Democrats have complained that Trump, by declaring Mueller’s investigation a "hoax" and downplaying the scale of Russian interference, has dampened federal efforts to prepare states for future threats.
Donald Trump has questioned the extent of Russia’s meddling in the 2016 elections. But he says he’s sure the 2018 midterms will be tainted by political interference – from within his own Justice Department.
Trump on Tuesday warned without evidence that special counsel Robert Mueller’s team investigating whether Trump’s campaign coordinated with Moscow in 2016 “will be meddling” in the upcoming congressional elections, when control of the House and Senate are in play.
The attack – the latest in Trump’s ever-expanding PR offensive against Mueller’s probe -�echoes Trump’s 2016 claim that the election results could be rigged against him, a charge he repeated until the moment he eked out a surprise Election Day victory. And Trump’s backers in Congress – as well as the Republican Party -�are bolstering the president’s latest charges with resolutions, letters and televised broadsides of their own.
"I respect the results of all of our elections, but will not tolerate prosecutors stalling and prolonging false narratives that influence the American people and their choices during the election process," said Rep. Todd Rokita (R-Ind.).
Rokita authored a resolution earlier this month contending that "a failure to resolve this investigation swiftly and accurately threatens to question the legitimacy of future elections held in the United States." Five GOP colleagues signed onto the proposal. Others in the party have echoed Trump’s concern, which he first raised in a May 4 tweet that wondered whether a protracted Mueller campaign "wrongfully impacts the Mid-Term Elections, which is what the Democrats always intended?"
"I agree with the president on this," said Harmeet Dhillon, California’s national Republican committeewoman, in a recent interview. "[T]here appears to be a clear partisan aspect to the constantly expanding investigation – paralyze the president and delegitimize the 2016 election outcome, with a view toward the midterms."
The president’s new line of attack represents the latest twist in a strategic blur of anti-Mueller messaging deployed by Trump and his allies to neutralize the probe – legally and politically. Indeed, Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani has acknowledged that Trump is seeking to win a public opinion battle against Mueller, whose investigators have punctured Trump’s inner circle with a series of raids, criminal charges and guilty pleas.
Trump’s allegation of election "meddling" by the Mueller team is alarming adversaries who say Trump’s messaging battle could erode supporters’ confidence the election results, particularly in a year in which Democrats are favored to make gains and possibly take control of the House.
"The president of the United States would rather you believe that there is domestic meddling in the next U.S. elections (with no evidence), than there was Russian meddling in the last one (despite incontrovertible evidence)," argued Mo Elleithee, a longtime Democratic strategist. "His disrespect for our democracy is stunning."
Indeed, Trump has occasionally used distortions and falsehoods that critics say chip away at public faith in the institutions he oversees. The intelligence community, especially, has borne the brunt of Trump’s vitriol, with the president accusing some civil servants of operating a "criminal deep state" that conspires to take him down.
And during the 2016 election, Trump raised questions about voting machine integrity and later suggested without evidence that "millions" of immigrants voted illegally, costing him the popular vote.
Indeed, there’s similarly no public evidence that Mueller’s team has the intent or the capacity to interfere with the 2018 elections, or that it is dragging out its investigation for political reasons.
But Trump’s newest election-meddling claims are getting air cover from Republican Party establishment and on Capitol Hill, where a band of rank-and-file Republicans has similarly adopted the view that Mueller’s aim is to sway the midterms and could call into question the results.
Rokita, who was once Indiana’s top election official, told POLITICO that his resolution reflects his belief that "Mueller’s investigation has gone on for far too long with no evidence of Russian collusion" with the Trump campaign.
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), a top Trump ally who endorsed Rokita’s resolution, took to Fox News on Sunday to similarly contend that Mueller is simply attempting to swing voters away from Republicans.
"I think the goal is just to drag it on and to continue to have a cloud over the Trump presidency to potentially sway voters in the midterm elections," he said.
But the PR offensive has included a blur of conflicting messages. And Trump’s claim is at odds with predictions from Giuliani and other Republicans in Congress, who say the probe will actually boost Republicans’ fortunes by energizing Trump’s supporters – many of whom think believe see the election as a chance to save the president from encroaching prosecutors.
“There could be a little advantage for us. A little advantage for them,” Giuliani told POLITICO recently. “But once you get past Sept. 1, if this stupid investigation is still going on, the Democrats will be paying a big price for it.”
Trump’s charge also comes as his administration is working to sound the alarm about a renewed threat to the U.S. elections by foreign powers – not just from Russia, but from other adversaries like Iran or China. Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen met with dozens of lawmakers last week to express urgency about the foreign threat.
Democrats have complained that Trump, by declaring Mueller’s investigation a "hoax" and downplaying the scale of Russian interference, has dampened federal efforts to prepare states for future threats.
To many of Trump’s critics, the president’s rhetoric is simply a political device, amounting to something of a voter turnout operation.
"He’s trying to frame the Mueller investigation as part of a political war," said William Kristol, a conservative Trump critic who’s mounting a public campaign to defend Mueller. "It creates an excuse for Trump, something for Trump to run against. The practical effect of it will be, ‘You need to defend me against impeachment now.’"
"I think they are trying to stoke their laggard base, but if they actually moved on Mueller it would turbocharge voters who believe Congress should provide a check and balance on the executive," said veteran Democratic strategist David Axelrod. "The irony is that the greatest threat to the integrity of the next election is Russia, in which the president and House Republicans have shown little interest."
Darren Samuelsohn contributed to this report.
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