Donald Trump flies into Twitter rage about Michael Flynn, confesses to felony
Now that Michael Flynn has formally agreed to a plea deal in the Trump-Russia scandal, it was a matter of time before Donald Trump ended up tweeting about it. Flynn has given up evidence against Donald and other members of the Trump family, and even ever-oblivious Donald seems to have finally figured out he’s in real trouble. But when he flew into a Twitter rage on Saturday afternoon, Donald Trump only served to put himself in far more legal trouble.
Here’s what Trump tweeted around lunchtime on Saturday: “I had to fire General Flynn because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI. He has pled guilty to those lies. It is a shame because his actions during the transition were lawful. There was nothing to hide!” You caught the part where Trump blew it, right? For the first time, he’s admitting that he knew at the time that Flynn had lied to the FBI, which is a felony.
Days after Trump forced Flynn out, he turned around and asked then-FBI Director James Comey to let Flynn off the hook. If it can be demonstrated that Trump knew at the time that Flynn had committed a crime, then this means Trump was committing obstruction of justice. Special Counsel Robert Mueller has been working all year to line up witnesses and prove that Trump did indeed know. But now Trump just flat-out tweeted a confession that he knew Flynn had committed a crime.
Today’s tweet will end up being Exhibit A in Robert Mueller’s obstruction of justice case against Donald Trump in the firing of James Comey. Of course Mueller is also targeting Trump for several other crimes, ranging from money laundering to conspiracy against the United States, but obstruction of justice is the quickest and easiest to prove – and thus the shortest path to Trump’s ouster.
