Newt Gingrich defended President Trump against allegations that Trump’s firing of James Comey was a crime. Gingrich’s legal interpretation: “the president cannot obstruct justice.” I’m not a lawyer, but neither is Newt Gingrich (he holds a Ph.D. in European history), and if I can google some legal definitions, he should be able to as well.
The wordy definition of obstruction comes from 18 U.S.C. §1503.
In English: Anyone who tries to threaten or corruptly influence an executive branch official not to carry forward an investigation has obstructed justice. No part of the law excludes presidents–I checked.
What counts as a “threat” as opposed to an “order” is ambiguous, but corruption is less so. Black’s Law Dictionary defines a corruption as “[t]he act of an official or fiduciary person who unlawfully and wrongfully uses his station or character to procure some benefit for himself or for another person, contrary to duty and the rights of others.”
Combining the two definitions, any official who uses the powers of public office for personal gain by compelling law enforcement to drop an investigation could be guilty of obstruction of justice.
For example, if Bill Clinton had told Kenneth Starr he’d be audited by the IRS every year unless he dropped the Whitewater investigation, that would have been obstruction of justice.
Whether Trump committed a similar act when he told Comey that he hoped he could “let go” of the investigation of Michael Flynn will likely be decided by lawyers working for Robert Mueller. It’s possible that Trump didn’t threaten Comey; he may have merely expressed his wishes to a subordinate and then fired that subordinate without ever issuing a threat.
Of course, it’s also possible that Trump did threaten Comey by making it clear that Comey’s job depended on the termination of the Flynn investigation. It could be that Comey’s ouster was corrupt in some other way: Maybe Trump didn’t want Comey to find some unpleasant dealings unrelated the Russia investigation. In any case, the argument that Trump’s actions don’t amount to obstruction in no way requires Gingrich’s argument that no president could ever commit obstruction.
And Gingrich should know that. After all, he was speaker when the House impeached Bill Clinton for, among other things, obstruction of justice.
