July 25, 2019

Mueller’s Testimony Was Good News for Trump — And Pelosi

Robert Mueller’s disastrous testimony has taken the wind out of the sails of the Democratic impeachment drive. That is a victory for President Trump. But it also was good news for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

WASHINGTON — Robert Mueller’s disastrous testimony has taken the wind out of the sails of the Democratic impeachment drive. That is a victory for President Trump. But it also was good news for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

For most Americans, the Mueller investigation was about whether the president of the United States conspired with Russia to steal the 2016 election. Americans were told that the president was a traitor who had colluded with Vladimir Putin to subvert U.S. democracy. So, when Mueller released his report in April finding that “the investigation did not establish that the Trump Campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities,” the country breathed a sigh of relief and was ready to move on.

A Harvard-Harris poll in May found that 65% of Americans said Congress should not begin impeachment proceedings against Trump, and 80% of Americans said they wanted their “congressional representatives working more on infrastructure, health care, and immigration” instead of investigating the president. Pelosi was listening and tried to steer her caucus away from the suicidal push for impeachment.

But many Democrats refused to listen to her or the American people. Instead of focusing on substantive issues, they kept focusing on investigating Trump. Despite Mueller’s public declaration that he did not want to appear before Congress because “the report is my testimony,” they insisted he appear — even threatening to subpoena him. As a result, the prospect of Mueller’s testimony loomed over the country for months.

That was a huge risk. The Washington Post reports that Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) conducted focus groups in key battle grounds that showed “the public’s impression of the new House majority is bound up in its battles with Trump, not in its policy agenda” and the party’s preoccupation with investigations was “overshadowing the party’s agenda, threatening its grip on the House in 2020.” Rep. Charlie Crist, D-Fla., a DCCC vice chairman, warned that “it seems like there is a preoccupation with what’s happening as it relates to the White House, and so everything else sort of gets drowned out.”

Democrats took the House in 2018 by focusing on kitchen-table issues like health care and prescription drug prices to flip districts Trump won in 2016. But the impeachment obsession is threatening vulnerable freshman Democrats in those Trump districts. Rep. Ben McAdams, D-Utah, who won in a Trump district, complained that “I’m spending zero hours per week, zero minutes per week on investigations and impeachment, and I’m spending a lot of time on the issues that my district sent me here to work on . … But it doesn’t break through.”

Many of McAdams’s colleagues were unmoved by such entreaties. While pushing for Mueller to testify might overshadow their policy work, they calculated that it would also provide sound bites that would be politically devastating for the president. Their bet did not pay off. Mueller sounded fragile and confused, and gave Democrats no new ammunition to use against Trump. To the contrary, when he was asked by Rep. Douglas A. Collins, R.-Ga., “At any time in the investigation, was your investigation curtailed or stopped or hindered?” Mueller replied “no.” It’s hard to make a case for obstruction when the special counsel says he was not obstructed.

Democrats’ impeachment drive was never going to work. Even if they did pass articles of impeachment, the Senate is not going to convict him. The only way they’re going to get Trump out of office is by beating him in the 2020 election. But instead of focusing on things they need to do to defeat Trump at the ballot box — such as an policy agenda to win back working-class voters who voted for Obama but defected to Trump in 2016 — they’re focused on impeachment. Not only is that not winning back those Obama-Trump voters, it is pushing them away, because it is perceived as an effort to invalidate their votes.

So, the Mueller debacle was a gift to Pelosi. She gave her Democrats a shot at making their case for impeachment, and it blew up in their faces. Yet despite the obvious failure of the Mueller hearings, some pro-impeachment Democrats are undeterred. Politico reports that in a closed-door meeting after Mueller left Capitol Hill, House judiciary committee chairman Jerry Nadler, D.-N.Y., pushed to launch impeachment proceedings. Talk about a tin ear.

Pelosi understands that if Democrats run in 2020 on impeachment and Socialism they could lose not just the White House, but their House majority as well. The question is: Does her caucus now finally get it — or will they continue their suicidal impeachment drive?

© 2019, The Washington Post Writers Group

Who We Are

The Patriot Post is a highly acclaimed weekday digest of news analysis, policy and opinion written from the heartland — as opposed to the MSM’s ubiquitous Beltway echo chambers — for grassroots leaders nationwide. More

What We Offer

On the Web

We provide solid conservative perspective on the most important issues, including analysis, opinion columns, headline summaries, memes, cartoons and much more.

Via Email

Choose our full-length Digest or our quick-reading Snapshot for a summary of important news. We also offer Cartoons & Memes on Monday and Alexander’s column on Wednesday.

Our Mission

The Patriot Post is steadfast in our mission to extend the endowment of Liberty to the next generation by advocating for individual rights and responsibilities, supporting the restoration of constitutional limits on government and the judiciary, and promoting free enterprise, national defense and traditional American values. We are a rock-solid conservative touchstone for the expanding ranks of grassroots Americans Patriots from all walks of life. Our mission and operation budgets are not financed by any political or special interest groups, and to protect our editorial integrity, we accept no advertising. We are sustained solely by you. Please support The Patriot Fund today!


The Patriot Post and Patriot Foundation Trust, in keeping with our Military Mission of Service to our uniformed service members and veterans, are proud to support and promote the National Medal of Honor Heritage Center, the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, both the Honoring the Sacrifice and Warrior Freedom Service Dogs aiding wounded veterans, the National Veterans Entrepreneurship Program, the Folds of Honor outreach, and Officer Christian Fellowship, the Air University Foundation, and Naval War College Foundation, and the Naval Aviation Museum Foundation. "Greater love has no one than this, to lay down one's life for his friends." (John 15:13)

★ PUBLIUS ★

“Our cause is noble; it is the cause of mankind!” —George Washington

Please join us in prayer for our nation — that righteous leaders would rise and prevail and we would be united as Americans. Pray also for the protection of our Military Patriots, Veterans, First Responders, and their families. Please lift up your Patriot team and our mission to support and defend our Republic's Founding Principle of Liberty, that the fires of freedom would be ignited in the hearts and minds of our countrymen.

The Patriot Post is protected speech, as enumerated in the First Amendment and enforced by the Second Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, in accordance with the endowed and unalienable Rights of All Mankind.

Copyright © 2024 The Patriot Post. All Rights Reserved.

The Patriot Post does not support Internet Explorer. We recommend installing the latest version of Microsoft Edge, Mozilla Firefox, or Google Chrome.