Trump Attorney McGahn Told Mueller : "I never witnessed a single instance of Trump straying beyond the legitimate powers of his office"

THE NEW YORK TIMES TRIED TO DEEP SIX TRUMP AND McGAHN. But, Newt Gingrich explains it. • • • NEWT GINGRICH, A TRUE TRUMP FRIEND. Fox News published an article on Monday that every conservative should keep and read once a week. In the article, Newt explains why special counsel Mueller has made a fatal mistake. Here are excerpts fro, Newt's analysis : "New York Times reports that White House counsel Don McGahn is cooperating extensively with special counsel Robert Mueller. There is now no excuse for Special Counsel Robert Mueller to ask to interview President Trump. In fact, it is now clear the investigators have been given so much information about the President’s actions and had such remarkably open access, they should just close shop and write their final report. They no longer have any grounds for going to court to get a subpoena to compel the President to testify. Mueller’s fatal mistake was revealed Saturday in The New York Times story titled, “White House Counsel, Don McGahn, Has Cooperated Extensively in Mueller Inquiry.” Michael Schmidt and Maggie Haberman reported that there were at least 30 hours of interviews between the Mueller team and the White House Counsel. Don McGahn asserted throughout the interviews that 'he never saw Mr. Trump go beyond his legal authorities.' McGahn’s cooperation is historically unique because President Trump waived both executive privilege and attorney-client privilege. President Trump was so confident of his innocence that he waived both of these protections to allow the Special Counsel to thoroughly question the White House attorney. We are now at the end of the failed investigation....McGahn is a very widely-respected lawyer, who thoroughly understands the difference between legal and illegal behavior -- and he was in the room for virtually all of President Trump’s activities. It couldn’t be more clear : The Trump White House was comfortable talking for 30 hours with a pack of high-powered, very tough-minded investigators, because the President has done nothing wrong." • Newt Gingrich then lays out Mueller's abuses : "Nevertheless, at every stage, Mueller has conducted an aggressive, one-sided, and increasingly irresponsible, investigation. Mueller was brought in to seek the truth about whether there was collusion between the Donald Trump campaign and Russians to impact the 2016 election. His first step down the road of abusive aggressiveness was to hire a completely partisan team of mostly Democrat attorneys....He could have avoided hiring lawyers who had worked for Hillary Clinton or gone to the Clinton election night party. Instead he hired totally biased opponents of Trump -- who want to take down the President....Mueller’s second step down the road was to find accusations that had nothing to do with the election, the Russians, or a question of collusion. Look at the outrageous abuse of Paul Manafort. Manafort had been campaign chairman. He had ties with foreign businessmen. He had done extensive business in Ukraine. I’m sure the Mueller team believed if anyone was the obvious entry point for collusion, it would have been Manafort. Yet, they found nothing. Let me repeat this, because it is so ignored by the daily media headlines : The Mueller team found no evidence of Manafort colluding with any foreign entities on the 2016 election. Manafort is being tried over tax and banking issues that have nothing to do with Russian collusion or any election. In fact, the Manafort trial is a case study in how a ruthless prosecutor can use the power of the state to intimidate and punish an individual. Manafort and his wife were awakened in their pajamas in pre-dawn hours by FBI agents conducting a raid on their residence -- even though the previous day Manafort had been cooperating with the Senate’s investigative body. Furthermore, there was no evidence Manafort represented any danger of violence or flight. The early morning attack was designed to frighten Manafort and send a signal to other potential witnesses to cooperate -- or else. An extraordinary abuse of power was displayed through Mueller’s holding of Manafort in solitary confinement in a cell for 23 hours a day as he awaited trial. This level of deprivation is astonishing when done to an American citizen, who has committed no violent crimes and has not been convicted of anything. Again, it is an effort to intimidate and coerce. Mueller also understands that every person he goes after has to hire lawyers, spend their lifetime savings, and potentially end up deeply in debt to simply protect themselves from government lawyers who could potentially put them in prison." • Next concludes : "Now, we are at the end of