By
In recent years, plenty of investigative reports have been released related to Donald Trump scandals, and in every instance, the former president has weighed in on the findings — apparently without having read the documents. In fact, when the plain text of the reports haven’t said what Trump wanted them to say, he’s demonstrated an amazing habit of simply pretending reality has no meaning.
Around this time five years ago, for example, Trump claimed that the House Intelligence Committee had completely exonerated him in the Russia scandal. That wasn’t true. A few months later, he said the Justice Department inspector general’s office had “totally” exonerated him in the Russia scandal. That was both wrong and kind of bonkers. In February 2019, Trump also claimed that the Senate Intelligence Committee had also exonerated him in the Russia scandal. It hadn’t.
Or put another way, the Republican treats investigative reports the same way he treats election results: They only say what he wants them to say, and he only believes what he wants to believe.
All of this came to mind late yesterday, as the former president reacted with great excitement to the report from special counsel John Durham. In a series of hysterical missives published to his social media platform, the Republican suggested that Durham’s findings produced evidence of “treason“ and “the crime of the century.”
Trump went on to insist that the Durham report “spells out in great detail the Democrat [sic] Hoax that was perpetrated upon me and the American people.” At 2:15 a.m. local time, apparently still worked up, he added, “THEY ARE SCUM, LIKE COCKROACHES ALL OVER WASHINGTON, D.C.”
I realize, of course, that Trump isn’t much of a reader, and the idea that the former president would sit down and go through all 316 pages of the Durham report is obviously laughable. But like all of the other reports that Trump pretended were good news for him, the fact remains that the special counsel’s findings were actually an embarrassing dud. As the Associated Press reported:
The report Monday from special counsel John Durham represents the long-awaited culmination of an investigation that Trump and allies had claimed would expose massive wrongdoing by law enforcement and intelligence officials. Instead, Durham’s investigation delivered underwhelming results.
A New York Times report added that the report’s findings “revealed little substantial new information about the inquiry” and “failed to produce the kinds of blockbuster revelations” that Trump and his allies hoped Durham would uncover.
The special counsel’s report included no new indictments and made no additional recommendations about possible charges. The lengthy and expensive process — Durham’s investigation into the Russia scandal investigation lasted longer than Mueller’s original probe of the Russia scandal — has come to an ignominious end, not with a bang but a whimper.
For those who might benefit from a refresher — you’d be forgiven for thinking, “John Durham’s name sounds familiar, but I can’t remember why I’m supposed to care about him” — let’s revisit our earlier coverage and explain how we arrived at this point.
The original investigation into Trump’s Russia scandal, led by then-Special Counsel Robert Mueller, led to a series of striking findings: The former president’s political operation in 2016 sought, embraced, capitalized on, and lied about Russian assistance — and then took steps to obstruct the investigation into the foreign interference.
The Trump White House wasn’t pleased with the conclusions, but the Justice Department’s inspector general conducted a lengthy probe of the Mueller investigation, and not surprisingly, the IG’s office found nothing improper.
This, of course, only outraged Trump further, so then-Attorney General Bill Barr tapped a federal prosecutor — U.S. Attorney John Durham — to conduct his own investigation into the investigation. That was nearly four years ago.
After an extended period of apparent inactivity, the prosecutor eventually indicted cybersecurity attorney Michael Sussmann for allegedly having lied to the FBI. The case proved to be baseless; Sussmann was acquitted; and one of the jurors publicly mocked Durham’s team for having taken the case to trial.
Other prosecutorial attempts also failed, leading to a rather brutal tale of the tape for the special counsel:
- Two trials
- Zero convictions
- One provocative resignation
- And a largely meaningless guilty plea from an obscure figure
By any fair measure, this is the most inconsequential special counsel investigation in the modern history of American law enforcement.
But the humiliation is not limited to the prosecutor. Periodically in recent years, Trump has blurted out Durham’s name, hoping the prosecutor might yet bolster some of the former president’s conspiracy theories. As regular readers may recall, the Republican has even suggested at times that Durham’s probe could serve as a possible vehicle for retaliating against his perceived enemies.
So much for that idea.
About a year ago, the New York Times’ Charlie Savage wrote a report questioning why the Durham investigation existed. He added, “Mr. Barr’s mandate to Mr. Durham appears to have been to investigate a series of conspiracy theories.”
Those theories, however, lacked merit — a conclusion that yesterday’s report did not change.
There is a degree of irony to the circumstances: For years, Team Trump insisted that the Russia scandal was pointless but the Durham investigation was real. It now appears these Republicans had it exactly backward: The Russia scandal was real, and the Durham investigation was pointless.
This post revises our related earlier coverage.