https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/rudy-giuliani-trump-russia-collusion-crime-manafort-investigation-a8469741.html
Rudy thinks that perhaps colluding is not a crime.
From NBC:
National Review's Andrew McCarthy arguing on Fox News last week that there’s nothing necessarily wrong with the president’s political operation possibly having turned to a foreign adversary to help win an American election.
“Look, I don’t think that it’s bad if campaigns are turning to foreign governments for dirt. It’s not collusion, it’s not something that’s impeachable, it’s icky. But that’s what this is.”
All this time wasted claiming they never colluded when they could have just said this, instead.
Of course, this means that they have realized that the evidence is in that they did collude. But we should ignore that, as well as the pre-meeting strategy session that Rudy insists did not happen, but for which he indicates Rick Gates was in attendance.
A few points to be made here in response, outside of the obvious goal-post moving that indicates that after 18 months of tweeting "No Collusion" in all caps, proof of Trump's colluding is coming down the pike:
1. Accepting "dirt" from foreign governments is illegal. Its a violation of campaign finance laws that prohibit the acceptance of anything of value. Reasons for this are obvious. The same reason that contributions directly to a campaign are capped, and the contributors identified. How does accepting help from Russia, secretly, not run afoul of this law, Putin was simply exercising his free speech rights under the first amendment?
2. We aren't talking about "dirt." To use a comparison Trump supporters are fond of making, Steele interviewing people in Russia to report on Trump's doings in that country is digging up "dirt." Hacking into the emails of Americans is a
crime. As is spreading misinformation and fake news on Facebook under the guise of being a concerned US Citizen, defined in Mueller's indictments as "conspiracy against the United States." So colluding with a party to commit a crime is absolutely a crime. Its called being an accessory. And again, I don't know what I am missing for this to be untrue.
3. Under the same heading as above, aren't you an accessory to a crime when you knowingly benefit from it and don't report it to the authorities? Trump Campaign did not contact the FBI when people within the campaign knew the Russians hacked the DNC etc, and in fact actively pointed elsewhere in their public statements.
4. Lying to Congress is a crime. Even when you aren't sworn in. So unless there is testimony from Trump associates in the know that have already admitted to collusion, they have likely told a number of provable lies to Congress. Most notably, Trump Junior, who (it already may appear, if Cohen is to be believed) perjured himself in front of Congress when he claimed that he did not tell his father about meeting with Russians in Trump Tower.
5. Collusion would provide the impetus to show intent to obstruct justice. Which is a crime.
6. If the collusion happened due to circumstances that predated Trump's candidacy, that's treason/conspiracy against the US. For example, if Trump knew he would be in debt to Putin because of the Pee Tape, or because of money laundering, or something else, but ran anyway.
And if the above isn't a "crime" that's beside the point. It delegitimizes Trump's Presidency, reveals him to be disloyal to the US, and becomes a tremendous political liability for Trump and the political party that has done everything in their power to shield him despite his possibly treasonous actions.
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