Mick Mulvaney’s worst nightmare just came home to roost

| 3:00 pm EST November 16, 2019
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When the House impeachment inquiry announced earlier this week it had scheduled OMB official Mark Sandy to testify today, Palmer Report took that as a sign that he would indeed show up and testify. You don’t make everyone on the committee show up on a Saturday if you’ve merely scheduled the witness so you can mark him down for future obstruction of justice charges. Sure enough, Sandy showed up today.

Make no mistake: Mark Sandy’s decision to testify is pretty terrible for Donald Trump, but it’s Mick Mulvaney’s worst nightmare. Mulvaney has officially remained in charge of the Office of Management and Budget even while he’s been serving as Acting White House Chief of Staff. So the OMB paperwork delaying U.S. military aid to Ukraine has had Mulvaney’s fingerprints all over it, if not his name.

The old adage “follow the money” remains a popular one because it so often turns out to be fruitful. The OMB handles things like the formal approval of U.S. foreign aid, so it’s where you find the proof that the money was held up for corrupt reasons. Mulvaney ordered everyone in the OMB not to testify for a reason. If any of them were to tie Mulvaney to the paperwork, it would all but guarantee that Mulvaney will serve a lengthy prison sentence after Trump is gone.

For whatever reasons, Mark Sandy has decided to go ahead and testify about what really went on inside the OMB when it came to the Ukraine extortion scandal. We don’t yet precisely know what Sandy is saying behind closed doors; that’ll likely start to leak out tonight. But the fact that Sandy broke ranks and showed up at all is Mick Mulvaney’s worst nightmare. After this, we’re not sure if there’s any way Mulvaney can avoid cutting a plea deal.