Donald Trump is not lying about Robert Mueller. Mueller was the point man for a plot involving the Democratic Party establishment, intelligence agencies, and corporate media. Russiagate was a dangerous hoax.
“Robert Mueller just died. Good, I’m glad he’s dead. He can no longer hurt innocent people!” - Donald Trump
The public denunciation of a political enemy on the day of his death would be shocking if those words were uttered by anyone other than Donald Trump. The screed was vintage Trump: blurting out whatever he wanted without considering the thoughts and feelings of others, or any traditional niceties about not speaking ill of the dead, especially those who, as the saying goes, aren’t even cold in the grave.
But the decidedly rude response also had a significant element of truth. Despite his many lies about issues big and small Trump is not wrong about Robert Mueller’s pursuit of innocent people.
Mueller passed away 7 years after coming up empty-handed as special counsel in the investigation that was popularly known by the moniker “Russiagate.” Headlines such as those from the Washington Post, “Mueller did not find the Trump campaign conspired with Russia, attorney general says,” were shocking to millions of people who followed every claim of wrongdoing and subterfuge.
The investigation lasted for two years, during which time the public was inundated with claims that Trump owed his presidency to collusion with the Russian government. In the end, there was no evidence of any such activity, no evidence that Vladimir Putin undid what passes for democracy in the United States. Millions of dollars were spent on an investigation that emerged with convictions for process crimes such as tax evasion and lying to investigators, while there was no proof that the lead story was true.
Russiagate involved countless examples of corruption and lies. One infamous example is the so-called Steele Dossier, which purported to prove that Trump was compromised by Russians when, in fact, that document was paid for by Perkins Coie, the law firm that also represented the Democratic National Committee. That information should have automatically discredited any claims emanating from the work of British former spy Christopher Steele. Collusion between Hillary Clinton, democratic politicians, and corporate media meant that Russiagate was little more than a “state sponsored domestic psy-op.” Trump was actually correct when he referred to the long-running manufactured scandal as a hoax.
For months, the public was told one tall tale after another, that the “walls were closing in” on the Trump administration, only for the story to be a dud. The real story was of a political witch hunt begun by Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential campaign. Stung by the revelations that she used a private server as Barack Obama’s Secretary of State and of a Clinton Foundation deal that gave a Russian corporation access to Canadian uranium, she needed a weapon against Trump and Russiagate was born.
The true story of collusion was between the Democratic Party, corporate media, and elements of what is known as the deep state. Trump’s declaration of wanting to improve relations with Russia made him an enemy of what is known as “the blob,” the bipartisan foreign policy establishment, media, think tanks and their funders. They feared that Trump might change the foreign policy consensus that had existed for decades and they were not going to allow that possibility to see the light of day.
In fact, it is Hillary Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, who did deals with Russian entities. A 2015 New York Times headline reads, “Cash Flowed to Clinton Foundation Amid Russian Uranium Deal.” The Clinton slush fund, known as a foundation, brokered an agreement that gave a Russian company control over one-fifth of the world’s supply of uranium. While there is endless speculation about whether Trump is in the pay of Russian “oligarchs,” Bill Clinton was paid $500,000 to give a speech in Moscow shortly after the agreement was reached.
It can be argued that Trump is serving in his second presidential term because of Russiagate, a plot that was hatched by an incompetent politician, Hillary Rodham Clinton. Clinton actually won the popular vote in 2016, but she did not give adequate attention to the most basic campaign strategy in a presidential election, a get-out-the-vote effort in key swing states. She lost in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin and thus gave Trump a victory in the Electoral College. He would be a footnote in history if Hillary Clinton had spent more time on the basics of electioneering and less time creating elaborate plots meant to cover up for her own misdeeds.
Astute observers saw through the ruse even as it operated. We were told that 17 intelligence agencies were convinced of Russia’s involvement in the 2016 election, only for the number to be whittled down to 4 of that group. The lasting impact allows any and all trickery to be explained away with claims of some sort of Russian involvement. In 2020, the Joe Biden campaign pulled the same trick as true stories of his son Hunter’s laptop containing proof of drug addiction and his contacts with Ukrainian officials became public. Biden’s team, led by Antony Blinken, who would serve as Secretary of State, solicited 51 intelligence officials to attest to the laptop story having the “hallmarks of Russian disinformation.”
Anyone who doubts whether there was any substance to the Russiagate investigation need only look at Mueller himself. Congressional democrats wouldn’t let go of their story and insisted that Mueller testify before Congress, but their effort ended with Mueller looking foolish for the simple reason that neither Trump nor anyone else was indicted on any conspiracy charge.
Black politics was a casualty of Russiagate as well. The only conspiracy indictments were of Russians far outside the reach of U.S. law who were accused of the crimes of sowing “discord in the U.S. political system” and encouraging “U.S. minority groups not to vote in the 2016 U.S. presidential election or to vote for a third-party U.S. presidential candidate.” Russiagate literally criminalized independent Black politics. The party that gets 90% of Black votes without even trying didn’t deliver and instead fell back on tired tropes claiming that Black people only act outside of the duopoly if tricked by foreign actors.
There is no statute of limitations on the truth, nor should it matter that the person now being truthful often lies about some very serious issues. Trump claims that he is negotiating with Iran to end the war of aggression he waged against them, when in fact the country’s leaders won’t respond to his entreaties.
It isn’t necessary to be a Trump supporter in order to point out that he is telling the truth about a very serious matter that has consumed public attention for years. The Russiagate narrative continues to this day and is responsible for a loss of trust in the media and in the electoral process itself. One need not be a Russiagate wonk to sense that something was deeply amiss and that elections are rigged and that the media collude with elements of the state in their so-called journalistic efforts.
The argument that Trump’s crimes against Iran and Cuba and Venezuela and against immigrants and citizens of this country who are said to be an “enemy within” should be the focus of attention to the exclusion of all else is understandable but misguided. There would be no Trump 45 or Trump 47 if the Democratic Party had actually offered voters what they needed and wanted. Instead, their $1 billion candidate tried to use trickery because she had so little to offer and who, along with the political establishment, was so made incompetent by political corruption.
Russiagate was a very dangerous fraud and it will live on for a long time and no one should be shy about saying so. It is the cause of public cynicism, and a destruction of trust in once respected institutions. We can condemn ICE and imperialism and white supremacy and still point out the damage that was done by Robert Mueller and so many others.
Margaret Kimberley is the author of Prejudential: Black America and the Presidents. You can support her work on Patreon and also find it on Twitter, Bluesky, and Telegram platforms. She can be reached via email at margaret.kimberley@blackagendareport.com.
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