Republican Senator Orrin Hatch, a man of supposed impeccable integrity and consistency . . . a man who claims to be a temple-recommended, full-tithe paying member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, has told America that he doesn’t care about the evidence presented in federal court by prosecutors in the Southern District of New York (SDNY) against Donald Trump.
In response to a CNN interviewer who asked about federal charges implicating Trump in directing Michael Cohen, Trump’s former attorney and ‘fixer’, to pay off Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal to make sure that voters in 2016 wouldn’t find out about affairs Trump allegedly had behind his wife’s back, Hatch said, “I don’t care. All I can say is he’s doing a good job as president.”
Hatch added, “I don’t think Trump was involved in crimes,” and then went on to say, “The Democrats will do anything to hurt this president. What happened before he was elected president is one thing, but since he’s been elected, the economy’s done well, our country is moving ahead. We’re in better shape than we were before he became president. And I think we ought to judge him on that basis.”
Would the honorable Republican senator from Utah have made those statements unless he had inside information to prove that a telephone conversation in which Trump directs Cohen to pay Daniels and McDougal was recorded by a Trump imposter?
Additionally, wouldn’t Hatch have had rock-solid evidence to prove that SDNY prosecutors are not public servants dedicated to fulfilling their oaths of office to uphold the rule of law but are in fact Democratic operatives who are using Cohen’s accusations to take down Trump . . . irrespective of what the truth might be?
Think about it . . . eighty-four-year-old Orrin Hatch, who will have been paid millions of taxpayer dollars to sit in the United States Senate for 42-years when he retires on January 3, 2019, doesn’t care about any accusation anyone might make despite some unnerving revelations about Trump’s moral compass.
Trump has dodged the draft, bragged about sexually assaulting women, laughed about surreptitiously watching beauty contestants undress, filed for multiple bankruptcies, defrauded thousands of Trump University students, encouraged violence against anyone who dares to disagree, cheered on cohorts who refuse to cooperate with law enforcement, and has consistently lied to the American people.
As a long-term senator and respected Republican leader trusted by his Utah constituents and others, is it not reasonable to assume that, despite those revelations about Trump, Hatch would have the rest of us not care either?
Good question . . . but wait a minute.
What would Hatch say if a Democratic president was accused of having committed a morally reprehensible crime, even if the economy was doing well?
Let me think.
Oh yeah. I just remembered that in 1998, when the Republican majority in the House of Representatives voted to impeach Bill Clinton for lying about having had an affair with Monica Lewinsky even though the economy was booming, Orrin Hatch, then the Republican chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said the following:
“Committing crimes of moral turpitude such as perjury and obstruction of justice go to the heart of qualification for public office. These offenses were committed by the chief executive of our country, the individual who swore to faithfully execute the laws of the United States.
“This great nation can tolerate a President who makes mistakes. But it cannot tolerate one who makes a mistake and then breaks the law to cover it up. Any other citizen would be prosecuted for these crimes.”
Oops . . . never mind.