White House counselor Kellyanne Conway‘s attorney husband George was quick to respond on Monday to President Donald Trump‘s latest anti-Robert Mueller Twitter tirade.
Trump rattled off a series of tweets in the morning, lamenting the latest news about Michael Cohen, praising Roger Stone for having “guts” (i.e. saying that he will “never testify against Trump”), and calling Mueller “a much different man than people think.”
“Michael Cohen asks judge for no Prison Time.” You mean he can do all of the TERRIBLE, unrelated to Trump, things having to do with fraud, big loans, Taxis, etc., and not serve a long prison term? He makes up stories to get a GREAT & ALREADY reduced deal for himself, and get…..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2018
….his wife and father-in-law (who has the money?) off Scott Free. He lied for this outcome and should, in my opinion, serve a full and complete sentence.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2018
“I will never testify against Trump.” This statement was recently made by Roger Stone, essentially stating that he will not be forced by a rogue and out of control prosecutor to make up lies and stories about “President Trump.” Nice to know that some people still have “guts!”
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2018
Bob Mueller (who is a much different man than people think) and his out of control band of Angry Democrats, don’t want the truth, they only want lies. The truth is very bad for their mission!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2018
George Conway singled out tweet number three and offered a pithy response.
File under “18 U.S.C. §§ 1503, 1512” https://t.co/e4ZGVn1kJi
— George Conway (@gtconway3d) December 3, 2018
“File under ’18 U.S.C. §§ 1503, 1512,'” he said. That’s another way of saying: obstruction of justice.
18 U.S.C. § 1503 is the law on the books against corrupt or forceful attempts to “influence, intimidate, or impede any grand or petit juror, or officer in or of any court of the United States, or officer who may be serving at any examination or other proceeding before any United States magistrate judge or other committing magistrate, in the discharge of his duty.”
18 U.S.C. § 1512 is, plain and simple, witness tampering.
George is right. This is genuinely looking like witness tampering. DOJ (at least with a nonfake AG) prosecutes cases like these all the time. The fact it's done out in the open is no defense. Trump is genuinely melting down, and no good lawyer can represent him under these circs https://t.co/zqFUoQvWTf
— Neal Katyal (@neal_katyal) December 3, 2018
Conway is suggesting that Mueller might be looking at this tweet, as Mueller has apparently looked at other statements made on the president’s social medium of choice.
As some started to regard the implications of Conway’s tweet as “a Big Deal,'” Conway responded:
File under “Stating the obvious”
— George Conway (@gtconway3d) December 3, 2018
Conway’s retweets have a theme to them as well.
“Message received.” https://t.co/aXlRvZgv5e
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) December 3, 2018
You scared, bro? https://t.co/nZri0HwvPT
— Bradley P. Moss (@BradMossEsq) December 3, 2018
Lots of signaling happening on this website today… https://t.co/vtOy6Zs1WB
— Josh Campbell (@joshscampbell) December 3, 2018
This doesn’t seem very cool or very legal. https://t.co/VHnQ5CnywE
— Jon Favreau (@jonfavs) December 3, 2018
The president also caused a stir recently when he said that a pardon of Paul Manafort, for instance, is not off the table. Some have argued this would be a presidency ending move. Manafort was recently accused of lying repeatedly to FBI investigators after cutting a cooperation deal with Mueller to avoid a second trial.
Trump’s Twitter outbursts of late have come in advance of developments in the Mueller probe.
Most recently, Conway took President Trump to task for replacing Jeff Sessions with acting Attorney Attorney General Matthew Whitaker, calling the move “illegal.” He did so in an op-ed for the New York Times.
Conway’s also a founding member of the new conservative lawyers group “Checks and Balances,” which was started to “protect constitutional principles that are being undermined by the statements and actions of this president.”
Editor’s note: this story was updated after publication with additional reactions from George Conway, and context.
[Image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images]