hicks that the statement drafted aboard Air Force One would backfire because documents would eventually surface showing that the meeting had been set up for the Trump campaign to get political dirt about Mrs. Clinton from the Russians.

According to his account, Ms. Hicks responded that the emails “will never get out” because only a few people had access to them. Mr. Corallo, who worked as a Justice Department spokesman during the George W. Bush administration, told colleagues he was alarmed not only by what Ms. Hicks had said . . . but also that she had said it in front of the president without a lawyer on the phone and that the conversation could not be protected by attorney-client privilege.

Contacted on Wednesday, Mr. Corallo said he did not dispute any of the account shared by his colleagues but declined to elaborate further. . . . lawyers had already copied and stamped the emails for delivery to Capitol Hill.

Mr. Corallo told colleagues that he immediately notified the legal team of the conversation and jotted down notes to memorialize it. He also shared his concerns with Stephen K. Bannon, then the president’s chief strategist.

Mr. Corallo left the job shortly after the phone call. The recent book “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House,” . . . . linked Mr. Corallo’s resignation to concerns he had about obstruction . . . .

The younger Mr. Trump ultimately released the emails after being told The Times was about to publish them. Within weeks, Mr. Mueller sent out grand jury subpoenas for documents and interviews about the June 2016 meeting.

A couple of take aways: first, Trump's first inclination is always to lie regardless of the topic or issue.  Here, the false statement to the Times may not have been a crime, but lying to investigators about it and how it came into existence, will be crimes.  The second take away?  Ms. Hicks is likely in a shit load of trouble.  She may have already lied to investigators and Corallo may set the stage where she will be seeking her own plea deal before it is all over.   Should that happen, let's hope she throws Trump under the bus.