Trump lashes out at Mueller
With a number of probes moving closer to the Oval Office, President Donald Trump and his attorney unleased a fresh series of attacks yesterday on the investigators, questioning their integrity while categorically ruling out the possibility of a presidential interview with the special counsel.
Trump and Rudy Giuliani used Twitter and television interviews to deliver a series of broadsides against special counsel Robert Mueller and federal prosecutors in New York. Giuliani said he was ‘‘disgusted’’ by the tactics used by Mueller in his probe into Russian election interference, including in securing guilty pleas from the president’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn on a charge of lying to federal investigators.
Trump, Giuliani said, would not submit to an interview by Mueller’s team.
‘‘They’re a joke,’’ Giuliani told Fox News Sunday. ‘’Over my dead body, but, you know, I could be dead.’’
The special counsel, who is investigating possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russia, has continued to request an interview with the president. Last month, the White House sent written answers in response to the special counsel’s questions about possible collusion. The White House has resisted answering questions on possible obstruction of justice.
Giuliani sarcastically said that the only thing left to ask the president was about ‘‘several unpaid parking tickets that night, back in 1986, ‘87 that haven’t been explained.’’
If the president officially refuses an interview request, the special counsel’s team could theoretically seek to subpoena him to compel his testimony. Such a move would almost certainly trigger an immediate court fight.
Trump and Giuliani have repeatedly tried to paint Cohen as untrustworthy, with the former New York City mayor calling him a ‘‘pathological liar.’’
Trump and Giuliani have also accused prosecutors of intimidating the president’s associates into making false claims.
‘‘Remember, Michael Cohen only became a ‘Rat’ after the FBI did something which was absolutely unthinkable & unheard of until the Witch Hunt was illegally started,’’ Trump tweeted. ‘‘They BROKE INTO AN ATTORNEY’S OFFICE!’’
It was not a break-in. The FBI executed a search warrant obtained from a judge in conducting a raid in April on Cohen’s home, office and hotel room and seizing records on a variety of matters, among them a US$130,000 payment made to porn actress Stormy Daniels by Cohen. The application for the warrant was approved high in the Justice Department.
In response to Trump’s tweet, former FBI Director James Comey tweeted, ‘‘This is from the President of our country, lying about the lawful execution of a search warrant issued by a federal judge. Shame on Republicans who don’t speak up at this moment – for the FBI, the rule of law, and the truth.
Prosecutors have said Trump directed Cohen to arrange the payments to buy the silence of Daniels and former Playboy model Karen Mcdougal in the run-up to the 2016 campaign. Federal prosecutors in New York say the payments amounted to illegal campaign contributions because they were made at the height of election season to keep voters from learning of Trump’s alleged infidelities.
Giuliani has argued the payments were made to protect Trump’s family, not to influence the election.
‘‘If there’s another purpose, it’s not a campaign contribution,’’ Giuliani told ABC. ‘‘Suppose he tried to use campaign funds to pay Stormy Daniels. It wouldn’t be illegal. These are not campaign contributions.’’
The hush money wasn’t initially reported on campaign finance documents and, in any case, far exceeded the legally acceptable amount for in-kind contributions. –AP
‘‘Remember, Michael Cohen only became a ‘Rat’ after the FBI did something which was absolutely unthinkable & unheard of until the Witch Hunt was illegally started. They BROKE INTO AN ATTORNEY’S OFFICE!’’ Donald Trump