Trump appears to be hellbent on doing whatever it takes to obstruct Mueller’s investigation – even if it means getting someone killed.
Trump launched a public venting on Sunday about the special counsel’s investigation, demanding that the Department of Justice open an investigation into whether the “FBI/DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the Trump Campaign for Political Purposes.”
I hereby demand, and will do so officially tomorrow, that the Department of Justice look into whether or not the FBI/DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the Trump Campaign for Political Purposes – and if any such demands or requests were made by people within the Obama Administration!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 20, 2018
The Washington Post reported that: “The tweet seemed to be a response to recent reports about the FBI using a longtime intelligence asset to advance its investigation into Russian election meddling. Trump and his allies have seized on the use of the asset to claim that the FBI has spied on his campaign.”
Explaining that it would be unprecedented for Trump to order an investigation into the investigation of his campaign, The Washington Post warned that Trump’s demand “could presage more important developments,” that it could put the FBI informant’s life at risk.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) has sought documents on the FBI’s use of the asset and, so far, has been rebuffed by Justice Department leaders, who worry that exposing the source or the source’s work could put him in danger. The FBI had been working over the past two weeks to mitigate the potential damage if the asset’s identity were revealed, according to several people familiar with the matter. [emphasis added]
Indeed, last Friday Democratic Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, warned that to force the identity of the source “would be at best irresponsible, and at worst potentially illegal.
Continuing, he tweeted that: “Publicly outing a source risks not only their life, but the lives of every American, because when sources are burned it makes it that much harder for every part of the intelligence community to gather intelligence on those who wish to do us harm.” [emphasis added]
It would be at best irresponsible, and at worst potentially illegal, for members of Congress to use their positions to learn the identity of an FBI source for the purpose of undermining the ongoing investigation into Russian interference in our election.
— Mark Warner (@MarkWarner) May 18, 2018
Warner also tweeted a link to an article by The Washington Post that discussed the risk of such a move by Trump:
FBI Director Christopher A. Wray testified Wednesday [May 16] before a Senate Appropriations subcommittee that the FBI takes seriously its responsibilities to Congress but said the bureau also has important responsibilities to people who provide information to agents.
“The day that we can’t protect human sources is the day the American people start becoming less safe,” Wray said. “Human sources in particular who put themselves at great risk to work with us and with our foreign partners have to be able to trust that we’re going to protect their identities and in many cases their lives and the lives of their families.”
The source is a U.S. citizen who has provided information over the years to both the FBI and the CIA, as The Post previously reported, and aided the Russia investigation both before and after Mueller’s appointment in May 2017, according to people familiar with his activities. [emphasis added]
Indeed, The Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News reported on Sunday [May 20] that people may have already died as a result of Trump’s foreign policy blunders:
The sudden trashing of long-standing American policy objectives — like the Iran deal or delaying any move of the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem until a true Israel-Palestinian peace deal — risks war on large scale. People could die in the name of keeping 666 Fifth Ave. [Kushner organization high rise in NYC] and the Trump Organization afloat. Arguably, some already are [dying]. [emphasis added]
The Philidelphia Inquirer and Daily News also stated that Trump’s actions make those of Nixon pale by comparison:
What is beginning to take shape is the outlines of a scandal that threatens to be worse than Watergate on a massive scale, that would make Richard Nixon’s crimes truly seem like “a third-rate burglary” in comparison.
They concluded their article with the following warning:
It never should have gotten to this point. The political pundits are still busy debating whether Trump impeachment is a good fall political strategy for the Democrats or a losing hand. But things have already moved way beyond that. If we’re at the point where we can tolerate soliciting foreign governments for help in a presidential election, using stolen data, reality-bending psychological warfare and voter suppression of blacks to win, a president and his son-in-law senior adviser profiting from deals while sitting in the White House, slush funds to pay off mistresses and God knows what else, and then making life-or-death decisions based on all of these utterly corrupt things, then the United States is not a country anymore. How much worse does the worst political scandal in American history have to get before the people who actually can do something wake up and do something? [emphasis added]
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