Donald Trump administration unwittingly confirms Reince Priebus pressured FBI over Russia
Here’s something you don’t see every day: an administration which delves so vehemently into making the media look bad that it ends up unwittingly confirming the truth about one of its own exploding scandals in the process. But that’s precisely what happened today when Donald Trump’s White House tried to push back against a CNN report that White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus had pressured the FBI over the Trump-Russia investigation.
CNN had reported that Donald Trump’s White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus had asked FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe to help him control the media’s coverage of the Trump-Russia scandal. Trump’s White House fired back today and disputed the story, claiming that it was McCabe who had initiated the conversation with Priebus about the investigation, and that only then did Priebus as for McCabe’s help in controlling the story – thus trying to make the case that CNN got it wrong. The trouble: in so doing, the White House actually confirmed that Priebus had asked for the FBI Deputy Director’s help on the investigation, which is illegal no matter who initiated the conversation, thus unwittingly incriminating Priebus in the process.
The bizarre development was first pointed out on-air by CNN itself. Reporter Jim Sciutto stated that “Between all the push back and the normal insults and the obfuscation, this essential fact, the White House confirms it did speak to the FBI about these communications and did ask for help knocking down stories describing those communications.” Media Matters has transcribed the entire exchange between Sciutto and Jake Tapper. But the upshot is that the Trump administration was so eager to make CNN look bad on a minor detail, it ended up confirming CNN’s claim – and quite possibly ending the political career of Reince Priebus in the process. Contribute to Palmer Report
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