The real reason Trump wants to throw Sessions over the side
Donald Trump wants to fire Attorney General Jeff Sessions – it kills two birds with one stone. How? Let’s look at the back story.
- There’s that whole Sessions Russia recusal thing.
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Monday that President Trump is “very disappointed” by Attorney General Jeff Sessions‘s decision to recuse himself from investigations pertaining to Russia.
“I think the president has been extremely clear about his position, I know I’ve answered this question a number of times over the last week,” Sanders told reporters aboard Air Force One. “He’s very disappointed that Attorney General Sessions chose to recuse himself, and there’s not much more to add.”
- There were also these tweets:
So why aren’t the Committees and investigators, and of course our beleaguered A.G., looking into Crooked Hillarys crimes & Russia relations?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 24, 2017
Attorney General Jeff Sessions has taken a VERY weak position on Hillary Clinton crimes (where are E-mails & DNC server) & Intel leakers!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 25, 2017
Problem is that the acting head of the FBI & the person in charge of the Hillary investigation, Andrew McCabe, got $700,000 from H for wife!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 25, 2017
- There was that rumor that Trump was contemplating the replacement of Sessions with Rudy Giuliani.
President Trump is so unhappy with Attorney General Jeff Sessions that he has raised the possibility of bringing back Rudolph Giuliani to head the Justice Department, according to West Wing confidants.
- In internal conversations, Trump has recently pondered the idea of nominating Giuliani, a stalwart of his campaign.
- Even before last week’s blast at Sessions in a New York Times interview, Trump had expressed fury at Sessions — also one of the first prominent Republicans to back the Trump campaign — for recusing himself from the Russia investigation.
- And in a Monday morning tweet, Trump referred to “our beleaguered A.G.” not investigating Hillary Clinton.
Our thought bubble: Trump often muses about possible personnel moves that he never makes, sometimes just to gauge the listener’s reaction. So the Giuliani balloon may go nowhere.
- Here is another reason that “balloon” has already gone full Hindenburg:
Trump ally and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani swatted away rumorsthat he was being considered to replace Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Monday, and contradicted the President by saying Sessions was right to recuse himself from matters related to the 2016 campaign and Russian meddling therein.
Sessions, Giuliani told CNN, “made the right decision under the rules of the Justice Department.”
- Therefore, it’s time to launch another blimp:
Among the names being floated as possible Sessions replacements are Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) and former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, according to people familiar with the conversations. …
In a statement released late Monday, Cruz said he is “deeply gratified that we have a principled conservative like Jeff Sessions serving as Attorney General. The stories being reported in the media tonight are false. My focus is and will remain on fighting every day to defend 28 million Texans in the U.S. Senate.”
In other words, Cruz would love the job.
- One last tweet for your contemplation:
Jared Kushner did very well yesterday in proving he did not collude with the Russians. Witch Hunt. Next up, 11 year old Barron Trump!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 25, 2017
Yesterday, Kushner brought his “I am not a crook” “I did not collude with that woman, Miss Veselnitskaya” song-and-dance to a closed-door hearing in which he was questioned by senior aides to the Senate Intelligence Committee.
How much trouble is Jared in? Big trouble.Overhanging Jared Kushner when he testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Monday was the threat of criminal prosecution – for alleged past behavior and for perjury if he purposefully misleads Congress.
The decision whether to prosecute rests with the Special Counsel, the Justice Department, and possibly the President (think: pardons).
Another remedy for some of Kushner’s alleged misdeeds is revocation of his security clearances, and that decision too is in the hands of the Executive Branch and the President.
But Congress may have its own supreme power available—impeachment.
Trump will not be able to stop Congressional probes. If Trump is still in office at the end of 2018, Dems will likely take back the House and show no mercy to Donald.
More urgently, Trump – quite rightly, for once – sees Mueller as an existential threat not merely to his so-called presidency but his money.
Trump would love to ram a new AG candidate, one who would give Mueller the boot and launch yet another redundant “investigation” of Hillary, through the Senate. Hillary remains the ideal shiny object to dangle before America’s reactionary, sexist, believe-anything-Limbaugh-Sean-and-Donald says demographic. By going after Hillary yet again, Trump’s base would be mollified, the mainstream media would distracted from Russiagate, and chaos would once again reign.
Better yet for the hard-right and American oligarchs, Trump would erode – if not outright destroy – the political neutrality of the Justice Department, using it as his “enforcer” to settle petty, personal beefs in an outright abuse of power. His fanboys would be fine with that, and it’s possible the corrupt, billionaire-owned, Republican-controlled Congress would not lift a finger to intercede.
