Rudy Giuliani, the president’s lawyer, said in an interview that Mr. Trump had urged Mr. McGahn to cooperate “because the president is confident that he’ll just tell the truth, and the truth reveals the situation in which the president didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Did he provide anything harmful? The answer is no he didn’t,” Mr. Giuliani said. Mr. Giuliani said if he himself were to interview with Mr. Mueller, “we’d be talking for three to four days. But there would be nothing in it that was harmful to the president.”
.. Last summer, while the investigation was under way, the president sought to fire Mr. Mueller, but backed off when Mr. McGahn said he would resign rather than carry out the order, a person familiar with the matter said.
.. Mr. McGahn was also on the receiving end of a warning in April to the president from Attorney General Jeff Sessions not to fire his deputy, Rod Rosenstein, who is overseeing the Mueller investigation. Mr. Sessions told Mr. McGahn that he would consider resigning if Mr. Trump fired his deputy, according to a person familiar with the message.
.. Mr. McGahn was also involved in conversations with the president as Mr. Trump moved to fire Mr. Comey in May 2017. Days before the firing, Mr. Trump dressed down Mr. McGahn and Steve Bannon, his chief strategist at the time, over Mr. Sessions’ decision to recuse himself from the Russia investigation two months earlier.
.. He is widely expected to leave the White House if and when Brett Kavanaugh, Mr. Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court vacancy, is confirmed.
.. Mr. McGahn urged other members of the White House Counsel’s Office to use his attorney, according to a person familiar with the matter, a move that left the impression he wanted to ensure his office colleagues gave consistent accounts.
You can tell who Trump is through the company he keeps
what the trial reveals is something very damning, in the ethical if not legal sense: namely, what kind of people Trump surrounds himself with.
There was no secret about Manafort’s record as an influence-peddler on behalf of corrupt dictators and oligarchs when he went to work for Trump. On April 13, 2016, Bloomberg columnist Eli Lake wrote a prescient article headlined: “Trump Just Hired His Next Scandal.” Trump couldn’t have cared less. His whole career, he has surrounded himself with sleazy characters such as the Russian-born mob associate Felix Sater, who served prison time for assault and later pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges, as well as lawyer-cum-fixer Michael Cohen, who is reportedly under investigation for a variety of possible crimes, including tax fraud.
.. These are the kind of people Trump feels comfortable around, because this is the kind of person Trump is. He is, after all, the guy who paid $25 million to settle fraud charges against him from students of Trump University. The guy who arranged for payoffs to a Playboy playmate and a porn star with whom he had affairs. The guy who lies an average of 7.6 times a day.
.. And because everyone knows what kind of person Trump is, he attracts kindred souls. Manafort and Gates are only Exhibits A and B. There is also Exhibit C: Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.), the first member of Congress to endorse Trump, is facing federal charges of conspiracy, wire fraud and false statements as part of an alleged insider-trading scheme. Exhibit D is Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who has been accused by Forbes magazine, hardly an anti-Trump rag, of bilking business associates out of $120 million.
.. In fairness, not all of Trump’s associates are grifters. Some are simply wealthy dilettantes like Trump himself
.. Among the affluent and unqualified appointees Trump has set loose on the world are his son-in-law Jared Kushner and his former lawyer, Jason Greenblatt, who are somehow supposed to solve an Israeli-Palestinian dispute that has frustrated seasoned diplomats for decades. No surprise: Their vaunted peace plan remains MIA.
.. ProPublica has a mind-boggling scoop about another group of dilettantes — a Palm Beach doctor, an entertainment mogul, and a lawyer — whom Trump tasked as an informal board of directors to oversee the Department of Veterans Affairs. None has any experience in the U.S. military or government; their chief qualification was that they are all members of Trump’s golf club, Mar-a-Lago.
