President Trump told reporters Sunday evening that he is not considering firing special counsel Robert Mueller, whose investigation into Russian election meddling has been a constant irritant to the White House. At the same time, however, Trump and his allies are stepping up their campaign to discredit Mueller, who has come under fire from Republicans following reports that several members of his team demonstrated anti-Trump animus.
Investigator Peter Strzok, whom Mueller removed from his team in August, reportedly sent texts to a colleague in 2016 disparaging Trump and saying that Hillary Clinton “just has to win.” Another prosecutor, Andrew Weissman, has drawn criticism as well for his support of the Clinton campaign and an email he sent acting Attorney General Sally Yates praising her for refusing to enforce Trump’s travel ban.
The allegations of bias have been a major talking point for the White House and its allies for weeks, with media figures and even some congressmen saying it proved the investigation should be shut down.
“There is a cleansing needed in our FBI and our Department of Justice,” Fox News host Jeanine Pirro said Dec. 10. “It needs to be cleansed of individuals who should not just be fired but who need to be taken out in handcuffs.”
Congressman Matt Gaetz made a similar argument last Thursday on Fox News Radio, asking, “Where in the hell is our attorney general?”
“We need Attorney General Sessions to step up, do his job, and seize control of the nightmare that is this investigation,” Gaetz said.
Then, on Saturday, a lawyer representing the Trump campaign accused Mueller’s team of a separate misdeed: improperly obtaining campaign emails that should have been protected by attorney-client privilege. Asked about the emails on Sunday, Trump said, “It’s not looking good.”
“It’s quite sad to see that. My people are very upset about it,” Trump said. “I can’t imagine there’s anything on ’em, frankly, because as we said, there’s no collusion. There’s no collusion whatsoever.”
In a rare public statement, a spokesman for the special counsel told reporters they had followed appropriate channels in their information requests.
“When we have obtained emails in the course of our ongoing criminal investigation, we have secured either the account owner’s consent or appropriate criminal process,” spokesman Peter Carr told Axios on Sunday.
The evidence indicates that Mueller, who continues to receive bipartisan praise for his record of public service, has been beyond reproach in navigating these concerns—removing Strzok from his team months before the agent’s apparent biases were reported in the press, and making every effort to demonstrate that the investigation is being conducted without partisan rancor. But the appearance of animus has nevertheless reinforced the suspicions of many Republicans that the investigation is slanted against the president—even among Mueller’s own defenders on Capitol Hill.
Sen. John Cornyn of Texas tweeted Saturday that Mueller “needs to clean house of partisans.” And on Sunday, Sen. James Lankford suggested that Strzok’s involvement might have tainted the investigation even if Mueller’s intentions were immaculate.
Strzok “had a strong bias against now-President Trump when he was candidate Trump,” Lankford said told CBS News’s John Dickerson. “What they have got to determine is, was he directing the investigation one way or the other while he was on the investigation? Is that something they can go back and repair, and look and see if there’s any kind of bias that is in it?”
“Obviously, I don’t think it taints the entire process,” Lankford continued. “But it certainly taints that season of it.”
