Mike Pence throws National Security Advisor Michael Flynn under the Trump-Russia bus
Now that the U.S. intelligence community has confirmed today that National Security Advisor Michael Flynn did indeed discuss U.S. sanctions with the Russian government in December, in violation of the law, the exploding scandal has quickly spread to vice president Mike Pence. When Flynn previously claimed that sanctions were not discussed during the phone calls, Pence publicly confirmed as much. But now Pence is throwing Flynn under the bus to try to protect himself, in a sign of how swiftly Trump-Russia is unraveling.
Mike Pence had previously confirmed publicly that Michael Flynn had not discussed sanctions during the numerous phone calls he made to the Russian ambassador, on the day the sanctions were announced by President Barack Obama. But now that the intel community is confirming Flynn did discuss sanctions, Pence is hanging him out to dry. Pence’s office is now leaking to CNN that Pence had merely been taking Flynn’s word for it when he vouched for him, and that Pence doesn’t definitively know what Flynn said to the Russians. This is rather clearly an attempt on Pence’s part to insulate himself from the scandal. The question now is what Flynn, who has often come off as being unstable, will do in response — and it may not be pretty.
The last time Michael Flynn got ticked off at his boss, he retaliated by going against orders and leaking classified information to Pakistan. Now that Mike Pence appears to be trying to set up Flynn as the fall guy for Trump-Russia, the erratic and often angry Flynn could rat out Pence (and Trump) in retaliation – or simply to protect himself legally, now that he’s been exposed as having violated federal law on Trump’s behalf.
The Nixon administration’s fate was sealed when Richard Nixon reached the point where he had to start firing his own top people in a last ditch attempt at walling himself off from the Watergate scandal. They then turned against him, and that was his downfall. Donald Trump has fired a number of key people already out of spite, but none of them were his people. If Trump fires his own appointee Michael Flynn over this, or if Flynn senses he’s about to take the fall and flips, it could be the shortest path to the Russia scandal leading to Trump impeachment hearings.
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