Former GOP Senator Rick Santorum tried desperately to defend President Donald Trump from allegations that he obstructed justice during an appearance on CNN Wednesday morning, but he failed miserably.
Responding to an explosive report from the New York Times that suggests Trump tried to install a loyalist to oversee the investigations being conducted by the U.S. Attorney’s office in the Southern District of New York, host John Berman asked Santorum if the president should have known better. Santorum responded:
“The president of the United States has — is the chief executive of the country. He has — he has the right to talk to his officials about the way things, you know, the conduct of investigations, even when it comes to him, and the president obviously didn’t order or force Mr. Whitaker to do that. He made comments about things or maybe even, you’re reporting, mused about things that he didn’t like about the investigation. Is that — is that improper? I would say no. Is it wise? No. But I don’t think it’s improper behavior on the part of a president.”
Since when is obstruction of justice not improper? When it’s done by a Republican president, it’s not a big deal, according to Santorum and his fellow Trump acolytes.
Berman asked asked why former House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes (R-CA) didn’t object when former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe notified him and other members of Congress that that agency had opened an investigation into his actions during the 2016 election. Once again, Santorum squirmed:
“Well, look, I’ve been in a lot of those briefings and you sit there and take the briefing and you then try to find out what, you know, what’s true and what’s not true from what you’ve just been told. And I’m not surprised that he wouldn’t necessarily object at that moment because probably a lot of the information was new and you don’t want to just start flailing away. You want to do your background checking and then you come back with maybe an informed position to counter what Mr. McCabe had said.”
Oddly, however, Nunes certainly did object to the Mueller probe and other investigations into the 2016 Trump campaign, even going to far as to share information from his committee with the White House and willingly defending the president despite evidence suggesting that he and members of his campaign met with Russian nationals on numerous occasions.
While Rick Santorum and other Trump defenders may try to make excuses for the indefensible actions of the president, each new revelation brings him closer to being removed from office.