the failed investigation. With McGahn’s 30 hours of testimony, it is clear there is no evidence of President Trump either colluding with the Russians or engaging in illegal obstruction of justice. Saturday’s New York Times story should be the end of the story. No sitting President has the time for distractions as big as the Mueller investigation absent the showing of a compelling need -- the most important element of which is that any information President Trump has cannot be derived from some other source. President Trump has not invoked any privilege and has permitted complete access to his White House Counsel, as well as others. Mueller can no longer even come close to meeting the compelling need standard. As such, it is time to shut the investigation down and allow the president to do what Americans hired him to do -- focus on making America great again. Continuing to draw out this partisan investigation only serves to confirm what most Americans now understand – it had no basis in law or fact. Mueller should write his report to Congress and return to his retirement." • • • THE NEW YORK TIMES ARTICLE. The New York Times article titled "White House Counsel, Don McGahn, Has Cooperated Extensively in Mueller Inquiry" was written by Michael Schmidt and Maggie Haberman and published last Friday. It begins with a smear : "Donald F. McGahn II, the White House counsel. For a lawyer to share so much with investigators scrutinizing his client is unusual, but Mr. McGahn views his role as protecting the presidency, not the President." As if any "sharing" would necessarily condemn Trump. The NYT says : "The White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, has cooperated extensively in the special counsel investigation, sharing detailed accounts about the episodes at the heart of the inquiry into whether President Trump obstructed justice, including some that investigators would not have learned of otherwise, according to a dozen current and former White House officials and others briefed on the matter. In at least three voluntary interviews with investigators that totaled 30 hours over the past nine months, Mr. McGahn described the President’s fury toward the Russia investigation and the ways in which he urged Mr. McGahn to respond to it. He provided the investigators examining whether Mr. Trump obstructed justice a clear view of the President’s most intimate moments with his lawyer. Among them were Mr. Trump’s comments and actions during the firing of the FBI director, James B. Comey, and Mr. Trump’s obsession with putting a loyalist in charge of the inquiry, including his repeated urging of Attorney General Jeff Sessions to claim oversight of it. Mr. McGahn was also centrally involved in Mr. Trump’s attempts to fire the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, which investigators might not have discovered without him." More innuendo and smear -- Trump never tried to "fire" Mueller, but if the President was in a "fury," we can certainly understand why -- he was and is being railroaded for actions that exist only in the demented minds of the Democrat Party and its junkyard dog Mueller and his staff. • But, the NYT got one thing right : "For a lawyer to share so much with investigators scrutinizing his client is unusual. Lawyers are rarely so open with investigators, not only because they are advocating on behalf of their clients but also because their conversations with clients are potentially shielded by attorney-client privilege, and in the case of presidents, executive privilege....Mr. McGahn’s cooperation began in part as a result of a decision by Mr. Trump’s first team of criminal lawyers to collaborate fully with Mr. Mueller. The President’s lawyers have explained that they believed their client had nothing to hide and that they could bring the investigation to an end quickly." • The Times went off the rails again in suggesting that Trump and McGahn were at odds : "It is not clear that Mr. Trump appreciates the extent to which Mr. McGahn has cooperated with the special counsel. The President wrongly believed that Mr. McGahn would act as a personal lawyer would for clients and solely defend his interests to investigators, according to a person with knowledge of his thinking....Mr. McGahn['s lawyer said McGahn] had been obliged to cooperate with the special counsel. 'President Trump, through counsel, declined to assert any privilege over Mr. McGahn’s testimony, so Mr. McGahn answered the special counsel team’s questions fulsomely and honestly, as any person interviewed by federal investigators must'...”Asked for comment, the White House sought to quell the sense of tension. 'The President and Don have a great relationship,' the White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said in a statement. 