About that whole “unwittingly” thing today between Donald Trump and the Russians

| 3:23 pm EST February 16, 2018
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Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein announced today that Special Counsel Robert Mueller has obtained grand jury indictments against thirteen Russian nationals and three Russian entities for conspiring to rig the election in Donald Trump’s favor. In the real world, this is a crippling body blow for Trump. In the desperate minds of Trump and his remaining supporters, only one word from today will matter: “unwittingly.” But in this context, that word doesn’t mean what they wish it meant.

Rosenstein used his press conference to spell out that the Trump campaign was “unwittingly” working with these Russian nationals. He did this for a reason: he doesn’t want Trump to hit the panic button and start trying to fire people. That wouldn’t work at this late date anyway, but this was Rosenstein’s way of ensuring that Trump remains the proverbial frog in the pot of boiling water who isn’t alarmed enough to jump out.

But for those listening closely, Rosenstein also made clear that the “unwittingly” part only related to “these indictments.” He’s parsing it this way because the next round of indictments will be against Americans who wittingly conspired with Russia to rig the election. How do we know this? Donald Trump Jr wasn’t unwittingly working with Russian government representatives when he met with them at Trump Tower in an attempt at illegally obtaining dirt on Hillary Clinton. Jared Kushner wasn’t unwittingly working with the Russian Ambassador when he met with him.

If you think it through, you can see where this is going. Today’s indictments against the Russians are a crippling political bodyblow to Donald Trump. But he’ll latch onto the word “unwittingly” and convince himself that this somehow vindicates him. As Trump is out doing delusional victory laps, Rosenstein and Mueller will continue to bring indictments and take Trump and his people down.