15 February 2020

The Accused Confesses

One of the central planks in Donald Trump's defense during the whole Ukraine scandal investigation and his subsequent impeachment trial was his claim that he did not send his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani to Ukraine to dig up dirt on Joe Biden's son. Trump insisted Giuliani did this on his own and Trump had no idea what was going on.

On Thursday, however, Trump admitted that was a big fat lie (details here and here).

If the House was so inclined, they could now impeach him again because of his admission. And then Trump would be lacking a key component of his defense. For strategic reasons, of course, the House is extremely unlikely to impeach again without a marked increase in Trump's disapproval numbers. The President almost certainly knows this.

What he doesn't seem to know, however, is that he could still be prosecuted as a private citizen for his Ukraine-related crimes once he leaves office. And by blabbing out a confession now, he has just weakened a potential key element of his defense in a future criminal trial.

Trump has confessed before to his crimes like this, most notoriously in an interview with Lester Holt at NBC where he admitted to firing FBI Director James Comey because the latter had ordered investigations into his campaign and more.

This episode once again demonstrates how Trump cannot keep his mouth shut when there's a strategic reason to do so, even when it's to his own personal benefit. This is an extraordinary flaw in an American President, who out of necessity must remember to keep secret a wide variety of matters.

And, of course, Trump has blabbed critical national security secrets to friends, while speaking publicly, when meeting with foreign leaders, and during press interviews.

Putting aside all the self-dealing and lying and corruption, his total lack of discretion is reason enough that he should be soundly defeated at the ballot box in November. He's putting America's security and future at risk.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Speak up!