OPINION:
Since I’ve lived the waking nightmare better known as “Trump-Russia” for nearly two years, people often ask me about the endgame. What are those attacking President Trump and his associates really after? Collusion? Obstruction? Financial crimes?
Not so much. Despite the daily onslaught from the #Resistance, those are mere pretexts for four primary objectives: impeachment, imprisonment, bankruptcy and defamation.
I say that after having testified before all three congressional committees investigating Russian interference into our 2016 elections and the special counsel.
Despite a 20-year Navy career from which I retired as a commander, including 10 years overseas and four years as a Pentagon spokesman, I’ve been lied about by members of Congress on live national television, smeared and relentlessly hounded by the media, and I’ve attracted multiple stalkers. It’s cost me five-figure legal bills — coming from my military retirement pay. Derailed prospects for a senior administration post and other valuable opportunities. Nobody wants to hire you if they think you could be indicted, they say.
And for what?
On July 20, 2016, during the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, after giving public remarks at the U.S. State Department-sponsored Global Partners in Diplomacy Program (GPD) in my role as the campaign’s full-time national security adviser, I shook hands and exchanged pleasantries with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak in a crowd of 50-plus other foreign ambassadors. That same evening at the GPD’s “Networking Reception,” after running into Mr. Kislyak at the buffet line, we ate chicken satays for a few minutes next to a couple of other ambassadors and Carter Page. The #Resistance screamed — two secret meetings. And one including Carter Page, no less! Attorney General Jeff Sessions, my boss on the campaign’s National Security Advisory Committee, was similarly smeared that day.
On July 11, 2016, during the Republican platform week also in Cleveland, I represented the campaign on national security, as assigned. One 82-year-old delegate from Texas was adamant about including a proposed amendment to the draft 66-page Republican Party Platform calling for sending “lethal defensive weapons” to Ukraine. After a short yet confusing debate, a majority of the delegates voted to strike those words from her proposal in favor of “appropriate assistance.” The latter better reflected Donald Trump’s stated position to avoid World War III over Ukraine. Yes, the same position as President Obama. Yet the incident has been dishonestly portrayed by The Washington Post and countless others as the Trump campaign “gutting” or “changing the GOP Platform.”
Lastly, as the director of the National Security Advisory Committee, I oversaw a loosely organized group of roughly 15 part-time, truly volunteer advisers, including Carter Page and George Papadapoulos. Though it’s become clear that I kept less tabs on them than an FBI informant and his colleagues, potentially at the highest levels of government during the Obama administration.
With that background explained, here’s the #Resistance endgame:
Impeachment: Democrats in Congress have said it loudly and often. If and when they win back the House of Representatives in November, they will impeach President Trump. It doesn’t matter if they find any evidence of wrongdoing. Or not. A simple majority vote will do. Impeachment hearings throughout 2019 may not remove the president, as that requires a two-thirds majority conviction in the Senate, but they would paralyze the government. Do you think gridlock is bad now?
Imprisonment: Though the multiple investigations and spying into Russian election meddling were purportedly launched to explore “collusion,” after nearly two years there’s still no evidence. Yet four Trump associates are most likely headed to prison for other things, like past financial crimes and lying to the FBI. Former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, his deputy Rick Gates, White House National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and George Papadapoulos are victims of the shakedown of the century.
Bankruptcy: Nearly 50 Trump associates from the campaign, transition and administration have been called before the various congressional committees, special counsel and/or grand jury. We are collectively spending millions of dollars defending ourselves from intense interrogations and blatant perjury traps. It goes like this: Can’t remember one of countless thousands of emails and phone calls from over a year ago? Too bad, here is a copy of the email, serial #XYZ1234 to refresh your memory. Better hope the names and dates match the oral exam you just took. Because if not, that’s perjury. Can’t recall once too often? Sorry, that’s obstruction.
Investigators have collected 1 million documents, and that’s why you need a good lawyer, or several. Thank God for my campaign colleague Michael Caputo, his lawyer Ralph Lorigo, and their grassroots supporters at the Michael Caputo Legal Fund for generously reaching out to pay my legal bills.
Defamation: Mugshots are splattered across TV screens and throughout national newspapers, magazines, blogs and social media suggesting nefarious activity nearly every day. Person X may have committed treason. Person Y is wanted for questioning. Perhaps the greatest example is the instance when FBI Director James Comey testified on live national TV during the March 2017 House Intelligence Committee hearing that the entire Trump campaign is under a counterintelligence investigation for ties to Russia, to include whether crimes were committed. Though he knew just a few people were under surveillance, he refused to rule anyone out and thus implied guilt of everyone in Mr. Trump’s orbit, from the president on down. Countless media outlets have gleefully speculated ever since on who might have done what and when. How do such purported journalists and pundits sleep at night?
While Americans are bombarbed with the millionth round of TV pundits spewing “salacious but unverified” nonsense and other malicious lies, it’s useful to remember the endgame.
• J.D. Gordon is a former Pentagon spokesman and retired Navy commander. He is a former full-time senior national security and foreign policy adviser to Republican presidential candidates Donald Trump, Mike Huckabee and Herman Cain.
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