WASHINGTON: He does not want Americans to see the full, unredacted Mueller Report on Russian interference in U.S elections although he claims it absolves him. He does not want to the public to see his tax records and has gone to extraordinary legal lengths to withhold them although he says he has nothing to hide. He does not want his aides and cabinet members testifying before Congress despite their constitutional obligation to do so. On top of everything, he talks of serving beyond his normal term and has suggested he will not accept any election result that does not give him a second term.
The face-off between Democrats who control the US Congress and a President who believes in untrammeled White House authority took another dangerous turn on Wednesday with President Trump asserting “executive privilege” to deny American lawmakers access to the full Mueller report subpoenaed by them. The White House move came shortly before the Democrat-led House Judiciary Committee met to vote to hold Attorney General William Barr in contempt for failing to provide the full Mueller report that they say is their right to review.
Barr last month released a redacted, 448-page version of the Mueller report that found no conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia, while affirming interfered in the 2016 election. But it also identified 10 instances of possible obstruction of justice by Trump while kicking the can over to the Congress to act on them.
But the White House argued that Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler and his Democrat associates were trying to “redo” the Mueller investigation to distract the country from the booming economy.“Faced with Chairman Nadler’s blatant abuse of power, and at the Attorney General’s request, the President has no other option than to make a protective assertion of ,” the White House said. “Neither the White House nor Attorney General Barr will comply with Chairman Nadler’s unlawful and reckless demands.”
The rebuke enraged Democrats, who have so far been divided over whether to impeach Trump. It appeared push the party further towards impeaching the President, with party leader and House Speaker , who was initially reluctant to go down the impeachment route because she believes it will only help Trump in the election, saying the President’s words and actions were now leading to “self-impeachment.” Nadler on his part called the White House rebuff unprecedented, saying if allowed to go unchecked, it would mean the end of congressional oversight, a cherished American ideal.
Republicans though rallied behind Trump in what has now become a deeply partisan Congress.
The spat over accessing the uncensored Mueller report, which some Democrats suspect contains more than was revealed, came even as Trump continued to stall scrutiny over his financial affairs, terming efforts to probe into his past record a witch-hunt. However, that ongoing fracas was further ignited by the New York Times accessing ten years of Trump’s tax record from the 1980s showing that he had declared losses amounting to more than $ 1 billion.
The suggestion that he was not all that successful a businessman as he boasted sent Trump into the usual rage. Terming the report that his businesses lost more than $1 billion from 1985 to 1994 “highly inaccurate,” Trump argued that the losses were “non monetary,” and real estate developers like him during that period were entitled to take “massive write offs and depreciation” for tax purposes
“You always wanted to show losses for tax purposes” and “renegotiate with banks,” Trump tweeted, calling it a “sport.”
To some critics, such an admission, and calling it a sport, was tantamount to gaming the system. But Trump’s Republican faithful were steadfast behind the President. Recent polls show that he has lost very little support among his base, causing some pundits to wonder if Democrats should waste any energy at all in trying to reason with Trump voters in Middle America to whom he can do no wrong, and even if he does, they will continue to support him because of their deep antipathy to the traditional establishment.
Republican lawmakers are so much in thrall of Trump’s hold on the electorate in Middle America that even those leery of his personality and his dealings have fallen in line. Republican leader for instance declared “case closed” with regards to the Mueller Report and asked Democrats to move on, despite the American public and its Representatives not knowing the full contents of the report except what Trump and his aides have put out.
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