'He appreciates all the hard work he’s done, particularly his help and expertise with the judges, and the Supreme Court' nominees. The President stressed that the White House had been cooperative with the investigation, tweeting on Saturday evening after this article was published that Mr. McGahn had been allowed to speak to the special counsel." • And, of course, the NYT had to toss in the Nixon affair : "Mr. McGahn’s relationship with the President soured as Mr. Trump blamed him for a number of fraught moments in his first months in office, including the existence of the special counsel’s inquiry. 'This sure has echoes of Richard Nixon’s White House counsel, John Dean, who in 1973 feared that Nixon was setting him up as a fall guy for Watergate and secretly gave investigators crucial help while still in his job,' said the historian Michael Beschloss. Mr. Trump’s lawyers still had a chance to keep Mr. McGahn’s insider knowledge from the special counsel. By exerting attorney-client privilege, which allows the President to legally withhold information, they would have gained the right to learn what Mr. McGahn planned to tell investigators and what he might reveal that could damage the president. But the President’s lawyers never went through that process, although they told people that they believed they still had the ability to stop Mr. Mueller from handing over to Congress the accounts of witnesses like Mr. McGahn and others. Mr. Mueller has told the President’s lawyers that he will follow Justice Department guidance that sitting Presidents cannot be indicted. Rather than charge Mr. Trump if he finds evidence of wrongdoing, he is more likely to write a report that can be sent to Congress for lawmakers to consider impeachment proceedings....Unencumbered, Mr. Burck [McGahn's own lawyer] and Mr. McGahn met the special counsel team in November for the first time and shared all that Mr. McGahn knew. To investigators, Mr. McGahn was a fruitful witness, people familiar with the investigation said. He had been directly involved in nearly every episode they are scrutinizing to determine whether the President obstructed justice. To make an obstruction case, prosecutors who lack a piece of slam-dunk evidence generally point to a range of actions that prove that the suspect tried to interfere with the inquiry. Mr. McGahn gave to Mr. Mueller’s investigators, the people said, a sense of the president’s mind-set in the days leading to the firing of Mr. Comey; how the White House handled the firing of the former national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn; and how Mr. Trump repeatedly berated Mr. Sessions, tried to get him to assert control over the investigation and threatened to fire him. Despite the Trump lawyers’ insistence that cooperation would help end the inquiry, the investigation only intensified as last year came to a close. Mr. Mueller had charged Mr. Trump’s former campaign chairman and his deputy and won guilty pleas and cooperation agreements from his first national security advisor [the infamous General Flynn case, in chich even the FBI says Flynn was telling the truth, although he was charged with lying to the FBI], and a campaign advisor....The White House has handed over more than one million documents and allowed more than two dozen administration officials to meet with Mr. Mueller in the belief that he would be forced to conclude there was no obstruction case." • The Times, perhaps inadvertently, gives the bottom line for the entire Mueller probe : “ 'It was an extraordinary cooperation -- more cooperation than in any major case -- no President has ever been more cooperative than this,' Mr. Dowd said, adding that Mr. Mueller knew as far back as October, when he received many White House documents, that the President did not break the law. As the months passed on, it became apparent that Mr. McGahn and Mr. Burck had overestimated the amount of thought that they believed the President put into his legal strategy. Rather than placing the blame on Mr. McGahn for possible acts of obstruction, Mr. Trump has yet to even meet with the special counsel, his lawyers resisting an invitation for an interview [such an interview would be for the sole purpose of accusing Trump of lying, just as the prosecutors had already accused Flynn]. Mr. McGahn is still the White House counsel, shepherding the President’s second Supreme Court nominee, Brett M. Kavanaugh, through the confirmation process. Mr. Mueller, armed with Mr. McGahn’s account, is still trying to interview witnesses close to the President. But the White House has a new lawyer for the investigation, Emmet T. Flood, who has strong views on privilege issues. When the special counsel asked to interview Mr. Kelly, Mr. Flood contested the request, rather than fully cooperate." • • • PRESIDENT