Tuesday on Fox News Channel’s “Your World,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) reacted to the conclusion from the Mueller report as disclosed by Attorney General William Barr’s letter to Congress.
According to Barr, Department of Justice special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election found no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government.
Host Neil Cavuto asked Paul if the findings exonerated President Donald Trump.
“Absolutely,” Paul replied. And I think this is a good day for America if we’re going to get beyond all this. I think it was a partisan witch-hunt from the beginning. The president has been exonerated. The Democrats and some in the left-wing media that promoted this, I think they need to apologize to the country, and they need to try to be more objective in the reporting and not create some kind of narrative that somehow President Trump is a Russian spy, which was ridiculous, but also insulting.”
On the obstruction of justice question, Paul said if there was no crime, the justice could not be obstructed.
“I think that you can’t obstruct justice when there wasn’t a crime,” he said. “How do you cover up for a crime that didn’t occur? So, if President Trump and nobody in his campaign colluded with Russia, which was the accusation if they didn’t do that, how can they be covering up for something they didn’t do? So I think it’s — this idea that where’s the burden? It’s sort of like, somebody stole some groceries in New York today. Are you guilty of it, Neil? Do you have to prove that you’re not guilty? Or should the government have to prove you’re guilty? It sort of turns it on his head, and it’s like, oh, the president needs to prove that he didn’t obstruct justice. No, that’s the government’s job. And they have a burden to prove it. They couldn’t prove it. But there also is no crime, so you can’t obstruct a crime that didn’t happen.”
Cavuto asked Paul for his thoughts on a presidential pardon for any of the actors involved in the Mueller probe, to which Paul recommended Michael Flynn, Trump’s former national security advisor.
“The one that I have the strongest feeling about is General Flynn because I think no American should be prosecuted for something they said in a private phone call unless a judge gave a warrant to the government and said they can listen to the phone call,” Paul added. “They listened to General Flynn because they were spying on the Russian ambassador, OK? That’s foreign intelligence. But that shouldn’t be domestic prosecution. So what they did to Flynn should not only is — not only was unfair, but I think should be unconstitutional. And I have been bugging the president for years to come forward and fix this for all Americans, and say that no foreign intelligence gathering of information could ever be used against an American citizen in court for a crime unrelated to terrorism. So what they did to General Flynn was unfair. And I have told the president — he’s not responded to me — but I have told him my opinion is that he ought to pardon General Flynn.”
Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor
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