It was only a matter of time after the Buzzfeed News story implicating Trump in the crime of obstruction of justice by directing his attorney to lie to Congress before Trump would have to tweet damning statements about it. After several morning tweets about Nancy Pelosi and the dangers of a migrant caravan, Trump finally couldn’t take it anymore. He had to show his hand, and it wasn’t a very good one.
If Trump’s best defense for the story is that Michael Cohen is a liar and his father-in-law is a criminal that Cohen is turning state’s evidence for in order to reduce his own criminal sentence as well as trying to get his wife’s father out of trouble, it’s a very bad defense. The Buzzfeed News article shows quite clearly that Cohen was not the source and that Cohen’s testimony is not the main source of proof that Trump obstructed justice.
‘The special counsel’s office learned about Trump’s directive for Cohen to lie to Congress through interviews with multiple witnesses from the Trump Organization and internal company emails, text messages, and a cache of other documents. Cohen then acknowledged those instructions during his interviews with that office.’
All Cohen did was confirm that the people who worked for Trump were telling the truth, which had already been proven through emails, text messages, and other documents. If Cohen had denied it to prosecutors, he would have been charged with yet another lie. There was already evidence to prove that he would have been lying.
Trump’s immediate pivot to the government shutdown and the border wall is just more evidence that the current crisis our country faces due to Trump’s shutdown has nothing to do with border security or a national emergency. It’s a deflection. Trump knew this story was getting out of control, that Mueller’s investigation was getting closer to the end, and that Democrats in the House were going to uncover more than he wanted them to.
What better way to redirect focus than to shut down the government, using federal workers as pawns in the media attention game?
Twitter was uninterested in Trump’s lies and deflection. They got the point of the Buzzfeed News story and let Trump know about it. Read some of their comments below:
Featured image via Flickr by Gage Skidmore under a Creative Commons license
