‘First Time Mr. Trump Is Known to Have Tried to Fire the Special Counsel’
President Donald Trump ordered the firing of Special Counsel Robert Mueller last June, but backed down after White House Counsel Don McGahn threatened to quit if Trump went through with it, accoerding to a just-published report by The New York Times.
“The West Wing confrontation marks the first time Mr. Trump is known to have tried to fire the special counsel. Mr. Mueller learned about the episode in recent months as his investigators interviewed current and former senior White House officials in his inquiry into whether the president obstructed justice,” The Times adds.
Trump believed Mueller had three conflicts of interest that would have made it OK to fire him over.
“First, he claimed that a dispute years ago over fees at Trump National Golf Club in Sterling, Va., had prompted Mr. Mueller, the F.B.I. director at the time, to resign his membership,” The Times reports. “The president also said Mr. Mueller could not be impartial because he had most recently worked for the law firm that previously represented the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. Finally, the president said, Mr. Mueller had been interviewed to return as the F.B.I. director the day before he was appointed special counsel in May.”
Frequent MSNBC guest and editor of the popular Lawfare blog Benjamin Wittes responds to this news:
Former CIA Officer and former independent presidential candidate:
Former U.S. Attorney who Trump did fire:
Former DOJ chief spokesperson:
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