TRUMP'S RESPONSE. It came just on Friday -- the day the NYT article was published, and it was a classic string of Trump tweets : "@realDonaldTrump. The failing @nytimes wrote a Fake piece today implying that because White House Councel Don McGahn was giving hours of testimony to the Special Councel, he must be a John Dean type “RAT.” But I allowed him and all others to testify - I didn’t have to. I have nothing to hide......I allowed White House Counsel Don McGahn, and all other requested members of the White House Staff, to fully cooperate with the Special Counsel. In addition we readily gave over one million pages of documents. Most transparent in history. No Collusion, No Obstruction. Witch Hunt!" • • • WHEN WILL THE DEEP STATE GIVE UP?? Townhall said it on Monday, while actually trying to inculpate President Trump : "The information McGahn shared with Mueller included testimony that was both 'potentially and favorable' to Trump; plus -- and this is no small thing -- he asserted that he never saw the President exceed his legal authority. In other words, as relayed over the course 30 hours of wide-ranging interviews with the special counsel, the most senior White House lawyer (who was present for all sorts of highly sensitive private discussions, presumably including a healthy dose of Trumpian candor) attests that he never witnessed a single instance of Trump straying beyond the legitimate powers of his office." Townhall goes on to note that the NYT article describes McGahn as : " 'a cooperative witness,' not a 'cooperating witness' as that term is often understood. Significant difference. Then there's this extremely relevant fact, which appears near the story's 30th paragraph : "Last fall, Mr. Mueller’s office asked to interview Mr. McGahn. To the surprise of the White House Counsel’s Office, Mr. Trump and his lawyers signaled that they had no objection, without knowing the extent of what Mr. McGahn was going to tell investigators. Mr. McGahn was stunned, as was Mr. Burck, whom he had recently hired out of concern that he needed help to stay out of legal jeopardy, according to people close to Mr. McGahn. Mr. Burck has explained to others that he told White House advisers that they did not appreciate the President’s legal exposure and that it was 'insane' that Mr. Trump did not fight a McGahn interview in court. Trump was fully aware of Mueller's request that McGahn subject himself to an interview, and agreed to it, even 'without knowing the extent of what Mr. McGahn was going to tell investigators.' " Townhall says : 'It's possible, as the piece suggests, that Trump didn't know exactly how much McGahn ended up speaking with the special counsel's office. But he absolutely knew that it was happening, and didn't try to prevent McGahn from fully cooperating. If the President were desperate to keep incriminating information out of Mueller's hands, it's hard to imagine that he'd green light his own White House Counsel to sit down for an unrestricted interview. Indeed, this approach was so permissive that it 'stunned' even McGahn." • So, the reality is that McGahn neither kept his actions secret from Trump, nor, apparently, did he 'turn on' his boss during the Mueller interviews. President Trump underscored this point on Twitter : "The failing @nytimes wrote a Fake piece today implying that because White House Counsel Don McGahn was giving hours of testimony to the Special Councel, he must be a John Dean type “RAT.” But I allowed him and all others to testify -- I didn’t have to. I have nothing to hide." • It is time to pull the plug in the Mueller special counsel charade. There is no good-guy-bureaucrat Cary Grant trying to save a naively innocent Audrey Hepburn here. There is only vitriole and hatred for a President whose sin / crime was to win an election by beating the socks off their darling Hillary. • American Thinker's Thomas Lifson told us on Monday that : "Alcee Hastings, a senior Democratic whip in the House of Representatives, and a prominent member of the Congressional Black Caucus, offered a threatening joke to a rally on Sunday. As the poor quality of the video embedded below attests, TV cameras were not there to record the event, and Hastings probably didn't expect the broader public to become aware of his incitement. Amber Athey of the Daily Caller : 'Hastings was speaking at a rally in Sunshine, Fla. when he repeated a joke he heard from Ari Silver, the son of former Florida state legislator Barry Silver. ('Collusion'? –T.L.) 'I will tell you one joke,' Hastings said. 'Do you know the difference between a crisis and a catastrophe? A crisis is if Donald Trump falls into the Potomac River and can't swim,' Hastings said, retelling the joke. 'And a catastrophe is anybody saves his ass.' The crowd cheered and whooped in delight at the joke.'