The national media have decided that it’s inappropriate for President Trump to inquire about the identity of a whistleblower who is accusing him of abusing power. But Trump has every reason to want to know.
Oh, and as it turns out, the first people to find out about the whistleblower’s identity, and share details about him with the world, were none other than four journalists at the New York Times.
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When Trump was asked by a reporter Monday at the White House whether he knew the identity of the whistleblower, the president said he was “trying to find out.” Of course he is. Who isn’t interested in learning more about the intelligence official who just kicked off an impeachment inquiry against a sitting president? Who isn’t curious about that person’s motives?
Trump is always expected to sit with his hands tied behind his back and a blindfold over his eyes whenever he’s under siege. And so liberals immediately attacked him for suggesting that he might want to know who it was that just accused him of misconduct.
“The whistleblower’s identity is protected by law,” tweeted Renato Mariotti, a legal analyst for CNN. “Trump is trying to retaliate against a witness in plain sight.”
Mariotti might look up the word “retaliate,” because at least as of Tuesday, it did not mean “learning more about the person who just accused a sitting president of abusing his office.”
Regardless of whether there are laws that allow a government whistleblower to make allegations of wrongdoing from anonymity, that doesn’t mean people aren’t free to find out who it is on their own.
The New York Times already knows who it is, not because the whistleblower came to the paper’s reporters ready to reveal himself but because the Times, like everyone else, wanted to know.
The Times last week reported the name of the whistleblower’s lawyer, that the whistleblower is a CIA officer, and that he had worked for some time in the White House. If the most important national paper in the country gets to know who it is and share information about him, why shouldn’t anyone else be allowed to know, especially the person who’s being accused of wrongdoing?
Reasons liberals have for wanting to keep the whistleblower anonymous are clear. It’s asymmetrical warfare. The less Trump knows about where the allegations are coming from, the weaker his position in defending himself.
Trump is allowed to want to know who’s making these claims against him, and he would be right to find out.
