Trump's 2020 Run Will Be the 'No Collusion' Campaign

[demmiblue]

Considering that the president began using the phrase “no collusion” prior to the appointment of special counsel Robert Mueller — his first tweet on the matter was May 8, 2017, the day before firing FBI Director James Comey — it’s quite appropriate that he’d celebrate the release of the Mueller report summary by repeating the slogan as a victory call. As a fan of both political mantras and a notorious sore winner, it appears that Trump intends to play the “no collusion” card well into the 2020 campaign.

According to a senior White House official who spoke with the Washington Post, a “feeling of euphoria” overcame Trump staffers on Sunday, as they celebrated what they interpreted as a clean slate from the Mueller investigation. After a weekend spent in Florida golfing with Kid Rock and Lindsey Graham, Trump sounded thrilled when he spoke to reporters before boarding Air Force One: “After not looking at the other side, where a lot of bad things happened, a lot of horrible things happened, a lot of very bad things happened for our country, it was just announced there was no collusion with Russia, the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. There was no collusion with Russia. There was no obstruction, none whatsoever. It was a complete and total exoneration.”

White House aides and campaign officials also felt the momentum. The Trump campaign put together a video called “Collusion Hoax!” featuring prominent Democrats using the word in interviews as an all-caps “Wrong” stamp comes down over their faces. According to the Washington Post, the Republican National Committee released a set of “talking points” that targeted the cost of the probe, some $50,230 per day for 675 days. (The RNC failed to mention that the Mueller investigation reportedly brought the U.S. Treasury somewhere between $26 and $42 million in seized assets.)

One former White House official told the Post that Democrats have “just handed the Trump campaign the greatest election issue in modern political history, on a silver ­platter.” It’s quite likely that Trump will run with the findings, although Attorney General William Barr’s summary of the investigation explicitly states that “while this report does not conclude that the president committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him” from the issue of obstruction of justice. Already, that’s a sentence that’s been swept away by Trump and his allies, who are enjoying the political victory present in the first half of the headlines: “Mueller Finds No Trump-Russia Conspiracy, but Stops Short of Exonerating President on Obstruction.”

If the phrase “no collusion” looks like it’s going to last well into 2020, the Trump team’s day-one rush of serotonin could run dry pretty quickly. In order for the president to justify his synthetic claims of exoneration, he may have to support the release of the full report, a document that may not be as friendly to him as Bill Barr’s SparkNotes version is. As former federal prosecutor Ken White writes in the Atlantic:

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/03/report-trumps-2020-run-will-be-the-no-collusion-campaign.html?utm_campaign=nym&utm_source=tw&utm_medium=s1

[dalton99a]

1. Release the report.

[JaneQPublic]

2. Good.

While Trump dwells on old news and personal grievances, Dems will focus on kitchen table issues that affect the lives of real voters: health care, prescription costs, infrastructure, climate change, and a rebound from what will likely be another economic downturn by 2020.

[FBaggins]

3. I doubt it

He won’t be running against Clinton (or likely anyone on her team).

“Not guilty of crime ‘X’!!!!” Isn’t much of a campaign theme when his opponent will have almost four years of record to run against.

[DetlefK]

4. That's totally premature. That narrative could collapse any time.

All it takes is one leaker or Mueller publishing his own declassified summary or Mueller talking about it in a House hearing...

Also, don't forget that the topic of the 2008 election was national-security and McCain was leading Obama in the polls. And then the topic switched in the middle of the campaign-season to economy and all of a sudden people no longer wanted a third term for GWB.



Trump will have a hard time running on "no collusion" when he's implicated in massive financial crimes and the Democrats are running as the blue-collar party.

[kennetha]

5. If Democrats are stupid enough to let Trump control the narrative

They can kiss the presidency and the rule of law goodbye

[watoos]

10. I have been preaching about the narrative for decades,

finally people are listening. The M$M is not our friend. The M$M, including msnbc helped elect Trump. The M$M is complicit with right wing American oligarchs. The narrative was always controlled by the right, it has been controlled since the inception of cable news.

There are a few Democrats who can flip the right wing narrative, Ted Kennedy could, Al Franken could, AOC can, and Speaker Pelosi can because the press must cover her.

It is an uphill battle for Democrats when they have to fight Republicans and the M$M. For my sanity I only watch Nicolle Wallace and Rachel Maddow.

[Iliyah]

6. The voters are more concern about their well being . . .

Democrats took the house on issues concerning the American people. So, for majority of the voters, this is a no go. Also, majority of the voters know that t-rump colluded with Russia.

