Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., suggested Monday that President Trump should not sit down with special counsel Robert Mueller’s team of federal investigators in case he ends up becoming “a convicted felon” for misstating facts.
“We have a prosecutor that has such enormous power that they seem not to want to rest until they talk to President Trump,” Paul said during an interview with Fox News, referring to Mueller’s ongoing negotiations with Trump’s personal attorneys regarding the prospect of an interview for the Russia probe.
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“Are they going to talk to him about a business deal 25 years ago in Europe and expect him to recount the details of that, and if he gets the details wrong, all of a sudden, he’s a convicted felon?” Paul continued.
That “terrible amount of power” was one of the reasons why Paul believes “we really should not have these special prosecutors, period,” he said.
“I think they don’t serve any good because they have too much power over ruining people’s lives and trying to get people to give up information that may or may not be true,” Paul added.
Trump’s outside legal counsel has been reticent to agree to a sit down interview with federal investigators out of fear their presidential client could fall into a “perjury trap.”
After golfing with Trump in New Jersey this weekend, Paul told Fox News the president did not seem “obsessed” with Mueller’s Russia inquiry, despite Trump’s Twitter account indicating otherwise. Trump fired off a slew of angry tweets on Saturday and Sunday, mostly directed at the New York Times for a story about White House counsel Don McGahn extensively cooperating with investigators.
“I think he was probably more focused on wanting to know how my trip to Russia was, how we can have better engagement and try to get beyond into a better place in the world with people who may well be our adversaries at times, but also may be people that we have to have conversations,” he explained.
Paul, who first lobbied Trump in July to strip former CIA Director John Brennan of his security clearance, also said the nation was “safer” now that Brennan, a Trump critic, no longer had access to sensitive information.
