A president who rose to political prominence on birtherism — and then won the White House obsessed with Hillary Clinton’s emails — is latching onto scraps of conspiracy theories to build his political defense against impeachment.
In recent weeks, President Donald Trump has incorrectly claimed whistleblower rules were changed immediately before the whistleblower filed his or her complaint. He’s resurrected the myth that Democrats planted a spy inside his 2016 presidential campaign. And he’s promulgated the idea that the whistleblower is a partisan operative and part of the “deep state” of federal government employees out to get him. (The whistleblower reportedly is an intelligence officer, who Trump’s acting director of national intelligence has said “acted in good faith.”)
Data, evidence and repeated assurances from Trump’s own national security leaders do not appear to influence Trump as he searches for ways to undermine Democrats’ impeachment proceedings and the presidential bid of a leading rival, former Vice President Joe Biden.
Trump is joined in his like-minded distribution of misinformation by his close personal friend and lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, who often floats such ideas on TV — much to the chagrin of White House advisers.
Former administration officials say they’ve never been sure if Trump actually believes these theories, or simply sees them an effective political tool to silence critics, batter Democratic rivals and appeal to a slice of his base. His passionate and relentless effort to push the theories suggests the former; his long-running birther lie suggests the latter.
“I just think he keeps up the game,” a former senior administration official said. “It is much easier to have a conspiracy theory than have to deal with the facts. He and facts have a severe dislike for each other. He and facts don’t get along. If you are not going to get along with facts and you have an administration known for lying, then everything becomes a conspiracy theory.”
Many Trump allies and former advisers take a more charitable approach, saying the president often sniffs out intriguing tidbits of information and then highlights them for the American public and media to explore in greater detail.
“I learned to quit worrying a long time ago,” said Jason Miller, former chief spokesman for Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. “He has a pretty uncanny nose for politics. When he has a gut feeling about something, he usually ends up being right.” Miller then pointed to major news events he said Trump had predicted like Brexit, the alleged political biases of the former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe and the Hillary Clinton emails found on the laptop of Anthony Weiner just before the 2016 election.
“I don’t think he worries if one or two details are off,” Miller added. “The president likes to raise the questions, knowing everyone including the media will then go chasing it.”
By leaning so heavily on unsubstantiated musings, critics say the president has co-opted the Republican Party into being a fact-less operation.
One Republican close to the White House said he would far prefer the House Republicans take the lead in refuting the impeachment inquiry one allegation at a time rather than having the president do it hour-by-hour with his various theories and Tweets.
“It has been disconcerting in recent years to see the party rely more and more on outlandish theories of what the ‘deep state’ is doing,” said Michael Steele, the former chair of the Republican National Committee. “Where were all of these people, who suddenly seem to have existed inside the government body, when Ronald Reagan was running the government, or when Bush 41 or 43 were there? Where were all of these people?”
“It is just easier to blame it on some nefarious organization and individuals rather than doing the job you are going to do. If I can blame you, why would I take responsibility?” Steele added.
The White House press office did not respond to a request for comment.
As he hits the 1,000th day of his presidency this week, Trump has continued to move fluidly between fact and fiction. He has frequently been caught in lies — well over 12,000 since he took office, according to one count — and rarely cleans them up afterward.
During his business career, he was often caught in lies such as saying Princess Diana had taken an apartment in Trump Tower, or he’d call reporters while pretending to be a public relations spokesman named John Miller.
But back in his real estate days in New York, Trump was not much of an aficionado of conspiracy theories, said Barbara Res, a former top executive for the Trump Organization.
It’s true that he never took responsibility for anything negative that happened to him or his business and viewed mishaps as a personal attack, Res said, “but as far as promoting real conspiracy theories, no.”
“His ideas are more advanced and evolved now, but he has got new problems. The conspiracy theories he is spouting are an answer to that,” she said.
Trump went deep into conspiracy land in 2011 when he latched onto the discredited notion that President Barack Obama was born in Kenya. The state of Hawaii released Obama’s original long-form birth certificate in 2011 to prove he was, in fact, born in the U.S.
Yet the “birther” theory still served as a core part of Trump’s political ascent, even as evidence proved it false and Trump weighed running for president.
Obama poked fun at Trump for fomenting the birther movement during the glitzy 2011 White House Correspondents’ Dinner as Trump sat stone-faced in the audience.
“No one is happier, no one is prouder to put this birth certificate matter to rest than The Donald,” Obama told the crowd of thousands of journalists, politicians and celebrities. “And that’s because he can finally get back to focusing on the issues that matter — like, did we fake the moon landing? What really happened in Roswell? And where are Biggie and Tupac?”
As president, Trump has promoted conspiracy theories since his inauguration centered on the idea of the deep state, the Clinton emails or the alleged wiretapping of his New York City campaign quarters by Obama’s federal government. He’s also promoted the idea Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election to help the Democrats: a charge Trump’s former top homeland security adviser recently publicly debunked, citing no evidence for the allegation.
Former administration officials say it’s now futile to try to talk Trump out of these theories — with logic, data, common sense or even government intelligence — once he latches onto an idea.
Certain White House aides such as senior adviser Stephen Miller, or China trade hawk Peter Navarro often help to fuel Trump’s conspiracy-laden mind — especially with the idea that China is trying to steal all U.S. jobs, or every China exchange student is a spy. The latter is a mantra Miller often has discussed with the president, according to two former officials.
Escaping the Mueller investigation relatively unscathed only emboldened Trump and Giuliani, said one close White House adviser.
Just a day after Mueller testified about his findings to Congress, Trump made the July 25 call to the Ukrainian president and asked him to investigate Hunter Biden ahead of the 2020 campaign. This phone call and resulting whistleblower complaint now form the basis of the Democrats’ impeachment inquiry, with Democrats saying it was encouraging a foreign government to meddle in a U.S. election.
Trump’s not the first president to feel like he is under attack from foreign adversaries, or the media, or the intelligence community. President John F. Kennedy, for instance, often worried about officials leaking information, whereas President Richard Nixon was privately convinced the Johnson administration had bugged his airplane during the 1968 campaign.
The differences between Trump and other presidents is that he shares his conspiratorially minded, us-versus-them worldview far more publicly and prolifically, said Timothy Naftali, the founding director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum.
Americans did not know Nixon’s worldview until tapes of his Oval Office conversations surfaced.
“Trump and Nixon share this belief that the structure of government is working against them,” Naftali said. “Nixon’s conspiracy theories sent him down a rabbit hole that destroyed his presidency. We’ll see what happens to President Trump.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2019/10/15/trump-conspiracy-impeachment-defense-046284
2019-10-15 09:01:00Z
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