President Trump spent two years acting like a guilty man. Then exhaustive investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller didn’t find evidence to support the collusion charges leveled against him in the press.
What was Trump thinking?
It’s theoretically possible, but also implausible, to argue as many liberal media figures have in the wake of Mueller’s report, that Trump really did collude with Russia and just successfully covered it up.
But the simpler and more likely explanation is that Trump was so infuriated by an investigation into a crime he didn’t commit that he repeatedly tried to shut it down and repeatedly ordered his aides to lie about it and other matters pertaining to Russia and the FBI.
Trump looks bad.
The report exposes in him some of the same flaws Hillary Clinton shared, which we feared would compromise her presidency if she were elected: a reflexive aversion to transparency rooted in either guilt or paranoia.
Trump was his own worst enemy. Had he let the investigation run its course, he would have looked less guilty, would have retained more of his best staff, and would have seen the investigation end sooner.
The firing of FBI Director James Comey appears to have come in a fit of pique over collusion questions. It also triggered the special counsel investigation. Trump then allegedly instructed White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders to lie about why he fired Comey, claiming the director was deeply unpopular at the FBI.
Trump had another tantrum when he learned of that investigation, according to former Attorney General Jeff Sessions. The president accurately declared himself debilitated — he used a more colorful word — by the investigation, saying it would keep him from accomplishing anything for years.
Subsequently, he tried repeatedly to interfere with the investigation, according to witnesses. He allegedly urged Sessions to un-recuse himself, told aide Corey Lewandowski to lean on Sessions to do so, told White House counsel Don McGahn that Mueller had to go, and then told McGahn to deny, falsely, that he had issued such an order.
McGahn, the report says, blocked the effort to fire Mueller and refused to lie about it. This sort of scene plays out repeatedly in the Mueller report, leading to its conclusion: “The President’s efforts to influence the investigation were mostly unsuccessful, but that is largely because the persons who surrounded [him] declined to carry out orders or accede to his requests.”
Although it looks as though Trump wasn’t trying to cover up any collusion and never crossed the line into criminal obstruction, he did try to undermine an investigation and repeatedly pushed others to lie or deflect in order to defend himself. This reflects his disregard for the federal law enforcement apparatus of which he is the constitutionally designated head.
That is unbecoming and worrisome, and it is unethical to press others to lie, even when the lies are not under oath.
But demonstrating unbecoming and worrisome vices in our president was not the task of the special counsel. The investigation was about whether he colluded with Russia. He didn’t, and nor did his campaign. But his meddling guarantees that Congress will pick up on the obstruction issue where Mueller left off.
