Perspective: Mueller’s biggest bombshell? Trump told the White House counsel to lie.
Former White House counsel Donald McGahn, leaves the Eisenhower Executive Office building next to the White House on Aug. 30, 2018. By Daniel Hemel Daniel Hemel is an assistant professor of law at the University of Chicago. April 19 at 2:25 PM President Trump ordered the top White House lawyer to lie to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III. That is one difficult-to-escape conclusion of Mueller’s 448-page report, released to the public in redacted form Thursday.
Trump’s order to McGahn to carry out a coverup is the biggest bombshell in a report full of damning disclosures. Mueller’s analysis of that episode is the closest that the special counsel comes to concluding that the president committed obstruction of justice. It’s certainly one of the lowest points of a presidency that has stooped to many lows. And it should be the focal point of media coverage and congressional investigations in the coming days, weeks and months.
McGahn rebuffed the president every time, but that does not exonerate Trump. An unsuccessful attempt to obstruct justice is obstruction, nonetheless. Nor can Trump plausibly argue that his order to McGahn was facetious. Trump did not tell McGahn to lie just one time. Instead, he issued this instruction on four separate occasions — three times through others, once directly.
In other instances of potential obstruction outlined in the special counsel’s report, the facts remain murky or the president could conceivably claim that his motives were not corrupt. For example, it’s unclear whether the president tacitly told his longtime attorney and fixer Michael Cohen to lie to Congress. Likewise, it’s at least arguable that Trump fired James B.
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