tweet on saturday, i sure as heck hope the president is getting better legal advice from these guys than he s getting pr advice. to me that was a horrific two days coming out of the president s legal team that did not help this situation at all. paul, as i mentioned, the president s lawyer john dowd telling axios, quote, the president cannot obstruct justice because he s the chief law enforcement officer under the constitution s article ii and has his rightly to express his view of any case. president clinton was impeached for obstruction of justice. and never claimed the constitution immunized him. but we didn t say he s above the law. nixon suggested after he was gone in that interview with david frost that perhaps presidents can t commit certain crimes. this is a flat-out statement from the president of the united states through his attorney that he s above the law. it s really remarkable since he has he s his own worst witness, our president, right? he told, after the white h
. we re back. sticking with our politics lead, did president trump obstruct justice by tweeting he fired former national security adviser michael flynn for lying to the vice president and the fbi and for allegedly pushing comey to fire to protect flynn after he was fired? joining me now is the democratic senator from west virginia joe manchin. he s on the senate intelligence committee. senator, good to see you, as always. good to be with you, jake. i want to get your reaction to the president s lawyer, saying that the president cannot obstruct justice by definition. he s the chief law enforcement officer of the country. do you agree? can the president just is it impossible for the president to obstruct justice? i don t agree. i just think the rule of law means the rule of law. it means we re all held accountable and there are two no systems for two different types of people. in west virginia when i was governing, i had the same standards set by every individual in my state.
obstruct justice, you re almost saying he did. exactly. david ignatius, so let s key in on this reporting by mike allen. the president s lawyer saying the president cannot obstruct justice. your thoughts? well, it s a breathe taking statement. in the end it does put the matter four square. this investigation that mueller is conducting will affect the president to the extent that the house of representatives decides that there are high crimes and misdemeanors, impeachable offenses that are conveyed by the information mueller gathers. we don t know how mueller will make his report to congress about any unindicted co-conspirators or others he finds. that was never specified in his appointment. while it s technically true that he didn t obstruct justice and get prosecuted in a criminal
president can obstruct justice. it was like when nixon had an enemies list, you can t prosecute the people on his enemies list just because he doesn t like them. that s a dictatorship, authoritarian, the worst thing that could happen to democracy. we cannot let that be the standard. when nixon said anything i do is okay, because i am the president. so nothing i can can be illegal. everyone laughed, and i think that we should be looking askan of the statement of the president s lawyer the president cannot obstruct justice. get into that question and look at that tweet. apparently seemed at the time from the president now the white house saying this was actually his lawyer. saying it was a hmong bung male mangled tweet saying he fired general michael flynn because he lied to the vice president and the fbi. the crucial part of the tweet.
of fthers. newt gingrich made the case that any case against trump would be point onless. technically the president of the united states cannot obstruct justice. the president of the united states is the chief executive officer of the united states. if he wants to firt fe the fbi director, all he has to do is fire him. but that s not what gingrich believed in april of 1998 when president trump this is good. when bill clinton was in office and he was in charge of congress. what you have lived through for 2 1/2 long years is the most systemic deliberate obstruction of justice coverup, an effort to avoid the truth, we have ever seen in american history. and the time has come to say to the democrats and to say to the president quit undermining the law in the united states.