Donald Trump has spent three days attacking Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, but the most senior Republican in Congress has remained noticeably silent amid growing GOP concerns the president may fire the prosecutor.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has yet to comment on Trump’s Twitter assault on Mueller, which culminated Monday in the president’s decision to hire a vocal critic of the special counsel as the newest member of his legal team.
Mitch McConnell
Republicans are privately alarmed that Trump may try to oust Mueller — a move that would risk setting off a constitutional crisis — but few have threatened specific consequences if the president does so.
McConnell will almost certainly face questions about Mueller at his weekly press conference Tuesday afternoon. To date, his approach has been to say as little as possible. But he needs to strike a complicated balance in light of Trump’s popularity among Republican voters and his toxicity among Democrats and independents, who could help Democrats win the House in congressional elections later this year.
Lawmakers took some comfort in statements from Trump attorney Ty Cobb and White House officials that Trump wasn’t planning to fire Mueller. But Trump continued to attack the investigation as a “witch hunt,” and he hired Joseph diGenova, a former federal prosecutor who has said Trump is the victim of a “brazen plot” by the FBI and the Justice Department. DiGenova also has repeatedly criticized the Trump appointee who oversees Mueller’s probe, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.
Undermining Mueller
Back in January, McConnell said he saw no need to pass proposed legislation to protect Mueller because he knew of no “official” White House effort to undermine him. That position is no longer tenable, some Democrats said.
“The presumption of that response has now been exploded by both the president and his lawyers,” said Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, a senior Democrat on the Judiciary Committee.
For one thing, the White House was slow to try to defuse Trump’s attacks on Mueller. It took more than 24 hours for Cobb to issue his statement saying Trump had no plans to fire the special counsel.
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DiGenova’s addition to Trump’s team is a signal that Trump’s lawyers don’t see the probe ending soon. It may also reflect growing dissatisfaction by Trump with his lawyers’ be-patient assurances that he should let the Mueller probe take its course.
Cobb had said since the summer that the investigation wouldn’t stretch beyond the end of 2017. Trump and his legal team have been cooperating with the Mueller probe so far and have been negotiating terms for Mueller to interview Trump.
Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona, perhaps Trump’s most prominent Republican critic in the Senate, said he hoped his party’s leaders would speak out for Mueller.
“I’ve always felt, and a lot of my colleagues have said privately, that’s the red line we can not cross,” Flake said Monday. “I hope that leadership stands up and is more forceful in saying, ‘Don’t go there.”’
A senior Republican senator said Monday evening that legislation to protect the special counsel isn’t necessary.
‘Straight Shooter’
“I know Mueller well and believe him to be a straight shooter, and I continue to believe that giving Mueller the time and support necessary to get to the bottom of things is in the best interest of all parties involved,” Orrin Hatch of Utah said in a statement. “My conversations with the White House have led him me to believe legislation is not necessary at this point because I do not believe the president would take such a foolish action.”
But Democratic Senator Ron Wyden said all lawmakers should speak out now.
“Every single member of Congress should regard this particular moment as one of the most important in their period of public service, because this is a fundamental question of American values,” he said Monday. “Are we going to secure the rule of law, or in effect are we just going to, you know, let the politics of raw power and brute force make these decisions?”
Legislation Sought
The attacks have alarmed a number of Senate Democrats, some of whom are pressing their colleagues not just for statements but also to back legislation.
Whitehouse said the attacks on Mueller should prompt a markup in the Judiciary Committee on legislation to protect Mueller’s job. Bipartisan bills requiring judicial oversight of any effort to fire a special counsel received a hearing on Sept. 26.
The Democratic sponsor of one of the bills, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, said he’s going to press hard this week for action — maybe even on the must-pass omnibus spending bill needed to keep the government open past Friday night.
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Democratic Senator Chris Coons of Delaware said he’ll also push for a bipartisan statement warning of consequences if Trump fires Mueller, noting that the president previously said he wasn’t about to oust Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, only to go ahead and fire him.
“Clearly stating to the president what the consequences would be, how seriously we would take that, is something I’m going to be working relentlessly on this week, and trying to find Republican partners willing to do that,” Coons said.
Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley has urged the proponents of the two bills aimed at preventing Mueller’s dismissal without cause to negotiate a compromise, according to Grassley spokesman George Hartmann.
“It appears that some recent progress has been made along these lines,” Hartmann said, but he added that “the constitutionality of legislation that affects the executive’s ability to appoint and remove members of the executive branch remains an important concern.”
The lead sponsors of the bills are Republican Senators Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, both of whom have reiterated their opposition to firing Mueller since Trump’s new attacks over the weekend.
No Bills Needed
The No. 2 Senate Republican leader, John Cornyn of Texas, said he doesn’t think lawmakers need to do anything yet because he doesn’t believe Trump will act.
“Obviously, legislation requires a presidential signature. I don’t see the necessity of picking that fight right now,” he said.
While conceding Trump’s attacks on Mueller aren’t helpful, Cornyn said the message has been sent to the president many times, formally and informally, that he shouldn’t fire Mueller.
But like most Republicans, he wouldn’t name a specific consequence Trump would face if he went ahead and did it anyway.
Democrats aren’t unanimous in their worries.
Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said she was heartened by seeing Republicans like House Oversight Chairman Trey Gowdy speaking out over the weekend against any effort to shut down the Mueller probe.
“I don’t think we need it,” she said of the legislation to protect Mueller. “I was listening to various comments even from Republicans like Trey Gowdy. And people felt very strongly it would be a major breach for the president to fire Mr. Mueller. I agree with that.”
‘Rip Apart’
Efforts to remove him “would rip apart this administration,” Feinstein predicted.
And Graham, who warned over the weekend that firing Mueller would be the beginning of the end of Trump’s presidency, says he’s not worried either.
“I have zero concerns that the president or his team is going to fire Bob Mueller,” he said. “Zero.”
If that did happen, he predicted Congress would step in and reinstate Mueller.
“If he got fired without cause, there would probably be an effort to reinstate him as an independent counsel,” he said, although it’s not clear whether such a push could overcome a presidential veto.
— With assistance by Laura Litvan, and Shannon Pettypiece
