In Washington, D.C., this week, a duel is playing out in the Senate. Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, is planning to move legislation protecting special counsel Robert Mueller through his committee, with a view to it getting a vote on the Senate floor.
Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is claiming the legislation will never get a vote. The scene is bizarre and confounding, with Grassley rightly claiming that McConnell does not run the Judiciary Committee, and McConnell appearing out of step with a shifting tide that has more Republican senators and House members voicing support for legislation like that which the Judiciary Committee will shortly consider.
Clearly, some Republicans are uncomfortable with the bill. They worry about offending President Trump, that he will see it as a slap in the face. Maybe Trump would, but the truth is, a Mueller protection bill is actually a Trump protection bill, and if Republicans actually want to keep the president in office, they’ll pass it.
An increasing number of legislators — many Republicans, and basically the whole Democratic Party — have gone on the record to say if Trump fires Mueller, it would be the end of his presidency. What they mean is, it would become vastly easier to impeach the president, something that sounds absurd now, because it is.
However, if Trump fires Mueller, he will look incredibly weak, which will erode support for him among key demographics he and Republicans rely on to win elections. He will increase the chances of Democrats retaking the House and Senate in 2018, and thereby the political jeopardy in which he finds himself. He will also increase the chances a Democrat wins office in 2020, in which event, it’s also likely that calls to investigate him would continue. Basically, there is no upside to firing Mueller, and that’s probably why the president has not done it and won’t do it. But why not make it an impossibility for him to detonate a proverbial suicide bomb on the national stage that takes out much of the GOP with him?
It’s worth remembering that in addition to protecting Trump, Republicans could, by passing a Mueller protection bill, instantly put a stop to a bunch of the “fake news” the president complains about. Yes, “fake news” can be a useful political foil, but it is also genuinely frustrating to see it repeatedly reported that the President is not a target of Mueller’s investigation, only for 23.5 hours out of every day to be spent talking about how Trump supposedly being in the firing line means he’s going to can Mueller and/or Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.
Instead of perpetuating this drama, Republicans should just pass a Mueller protection bill and save us all from the daily Defcon One warnings and heart rate spikes that ensue whenever it sounds like Trump is two minutes away from a decision that would end his political career. Sure, it’s not what the Founding Fathers envisioned Congress would be spending its time on, but needs change.
What’s more, whether you love Trump or hate him, an end to hysterical media cycles would get an immediate, big thumbs up from the entire American electorate.
McConnell should quit saying Grassley’s bill will never get a vote, and leave it up to the Republicans urging a Mueller protection bill to wrangle the votes. This is how Congress works, McConnell knows it, and Trump will benefit from it, as he and his advisers already know if they’re thinking straight about any of this.
Liz Mair is president of Mair Strategies.
