As a follow up to threatening the FBI director he fired mid-investigation this week, Donald Trump went on to wring his hands—again—about the unfairness of that investigation.
Trump has some variation of this statement in every interview he’s given since the hearing. That’s in addition to his real-time critique of Clapper’s testimony.
Clapper, who left the White House at the end of President Barack Obama's term, said nothing had changed from his prior statement.
"Yes, he was choking on that," Trump said. "Is there any record at all of collusion? He was the head of the whole thing. He said no. That's a big statement."
The trouble for Trump is that Clapper didn’t say there’s no record of collusion. What he said was the same thing he’s been saying for years.
“Not to my knowledge,” Clapper replied.
Trump throws up the pretense that Clapper was offering an active defense, the equivalent of “I know Trump did nothing wrong.” But Clapper is only providing a shrug, an exact match to “I don’t know.” And since the investigation was taking place at the FBI, Clapper wouldn’t know. Who would? James Comey.
Clapper’s public testimony before the Senate comes with precisely the same limits as his previous statements on the subject.
… Clapper clarified that his Meet the Press comment wasn’t meant to give people the idea he had direct knowledge of Comey’s investigation and had concluded it hadn’t uncovered evidence of collusion. Instead, he said he just wasn’t aware that Comey was investigating.
Clapper has said on multiple occasions that he wasn’t privy to Comey’s investigation. He’s also reminded people that he’s been out of the government for months, and isn’t in the loop on any information that may have surfaced from any source since them. Trump’s not the only one who’s made this claim. Trotting out Clapper’s statement has become part of the standard script for Sean Spicer and for a number of Trump surrogates.
Repetition doesn’t make it any more true or reasonable. Neither does Trump’s commentary.
"Watch them start to choke like dogs," Trump said lightheartedly, according to Time. "Watch what happens. They are desperate for breath."
After Clapper initially paused, Trump said, "Ah, he's choking. Ah, look."
Classy.