The real reason Sarah Huckabee Sanders didn’t resign when she was supposed to

| 10:55 pm EST February 23, 2019
Dear Palmer Report readers, we all understand the difficult era we're heading into. Major media outlets are caving to Trump already. Even the internet itself and publishing platforms may be at risk. But Palmer Report is nonetheless going to lead the fight. We're funding our 2025 operating expenses now, so we can keep publishing no matter what happens. I'm asking you to contribute if you can, because the stakes are just so high. You can donate here.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders has resumed making dishonest and idiotic defenses of Donald Trump’s crimes and lies, prompting a number of Palmer Report readers to ask why she’s still on the job. CBS News reported last summer that she and her Deputy Raj Shah would resign by the end of the year. Shah is now gone, but Sanders is rather oddly still there.

We recently learned that Special Counsel Robert Mueller interviewed Sarah Huckabee Sanders about the obstruction of justice antics she’d been carrying out from her briefing podium, and that right around that timeframe, she largely stopped doing press briefings. She still pops up in interviews to defend Trump from time to time, but she seems to be choosing her words carefully and speaking rather generically these days. It’s fairly clear that she knows she’s facing legal trouble – so again, why is she still on the job?

If you’ve been made aware that you’re in legal trouble for having conspired with your boss to commit a crime, and your boss is the President of the United States, you only have two options. The smart move is to cut a plea deal against your boss, and seek no prison time in exchange for your cooperation. The dumb move is to remain on the job and remain allied with your boss, under the delusion that he cares enough about you to pardon you in the end.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders is, as we’ve all seen time and again, rather dumb. But we’d imagine Robert Mueller filled her in on her precarious legal situation in the kind of simple terms that even she can understand. So the question is this. Is she still on the job because Mueller advised her to go back and spy on Donald Trump? Or is she still on the job because she’s truly stupid enough to think she’s getting pardoned? Take your pick.