.. Beyond the swindlers and dilettantes, there is a third group of people who have no business working for Trump or any other president: the fanatics. The most prominent of the extremists was Stephen K. Bannon, the notorious “alt-right” leader who was chief executive of Trump’s campaign and a senior White House aide. He may be gone, but others remain. They include Peter Navarro, who may well be the only economist in the world who thinks trade wars are a good thing; Stephen Miller, the nativist who was behind plans to lock immigrant children in cages and bar Muslims from entering the United States, and who is now plotting to reduce legal immigration; and Fred Fleitz, the Islamophobic chief of staff of the National Security Council. They feel at home in the White House because, aside from being a grifter and a dilettante, Trump is also an extremist with a long history of racist, sexist, nativist, protectionist and isolationist utterances
Steve Bannon’s New Political Order: Christianity, Capitalism, and Nationalism
At CPAC, Steve Bannon spoke of a ‘new political order’ emerging. What is this new political order? What is Bannonism, and how does it relate to Trumpism? Join me as we explore the political philosophy of Trump’s most trusted adviser.
- Capitalism
- Nationalism
- Christianity
Bannon: The 20th century was a conflict between Christianity and Atheism.
Enlightenment Free-market capitalism benefited one’s neighbors
Beginning in 1960-70, an narcissistic Baby Boomer generation took over, and moved towards socialism
Values: Globalism, Secularization, Sexualization
Occurs on coasts.
Does not see free-traders about conservative because it pushes people towards transnationalism
Rural-based blowback against urbanized globalism.
Envisions a “Third Way”: Christian Traditionalism
Christian values are indispensable to reining in capitalism to prevent narcissistic culture.
How do we protect this? By keeping out people who do not share our Christian values.
Nationalism is inclusive as long as they are willing to protect and perpetuate enlightened capitalism guided by Christian sentiments.
Trump’s worst political nightmare? Democrats with subpoena power
While some Democrats have pressed for Trump’s impeachment, what would be certain is that Democratic committee chairs would swamp Trump and his deputies with subpoenas, document requests and public hearings that would bog down his administration and distract from his agenda ahead of the 2020 elections.
Already, congressional Democrats have amassed dozens of oversight requests targeting the White House, various Cabinet departments and private entities with business ties to Trump and his family.
.. Some outside Trump advisers have mused in recent days that losing the House would be a political disaster but saw a silver lining in the possibility that Democrats would veer left next year and be a foil for Trump
.. “There is a never-ending stream of outrage,” said Scott Jennings, a Republican political consultant who served in the final three years of the Bush White House. “The only difference is, now all of their outrage is directed at Twitter. But when you give somebody a gavel, they can actually hurt you.”
.. Their mission would be to stop the EPA or any other regulatory agency from just functioning, basically, until they can regain power.”
.. it was difficult not to contemplate the possibilities that would come with not only subpoena power, but also a much larger staff and investigative budget.
.. Since Trump took office, Oversight Committee Republicans have blocked more than 50 Democratic subpoena requests ranging from
- documents pertaining to the administration’s health-care policies to
- information on the government’s use of chartered airplanes to
- a demand for testimony from former Trump strategist Stephen K. Bannon.
.. would also scrutinize policy issues such as
- prescription drug prices,
- postal reform and
- preparations for the 2020 Census.
.. Unlike the partisan congressional probes into Bush and Obama, which focused mainly on alleged missteps by subordinates, Democrats are primed to put the president himself in the investigative crosshairs
.. For one, Democrats would be able to inspect Trump’s federal income tax returns for the first time — a trove that they have long demanded but Republicans have shown no interest in obtaining. Under federal law, any tax return can be examined by the chairman of any of the three congressional tax committees.
.. Other information regarding Trump’s personal finances and business dealings could also be subject to Democrats’ prying eyes. They could include rosters of hotel clients and members of Trump golf and social clubs, as well as details of real estate deals that his companies have participated in.
.. requests for information on the response to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico last year, as well as Trump’s controversial border policies.
Four Democratic senators on Thursday requested a Pentagon investigation into whether the White House improperly offered tours of Air Force One to members of Trump’s private Mar-a-Lago Club in Florida.