Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley said it would be “suicide” for President Trump to fire special counsel Robert Mueller.
“I have confidence in Mueller, the president ought to have confidence in Mueller,” Grassley, R-Iowa, told Fox Business on Tuesday. “And I think to answer your question, it would be suicide for the president to talk about firing Mueller. The less the president said on this whole thing, the better off he would be, the stronger his presidency would be.”
Trump took aim at Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election again Monday after FBI agents raided the office and hotel room of Michael Cohen, Trump’s longtime attorney.
Law enforcement reportedly obtained a search warrant for Cohen’s office after receiving a referral from Mueller.
Speaking to reporters Monday after news of the raid went public, Trump again called Mueller’s probe a “witch hunt” and said the raid was a “disgraceful situation.”
Trump also called Mueller’s team of investigators the “most conflicted group of people I have ever seen” and said “many people” have told him to fire Mueller.
The president’s comments have again raised red flags for lawmakers, who are warning Trump against terminating the special counsel.
In addition to criticizing Mueller and his team, Trump hit Attorney General Jeff Sessions for recusing himself from the Russia investigation. Sessions’ recusal is a frequent source of frustration for Trump.
But Grassley defended Sessions on Tuesday and said Trump should not send the Senate another nominee to confirm.
“I think Jeff Sessions is doing a good job even though on some issues I very dramatically disagree with him. We’ve got three Cabinet people to approve now. We may even have a Supreme Court justice down the road a few months,” he said.
“The president shouldn’t be overburdening Congress with finding a new attorney general and going through that, particularly when the Democrats on every nomination that comes up, they filibuster it so it takes 30 hours to get through one of these.”
Grassley was referencing the Senate’s need to confirm CIA Director Mike Pompeo as secretary of state, CIA Deputy Director Gina Haspel as CIA director, and White House physician Ronny Jackson as secretary of veterans affairs.
