Donald Trump presidency discussion thread V

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

So when’s mueller taking trump down?

Not before January 3rd anyway.

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

That’s a bit more pedantic than I was expecting, and actually mueller can do it on his own in 2 years. So to rephrase - is there a route to trump that gets him impeached or jailed. And is it Russia related.

If you are a reader, treat yourself to Seth Abramsons 'Proof of Collusion'.

Irrespective of proof, I suspect politics is going to play the biggest part in Trumps future. I have been saying that he will be supported by GOP until he sees the writing on the wall at which point, poor health, will 'force' him to step back and the collective bodies will just be glad he is out of the way.

But, I'm recently moving towards thinking GOP support could vanish the moment they think he is irrefutably exposed at which point they could actually stab him in the back in an effort to claim some moral high ground.

Tell me how wrote: »

The scenario with struggling to fill the Chief of Staff position tells me that the tide is turning as to support for him within the GOP. The senate holding MSB responsible for Khasoogi is also a thumb in the eye of Trump.

That is why I suspect they might try to claim the high ground by impeaching him once they think he's going anyway.

The flipside though is how the RNC and Trump's re-election campaign have essentially joined forces for Trump's re-election campaign, as I think someone posted here earlier. While previously they would have remained separate (with the RNC typically supporting the President's re-election campaign), now they're setting up a new joint campaign, sharing resources and office space etc, thereby showing that they're fully behind Trump.

I think if they had serious enough doubts about Trump or felt like they should hold off until they see what happens regarding Mueller's report, they would have done so. Instead, they seem to be fully starting to throw their weight behind his re-election in a way they've never done previously and in a way that makes it much harder to separate themselves from him.

Penn wrote: »

The flipside though is how the RNC and Trump's re-election campaign have essentially joined forces for Trump's re-election campaign, as I think someone posted here earlier. While previously they would have remained separate (with the RNC typically supporting the President's re-election campaign), now they're setting up a new joint campaign, sharing resources and office space etc, thereby showing that they're fully behind Trump.

I think if they had serious enough doubts about Trump or felt like they should hold off until they see what happens regarding Mueller's report, they would have done so. Instead, they seem to be fully starting to throw their weight behind his re-election in a way they've never done previously and in a way that makes it much harder to separate themselves from him.

Be interesting to see if a "moderate" GOPer would try challenge that to go against him, someone like Kasich?

Quin_Dub wrote: »

Maybe - but what exactly is the trigger for this that we're waiting for them to react to?

Given everything that has already been proven to be fact , the GOP still support him.

There is absolutely nothing that could be made public about Trump that will make the GOP abandon him.

The only thing that will make them turn on him is a loss of voter support and so far he has the most stable Presidential support numbers in modern history.

They are very low numbers and utterly partizan (~90% GOP voter support and something like 15% Dem voter support) , but they really haven't moved one way or the other to any great degree since the day he was elected.

The pathway to Trumps removal is with the voter - Either at the ballot in 2020 or if sometime before that the heretofore immovable GOP voter support levels finally shift dramatically lower.

But again , I have no idea what exactly would be the trigger to make his supporters change their minds.

I don't agree that there is nothing that would make the GOP abandon him. There are rumours of a very compromising tape, for instance, that might give the GOP a cold shower. Other tapes include him using the N word. Or if widespread financial fraud was proven against him - I have no doubt he has been involved. And so on.

I think much of his personal base would remain loyal even if he were to eat their children but the GOP is a different matter.

Quin_Dub wrote: »

But as long as 90% of GOP voters support Trump , if the GOP split from him they are goosed.

His GOP voter support will have to drop by 30 points plus before the GOP will dump him. As long as he retains that core support they won't touch him..

I guess my point is that the GOP has shown itself to be utterly devoid of anything approaching morals and they will not make any decision unless and until it has a direct impact on their re-election chances.

None of them will suddenly develop morals in isolation.

Indeed. However, it's the soft GOP voters that are crucial. A 10% swing away from the GOP by GOP voters, because of the GOP's allegiance to Trump in light of new and damning disclosures, would mean Armageddon for the GOP. In the light of catastrophic new disclosures, the GOP would have to dump Trump.

Quin_Dub wrote: »

But as long as 90% of GOP voters support Trump , if the GOP split from him they are goosed.

His GOP voter support will have to drop by 30 points plus before the GOP will dump him. As long as he retains that core support they won't touch him..

I guess my point is that the GOP has shown itself to be utterly devoid of anything approaching morals and they will not make any decision unless and until it has a direct impact on their re-election chances.

None of them will suddenly develop morals in isolation.