[treestar]

7. This will be forgotten by then

and the Dotard will have done many other outrageous things that will drown this out.

[uponit7771]

8. RELEASE THE FULL REPORT NIXON TAPES 2.0

[el_bryanto]

9. That's inspiring

I don't see how democrats can beat a candidate has not been proven to have colluded with Russians hackers.

I mean isn't that like judging a high diver by their ability to make it to end of the board without tripping?

Bryant

[Sunsky]

11. This is why we need the Mueller report

And not some BS summary. Let them gloat prematurely. Let them lie to the public, that's their MO anyway.

Remember, Adam Schiff and some of our elected officials in Congress are privy to classified information that we know nothing about. These Democratic politicians seem convinced that there's something nefarious afoot and Trump is guilty as heck. I tend to believe them. They keep pushing for transparency, while the Rethugs want to keep us in the dark or sell us their narrative.

Dems should never tailor their action based on Rethugs reaction. Dems keep fighting, we've got this! The truth is on our side.

[kennetha]

12. Not even a "summary"

The “conclusion” that Trump did not obstruct justice is Barr’s not Meuller’s. Barr’s letter is therefore no mere summary of Meuller’s principal findings, despite being advertised as such.

[Sunsky]

13. You're absolutely correct

Just BS on paper. According to Barr- Mueller couldn't reach a conclusion on obstruction of justice, after a thorough investigation, that took years. However, he figured it out in a matter of hours. IMO his letter is an insult to one's intelligence.

[kennetha]

14. I don't think Mueller "punted."

I think he intended to PASS the decision to CONGRESS, which according to DOJ policy is the only body empowered to sit in judgment of a sitting president.

Barr decided to intercept the pass.

[karynnj]

15. I disagree that he has a "no collusion" 2020 campaign

That would be like someone whose murder charges were dropped because there was not evidence that was beyond a reasonable doubt. Running on that just brings up the issue.

I think we have heard previews of his 2020 campaign. Remember the laundry list -- most inaccurately described - of "accomplishments". The best economy EVER even though the country was heading DOWN when he won election. (Yes, I know the various graphs that show that after Obama's actions early in 2009, the economy which was almost going off the cliff steadily improved over the Obama years - continuing and even accelerating UNSUSTAINABLY into the first Trump year before they plateaued in 2018/2019.) He also speaks of the lowest unemployment rate -- but again, those rates went down in the Obama years.

Put together, his argument will be the tax cut legislation and deregulation gave us a great economy. This puts the issue right where the ideological positions are. They are ok with greater income inequality and fewer (optimally no) regulations - even as we see regulations as making the environment cleaner, people facing fewer health and safety risks etc.

On foreign policy, he will play to the isolationist xenophobic strain in this country. Here, there is another split in the country. This time it is NOT between the traditional Democratic and Republican parties. I have read articles on moderated debates between former statesmen - like Secretaries Condi Rice and John Kerry who spoke at Notre Dame. While they disagreed on many things, there were huge areas of agreement where they disagreed with what Trump is doing.

On national security, we will here the demonization of immigrants and claims that HE was instrumental in defeating ISIS. In fact, he went to the media last week showing two maps - one from 2014 (yes, 2014) and one now showing what he said was the amount of land ISIS controlled when he "won the election" and now. Ignored is that it was President Obama, Kerry, Biden etc who quickly got the coalition together and set the plan for how to proceed. That plan - to put local forces on the ground with international support, training and guidance AND following up with demining and reestablishing local governance in areas won back - was designed to decrease the likelihood that as soon as forces left, ISIS would reemerge.

In their view of the world - Obama failed in Syria, where Trump was tough because he order the bombing of an airfield with no planes there AND where ISIS formed because Obama either allowed it to or was inept AND Trump defeated them. Their view of what was done on Israel is just as strange - Obama and Kerry were anti-semitic and hated Israel (obviously untrue) while Trump stopped the world from attacking Israel, moved the embassy to Jerusalem, declared Israeli sovereignty over the Golan heights and has Jared creating a peace plan .. without talking to one side. Two previews of 2020 - Mike Pompeo speaking CBN nodding as an evangelist spoke of Trump being a modern day Esther, possibly born and elevated to the Presidency by God to save the Jewish people in this difficult time! The other is Trump himself saying the Democrats hate Jews and are anti semitic.

Consider even NK, where Trump has "adjusted" the situation that he started with -- saying war was imminent and would have happened had he not become President. In fact, his FIRST steps were to make the relationship worse. At the other end, he claims successes that just did not happen. I would expect that we will hear a lot of the revisionist history on North Korea ... and Iran.