There are, to put it mildly, a lot of technical details in and relating to the Mueller report. We’ve got the definitions of various crimes, the term “collusion” and its meaning, complicated legal questions about obstruction of justice, and of course a whole pile of redactions to sort through.
But while the technical legal analysis is fascinating, the most important conclusion from Mueller’s report has nothing to do with crimes. It has to do with patriotism.
Mueller’s report gives a detailed and damning timeline of how American citizens were attacked by intelligence agents of a hostile foreign power. Democratic Party servers were attacked and emails were selectively leaked to impugn their reputation. John Podesta was attacked — his personal correspondence was stolen and posted to the world. Election administrators were attacked — this is a direct attack on the institutions of American government. And thousands more were manipulated.
The Trump campaign may not have participated in this attack. But they knew. They knew that these Americans were going to be attacked. And they knew that Russia had been flirting with their campaign, promising illicitly obtained dirt on these Americans. At that point, the duty of any reasonable person — any patriotic American — would be to go to the FBI and report the attack. To do otherwise is to take the side of a foreign intelligence service against the United States, and is a betrayal of every ideal of patriotism and loyalty to one’s country that has ever been proclaimed.
This shouldn’t be a partisan issue. As much as some of us may have disagreed with John McCain, he would have gone to the FBI with this information in an instant. Indeed, he did, with the Steele dossier. Yet the Trump campaign instead chose to sell out to a foreign power for political gain. They hid the Russian contacts, continued to insist that they knew nothing, and despite their prior knowledge continued to feign innocence about the attacks.
Let me repeat: Donald Trump, and his campaign, took the side of a foreign intelligence agency as they attacked Americans.
Much is unclear about the Mueller report, but this is utterly indisputable. And it’s utterly damning.