The GOP, Fox News, the NRA, will back who they think will give them the best chance of retaining power. If they think that it isn't Trump then they will turn on him like piranhas.

If they do this, they can easily turn the Red Voter base against him because they have so much ammunition.

Hell, they can suggest the NRA were put at risk by Trump because Butina tried to use them to associate with him.

Quin_Dub wrote: »

That might be the critical shift... The loss of positive Fox News coverage might be the thing that shifts enough of his base..

I can see Ingraham and Carlson "switching sides" without compunction if that's the way the wind is blowing , but I'm not sure if Hannity would abandon him.

Would that mean that Hannity might have to be sidelined by Fox?

I think Carlson's goose is cooked given his comments the other day

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2018/12/18/tucker-carlson-said-immigrants-make-us-poorer-dirtier-four-companies-have-pulled-their-ads/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.68f7f4431387

Quin_Dub wrote: »

That might be the critical shift... The loss of positive Fox News coverage might be the thing that shifts enough of his base..

I can see Ingraham and Carlson "switching sides" without compunction if that's the way the wind is blowing , but I'm not sure if Hannity would abandon him.

Would that mean that Hannity might have to be sidelined by Fox?

Hannity's an actor he'll play the role he's paid for.

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

So when’s mueller taking trump down?

When I tried to get in touch, all I got was Peter Carr and all he said was "No Comment"

On a more serious note, Mueller's job is to investigate and prosecute. Here's his appointment doc...




What makes this a little more complicated is that it's current DOJ policy not to indict a sitting president. Effectively, this means that impeached by a majority in the house and convicted by a supermajority in the senate before he can be indicted. This adds a large political element to the process of "Taking down Trump" especially when democrats would need 20 republican votes to make that happen. In other words, it's not happening any time soon.

While Trump is safe for now, Mueller continues his job of prosecuting people who had roles in the Russian collusion as well as those who tried to cover it up or otherwise interfere/obstruct the investigation. With Trump currently out of bounds, this means picking off those around Trump with the possible exception of his family, at least for now. These include people like Campaign Chairman Manafort, Deputy Campaign Chairman Gates, National Security Adviser Flynn, Foreign Policy Advisor Papadopolous and Personal Lawyer Michael Cohen.

He has also indicted others in the US as well as many other Russians who took part in the hacking/leaking. Unusually, however, he has done this in such a way as to tell the public as much of what happened as possible in the form of speaking indictments. From those, for example, it is now a matter of public record that Roger Stone (who served on Trump's campaign for a while) was in communication with Russian Military Intelligence regarding the DNC hacks.

So for the next two year, we can expect more indictments, arrests, plea agreements and impotent angry tweets. We can also expect that indictments are going to continue to speak and join up more and more of the unconnected dots in this whole scheme. As this goes on, the public, and that includes FOX News viewers will have a better idea of what transpired between Trump and Russia. Depending on how the Republican base respond, this could make a Senate conviction more palatable but it could also make them more entrenched.

Personally, I think that Trump's days are numbered, politically. His approval is currently hovering at around 35% and has been for months. This will continue if the American economy holds up. During the midterms, republicans lost 40 House seats despite a strong economy. This is very unusual and shows that Trump is very unpopular. If the economy runs into difficulty, and indicators are already suggesting that this is already happening, then this will make even his most rabid supporters start to think a bit more rationally.

If Trump's support drops to the mid 20's or so, then Republicans, if the leadership is smart, will either have to accept annihilation in 2020 or put some distance between the party and Trump. Right now they are all-in on Trump but nothing is permanent in politics.

Back to the idea of impeachment; if Trump's base starts to shrink consistently (due to economy, investigations, whatever), and if it does so quickly enough for a more popular primary contender to emerge, it might give the Republicans enough time to cut their losses and start to see a post-Trump world. It might cause a schism between Republicans and Trumpers or enough of a majority might see the writing on the wall.

The worst case for Trump would be that Republicans decide that their chances of electoral success are greater without him at a time when they still have time to try something else. If they get to this point could will face a primary challenge but even if not, his presidency will be over in 2021.

It is at this point that he can be indicted. I should add, that I don't think he will be impeached. I'm not even sure that the Democrats would even want to do that. If they can keep Trump as the face of the Republican Party, it will give them a huge advantage going into the 2020.

tl;dr

Mueller won't indict Trump but he will indict people around him.
More indictments and a bad economy could make Trump unpopular enough for Republicans to reconsider backing him in 2020. Even if they do back him, he won't win 2020 and will can be indicted at that point. This is all speculation on my part.