The FBI investigation has operated on the assumption that Trump & Russia are coconspirators [View all]

[kpete]

The Washington Monthly article by Martin Longman is breathtaking. Here is the nut graf (dt'd) and the concluding graf:

The firing of Comey was interpreted as an effort to kill the Russia investigation for a simple reason. President Trump explained his decision in those terms. He did it in a memo he wrote that was spiked by his own White House counsel, Don McGahn. He did it in the Oval Office with the Russian ambassador and foreign minister. And he eventually did it on national television in an interview with NBC’s Lester Holt. It wasn’t just an effort to obstruct an investigation of himself. It was an effort to prevent the FBI from investigating Russia.

It has been fairly easy for people to contemplate that Trump might be trying to cover his own tracks, but there has been a widespread mental block when it comes to envisioning the American president as working to cover Russia’s tracks. The FBI overcame that hurdle after the firing of Comey. Ever since, the investigation has operated on the assumption that Trump and Russia are coconspirators both before and after the fact.

...

I’ve been arguing for a long time that people are underestimating how strong the case for impeachment will be and that even the Senate Republicans will not be able to shrug it off. With this new reporting from the New York Times, you’re beginning to get a sense of what I’ve been talking about.

It’s gratifying to see things starting to come to fruition, but it’s still frustrating to see people acting surprised after all the effort I’ve put in to make the case that this is an inquiry that began as an investigation into Russia but has long sought to prove, and will prove, that the president is acting as an agent of a foreign power.




https://washingtonmonthly.com/2019/01/12/the-intelligence-community-has-long-suspected-trump-of-being-under-russian-influence/