Good afternoon. Here's that constitutional crisis everyone has been warning you about.
On Monday, Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee not only abruptly closed their investigation into potential conspiracy between the Donald Trump campaign and Russia, but they followed within minutes by issuing a summary on a report that they handily wrote in advance. Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan immediately backed their play by issuing documents from the committee. Neither of these actions went through normal procedures. Neither of them was subject to any kind of vote. Neither of them was ever seen by Democrats on the committee before they were released to the public.
In doing so, Republicans in the House ensured Donald Trump that they were on his side. Not just that they would take no action should he face any charges, but that they would actively participate in a cover-up in support of Trump. They sounded a bell, clear and loud, that they’re not playing around. Just like Trump, they’re tired of following traditions, and rules, and laws. And they don’t care who knows it.
House Republicans may have the power to prevent important facts about President Trump and Russia from coming to public light. But here’s what they don’t have the power to do: prevent important facts about their own conduct on Trump’s behalf from coming to public light.
Make no mistake about it: Republicans aren’t just failing to find fault with Trump. They’re joining him in conspiracy. Because the ammunition they’ve provided to Trump goes directly against the evidence they’ve seen and takes the form of a permit that allows Trump to dismiss any challenge. If the expected purge of Trump’s remaining cabinet includes Jefferson Sessions and/or Rod Rosenstein, it will be because Trump has a nice “nothing to see here” permit issued by Devin Nunes and Paul Ryan. One that invites him to dismiss Robert Mueller at his pleasure.
Democrats in the House are doing their best to show what Republicans are covering up for Trump.
But so long as Republicans have control, Trump can act without consequence. And he is.
But here’s the real point to understand about this minority report: It will detail all the investigative avenues that House Republicans declined to take — the interviews that they didn’t conduct, and the leads that they didn’t try to chase down and verify. And Schiff confirmed that the report will include new facts — ones that have not been made public yet — that Republicans didn’t permit to influence their conclusions.
Based on what’s already in the public, and without a moment of speculation, we know that the Trump campaign was aware that the Russians had stolen emails from Democratic officials months before that information was made clear to the public—and before even the people from whom it was stolen were aware of the theft. We know that the Russians offered to make this material available to Donald Trump’s campaign. We know that the top officials of Trump’s campaign met with Russian representatives specifically to discuss this material. We know that the material was given to WikiLeaks for distribution. We know that WikiLeaks was in secret communication with members of the Trump campaign. And we know that the Trump campaign not only used the WikiLeaks material in ads, statements, and rallies, but that both members of the campaign and Trump’s IT team made an outreach to WikiLeaks to get advanced notice of upcoming material and coordinate strategy.
That’s a conspiracy, from the moment material was stolen right through planning to use that stolen material in an attempt to defraud the American public. There’s no need to search for a missing link, because all the links are there. Republicans aren’t just pretending they can not see these steps, they’re trying to roll back the clock all the way to “the Russians weren’t trying to help Trump.”
While Devin Nunes and Paul Ryan have thrown Donald Trump the biggest possible life preserver, they’ve also destroyed any illusion that the House was engaged in meaningful investigation, or that they ever had any intention other than protecting Trump at every turn.
Schiff had previously said the committee has discovered “ample evidence” of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. …
Schiff told me the minority report would set forth new facts not yet made public that will contradict the House GOP conclusions on both those fronts. He said he expected the GOP’s report to be “a far longer version of the Nunes memorandum that will omit key material facts and misrepresent others in order to tell the president’s political narrative.”
Schiff will not just reveal new evidence of collusion, he will detail the lengths Republicans went to in their effort to not find anything that could be used against Trump. That includes not interviewing campaign chairman Paul Manafort, and allowing Manafort’s replacement, Steve Bannon, to give only single word answers to a list of questions he created for himself.
Having already seen the Republican tactics firsthand with Nunes’ infamous memo and its attempt to edit and distort normal procedure to turn critical evidence against Trump into an attack on the FBI, Schiff knows what to expect.
“We will be presenting evidence of collusion, some of which is in the public domain and apparent to everyone willing to see it, and other facts that have not yet come to public light,” Schiff told me. “I fully expect that the majority will omit many of these facts in its report and mischaracterize others.”
On Tuesday, Republicans will finally allow Democrats to see a draft of the report that they wrote in advance of hearing testimony. And then they will release it, in pure disregard for the evidence.
And Donald Trump will be relieved of any niggling concern that someone out there might do something that would interfere with his lining his pockets, and with his friends lining their pockets, and with the regulatory function of government being gutted.
If you were wondering what Republicans would do about an impending blue wave that threatens to sweep them out of the office in November, this is what they will do. They’ll not just cover up conspiracy, they’ll participate. They’ll not just fight against their being any consequence to conspiracy, they’ll invite more.
Because who knows who might need a little help in the fall.