White House Counsel just scapegoated Mick Mulvaney something fierce
Based on what’s been leaking out to the media in recent weeks, it’s been clear that Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney and White House Counsel Pat Cipollone have ben trying to figure out how to scapegoat each other in the Ukraine scandal. It’s not entirely clear why the two of them have been so eager to take each other down, but it looks like Cipollone may be the one getting his wish.
Pat Cipollone had his White House Counsel’s Office perform an internal review to find out who might have been involved in illegally holding up U.S. military aid to Ukraine. To the surprise of no one, Cipollone’s review has conveniently determined that – wait for – Mick Mulvaney was the one trying to fabricate a legal justification after the fact for the illegal holdup.
Cipollone’s internal review has uncovered emails to and from Mulvaney that pretty clearly expose him as the henchman, and more to the point, Cipollone’s people have leaked to the Washington Post that they’ve uncovered these emails. This leak ensures that the media, the public, and the House Democrats won’t stop until these Mulvaney emails are made public, which means Mulvaney is going down.
The question now is what happens next. The White House Counsel has served up Mick Mulvaney’s head on a proverbial platter, giving Donald Trump the opportunity to simply claim that Mulvaney was behind the entire thing, and that Trump didn’t know about it. That would presumably include Mulvaney being fired. But if Mulvaney concludes that he’s not getting a Trump pardon, he could end up cooperating with the House impeachment inquiry in a last ditch effort at avoiding going to prison once Trump has been finished off. This is getting dicey for all of them.
