Day 285: Monday Rocked Trump
On Monday, Donald Trump watched from the private quarter of the White House as the indictments rolled in: Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, and Manafort’s right hand man, Rick Gates, who had been hanging around the White House for many months, had been charged with numerous, serious crimes.
Then, in what initially garnered less attention, news broke that George Papadopoulos, one of Trump’s former foreign policy advisers, had secretly pled guilty to lying to the FBI and appeared to be cooperating with special counsel Robert Mueller’s team.
Watching the developments unfold on the large television screens installed in his private residence, Trump was “seething,” according to a Republican close to the White House.
The indictments on Monday of campaign aides Paul Manafort and Rick Gates weren’t a surprise to Trump, according to people who have spoken with the President. Trump has long assumed that members of his presidential campaign would be swept up in Mueller’s probe.
The revelation that another campaign adviser, George Papadopoulos, pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI was far less expected, the sources said. And the assumption that Papadopoulos is cooperating with the FBI’s Russia probe stirred even more unease among Trump’s allies.
Trump’s response: George who?
Just one problem with the “no one even knew him” defense.
The photo above would be an Instagram post from Donald Trump in March 2016 as he meets with his “national security team” at his hotel in Washington D.C.
Trump is at the head of the table on the top of the photo. Jeff Sessions, then-senator, now-attorney general, is at the head of the table in the bottom left corner of the photo. Along with other members of the national security team sits Papadopoulos, two people to the left of Sessions in the dark tie.
As if Monday wasn’t bad enough for Trump, the courts are rebuffing his transgender military ban and the people are rebuffing him generally.
285 days in, 1177 to go
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