....While specifically recommending against rescuing a dying Donald Trump, the joke makes the broader point that his death would be desirable. This is in effect incitement. Hastings, of course, does not belong in any position of prominence or trust, as he was impeached, convicted, and driven off the federal bench for soliciting a $150,000 bribe in return for leniency in the sentences of two mob-related felons. A criminal inciting violence against a President is embraced by the voters of his racially gerrymandered district, the Congressional Black Caucus, and the Democratic Party." It is seriously worrying. The physical threats against the President are becoming more direct and they reveal the hated that produces evil -- I have friends who truly worry, despite his Secret Service and personal security teams, about the President's safety. • But, President Trump has wide wings, it seems. Funny how being truthful and saying what you mean can produce those wings. In a recent Rasmussen poll, President Trump's approval rating in the black community is shown to have doubled since last year. The Rasmussen Reports poll released last week found that 36% of black voters approve of the President, which doubled from 19% a year ago. The President explained it back in January : "@realDonaldTrump. African American unemployment is the lowest ever recorded in our country. The Hispanic unemployment rate dropped a full point in the last year and is close to the lowest in recorded history. Dems did nothing for you but get your vote! #NeverForget. " Nationally, 49% of US voters approve of Trump's performance, while 41% disapprove, according to Rasmussen. The poll follows former White House aide, Omarosa Manigault-Newman's claims in her tell-all book, “Unhinged,” that she caught Trump saying the N-word “multiple times” on microphone, adding in her book that she had a “growing realization that Donald Trump was indeed a racist, a bigot and a misogynist.” • • • DEAR READERS, too bad for Amapola-Omarosa and the ProgDems -- this support level is much higher than Republican presidential candidates have received in the last 50 years -- the highest level of African American support was received by Richard Nixon in the 1972 election, in which he garnered 18% of the vote, according to national exit polls. Since then it declined significantly to a low of only 4% in 2008. Compare thie Trump polls to the poll numbers for the mainstream media. Public trust of media is at historic lows : Americans in a recent Gallup Poll say that 62% of traditional media is biased and 80% of social media is biased, and Americans say 44% of traditional news reporting is innacurate and 64% of social media reporting is innacurate. Americans say 39% of traditional news media reports contain misrepresentations, and 68% of social media reporting has misrepresentations. The Deep State and its ProgDem overlords detest President Trump. They want to destroy him. But, any fair analysis -- not something the ProgDems and Deep State do -- of the Russia investigation must consider the President's carte blanche to his White House Counsel Don McGahn to speak to Mueller and his ProgDem partisans as a powerful mark in his favor. The Mueller gang's McGahn interviews didn't put a glove on the President and neither did the New York Times. Americans know that. They are increasingly rallying to the President -- partly because, I am sure, Americans do not like to see innocent people being bullied or trashed. Add to that the widespread support for the President's successful economic and foreign policies, and his uncanny ability to talk to people directly as one of them and as a President who loves them and has only their best interests at heart -- a gift that cannot be faked. Trump, by his force of character and determination to succeed for America, turning the tide. The ProgDems, their junkyard dog Mueller, and the media that provides their propaganda hailstorm are losing. It is time for them to find a useful occupation. What about helping the President Make America Great Again?? As they say -- when Hell freezes over. But, that's the point, isn't it? Hell is freezing over and around the Progressive Democrats. American Thinker's Jack Rail wrote on Monday : "Perhaps half the country expects the Deep State, eventually, to openly take over the legitimate government of the United States and establish martial law, masking the intent of permanent dictatorship behind storms of words on the mainstream media. This, many believe, was Obama's original plan until he thought he could pass the baton to Hillary and let her weather the storm of opprobrium. Hillary was fine with this as long as she finally got to be boss." • It just isn't ever going to happen -- and certainly not on President Trump's watch.