Another day, another bombshell in the ongoing scandal surrounding the special counsel investigation into Donald Trump’s ties to Russia.
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This time, according to The New York Times, the president’s former lawyer John Dowd pushed Trump to pardon two of his former associates – Michael Flynn and Paul Manafort – before Robert Mueller could flip them.
According to the stunning report, “A lawyer for President Trump broached the idea of Mr. Trump’s pardoning two of his former top advisers, Michael T. Flynn and Paul Manafort, with their lawyers last year, according to three people with knowledge of the discussions.”
The Times added: “The discussions came as the special counsel was building cases against both men, and they raise questions about whether the lawyer, John Dowd, who resigned last week, was offering pardons to influence their decisions about whether to plead guilty and cooperate in the investigation.”
Luckily, the pardons never happened and the two men appear to be cooperating with Mueller – but it still represents the latest example of Trump trying to derail or impede the special counsel investigation.
As MSNBC Justice and Security Analyst Matthew Miller tweeted a short time ago, this is “straight up corruption.” Bribing key Mueller witnesses with pardons in an attempt to keep them from spilling the goods on Trump – that’s the definition of obstruction.
This is just straight up corruption. Every lever Trump has to try and impede the investigation, he has used, from direct intervention with the FBI, to asking others to intervene, to dangling pardons in front of targets. https://t.co/bppflLoekz
— Matthew Miller (@matthewamiller) March 28, 2018
University of Alabama law professor Joyce Alene also pointed out that pardons go through the White House counsel, not a president’s private criminal defense lawyer.
The fact that Dowd was pushing for them suggests that their sole purpose was to impede Robert Mueller’s investigation and try to prevent special counsel targets from cooperating. In other words, more obstruction.
John Dowd was Trump’s personal, criinal lawyer. The WH Counsel is the lawyer who heads up the pardon process. For Dowd to have talked pardons for Manafort & Flynn strongly suggests those pardons were being contemplated as a last ditch way to obstruct the Mueller investigation. https://t.co/y3NkdDHDTc
— Joyce Alene (@JoyceWhiteVance) March 28, 2018
Evidence of obstruction is clear
For months, a growing pile of credible news reporting – and, likely, more examples not known to the public – shows that every step of the way, this president has tried to impede the Russia investigation.
Trump fired former FBI James Comey because of the Russia probe, and he has pressured other high-level officials in the agency over the course of his presidency.
He ordered the top White House lawyer to have Robert Mueller removed as special counsel, though he was rejected.
He privately pushed GOP members of Congress to wrap up their inquiries into Russia’s 2016 election interference.
He publicly shamed Attorney General Jeff Sessions for recusing himself from the investigation, frustrated that Sessions wasn’t protecting him.
Time and again, Trump has tried to kill the special counsel investigation into Russia, presumably to cover up any coordination that took place between Moscow and his campaign.
In doing so, the president has essentially built an obstruction of justice case against himself and served it to Robert Mueller on a silver platter.
Sean Colarossi currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and was an organizing fellow for both of President Obama’s presidential campaigns. He also worked with Planned Parenthood as an Affordable Care Act Outreach Organizer in 2014, helping northeast Ohio residents obtain health insurance coverage.
