As special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigators continue to bore into President Trump’s inner circle, Republicans have intensified their attempts to discredit the investigators as partisan hacks. As news began to break last weekend that former national security advisor Michael Flynn had struck a deal with Mueller, the president’s supporters latched onto another story: that one of Mueller’s top investigators had been reassigned to a supervisory job after it was discovered he had been critical of Trump in text messages a year before.
President Trump immediately seized on the story, retweeting reports that Peter Strzok had been “busted sending political text messages” and that FBI Director Christopher Wray “needs to clean house.”
Asked on Wednesday whether the president believed the special counsel was biased against him, press secretary Sarah Sanders replied that “we’ve seen some reports that certainly caused a great deal of concern, and we hope that those are fully looked at and investigated.” Administration allies in on the House Intelligence Committee, such as Congressmen Devin Nunes and Jim Jordan, have called for a fuller investigation into Strzok’s involvement in the Mueller probe as well.
Then, on Thursday, Fox News reported that the Justice Department was reviewing “over 10,000 texts” between Strzok and another FBI agent he was seeing romantically for further evidence of anti-Trump sentiment.
There’s reason to think Strzok could hold and express anti-Trump views while remaining a professional in his law enforcement work. Andrew McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor, argues there should be evidence of wrongdoing before we bury Strzok:
The problem for Mueller is nonetheless a political one—this is an investigation into people around the president of the United States, after all. And even the faintest perception of bias could be enough to hurt the credibility of his investigation.
Meanwhile, the congressional investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 election have revealed more emails about that June 2016 meeting between Trump campaign officials and Russian nationals at Trump Tower. CNN reports:
Franken Fallout—Minnesota senator Al Franken announced on Thursday he plans to resign “in the coming weeks.” At National Review Online, Rich Lowry rightly notes that Franken’s Senate floor speech announcing his resignation while still claiming innocence from the accusations of sexual misconduct “made no sense.”
“If he is innocent as he claims (he says some of the allegations were untrue and he remembers the rest differently than his accusers) and if he is as confident that the Ethics Committee would vindicate him as he says, he shouldn’t be resigning,” Lowry writes. “Indeed, a duly-elected senator wrongly accused owes it to himself and his constituents to fight on—lies and mis-remembered accounts shouldn’t chase anyone from the Senate.”
My colleague David Byler has a good piece explaining why Democrats remain the favorite to keep Franken’s seat in next year’s special election—even as Minnesota has started to trend slightly in the Republicans direction in recent years.
Thursday was the 76th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. At the White House, President Trump signed a proclamation to honor the memory of those who lost their lives in an attack he called “a pretty wild scene.”
“Today, our entire nation pauses to remember Pearl Harbor and the brave warriors who, on that day, stood tall and fought for America,” Trump said.
Trump was joined by six veterans of the attack, whom he praised as heroes and “living witnesses to American history.”
“As we remember that fateful day, it’s an incredible honor to be joined here with surviving veterans of the attack on Pearl Harbor,” Trump said. “And you’ll be here for the next seven years with me, okay? All right—seven years. After that, who knows?”
As he signed the proclamation, Trump also bragged about his administration’s dedication to the military.
“We are building up the military beyond what you ever thought. It got depleted. You know what happened over the last quite long period of time, but not with us,” he told the assembled veterans. “And we’ll do it in your honor. Okay?”
During the White House ceremony, one of the veterans broke into song after an unwitting Trump prompted him. It was touching:
A veteran sings a WWII song about Pearl Harbor during the White House event https://t.co/XG4d2AhEGR
— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) December 7, 2017
2018 Watch—Former Tennessee governor Phil Bredesen, a Democrat, makes his entry into that state’s U.S. Senate race official with a new video:
Bredesen was last elected statewide in 2006, the same year Republican Bob Corker was first elected to the Senate. Corker will not seek reelection in 2018.
I regret to inform you that the Millennials are at it again, this time ruining office holiday parties. Thankfully, Matt Labash is covering the story in the new issue of the magazine:
We’ve All Been There—This performance from Patti LaBelle at the 1996 National Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony, which is making the rounds on the internet, is bad, hilarious, and endearing:
Argentina Watch—From the Associated Press: “Argentine judge seeks arrest of ex-President Fernandez”
Song of the Day—“Sloe Gin” by Joe Bonamassa
