Pardoner’s tale
President Trump continues to advance the absurd idea that he is beyond the reach of the law. His ubiquitous attack attorney, Rudy Giuliani, has in recent days all but promised presidential pardons to Trump’s jailed former campaign manager and other associates facing criminal charges. If every Trump minion in a jam can count on clemency, then perhaps the president won’t have to test his dubious claim that he can pardon himself.
The investigation of a foreign plot to subvert a presidential election is, in Giuliani’s estimation, a mere mess to be tidied up with a sweeping abuse of power. As America’s former mayor put it to the New York Daily News, Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation “might get cleaned up with some presidential pardons.” He went on to clarify that Trump would pardon anyone “treated unfairly” — which happened to match Trump’s critique of a judge’s “very unfair” decision to jail Paul Manafort, who ran his 2016 campaign.
The assessment was very generous to a man who, while awaiting trial on conspiracy, money laundering and other charges, is accused of leaning on witnesses. But the message, especially as communicated by a former mob prosecutor such as Giuliani, couldn’t be clearer: Don’t be a rat and the boss will take care of you.
Not content to clean up after Mueller, Giuliani also asserted that the “investigation should be investigated,” distorting a Justice Department review as supporting his case. In fact, the department’s inspector general found no evidence of political bias affecting investigations of Trump’s campaign or Hillary Clinton’s email. Moreover, the review documented repeated instances of FBI bumbling that hampered Clinton and buoyed Trump.
To review, Trump is undermining the investigation of his campaign, promising to undo its results, and, if all else fails, threatening to unilaterally exonerate himself. Congress shouldn’t abide such disdain for the law and its enforcement, and voters shouldn’t tolerate lawmakers who do.