My Humble Predictions (Drum Roll Please)

Partly in light of the latest revelation about Trump’s attempt to fire special prosecutor Robert Mueller last June, which was thwarted by the White House counsel and subsequently denied all over the place by the White House staff and now also by Trump himself, I am going to go out on a narrow shaky limb and make some predictions. 

Of course, the public still does not know most of what Mueller‘s investigation has uncovered. Although there is already clear public evidence of attempted collusion with Russia by many members of Trump’s campaign, including Don Junior and Kushner, it is anyone’s guess whether there is sufficient evidence of criminal conspiracy related to that, and my prediction is that there will most likely not be criminal charges, although there will probably be additional revelations about collusion and connections, as well as about other Russian interference. 

I think it is likely that sooner or later there will be additional charges of money laundering and/or other financial crimes related to the Trump organization, although whether that will be directly tied to the campaign and its links to Russia is still anyone’s guess. It is also hard to predict whether Trump himself will get hit with any of these.  However, there may well be additional indictments on these or other charges within Trump’s inner circle, including Don Junior and Kushner, and I think that despite the inevitable political backlash, there is at least an even chance that they will get presidential pardons if convicted, or possibly even before trial, although of course that can only extend to federal charges.

I saved the best for last. I predict that there will most likely be obstruction of justice charges and probably also lying to the FBI charges against Trump within the next few months, assuming that he does testify in person before the special prosecutor’s team in the near future. I think this does depend to some extent on what the underlying crime or crimes turn out to be, which would have a direct bearing on the pivotal issue of Trump’s intent, but I think his probable knowledge of at least some of the attempted collusion and also of any financial crimes will tip the scales toward obstruction. Having said that, I do think that a major motivation in Trump’s attempts to shut down the investigations involves his obsession with denying any evidence or suggestion of illegitimacy of his electoral victory. I imagine Trump’s lawyers are sweating bullets over the prospect of his testimony in person with the special counsel, given his reported penchant for inventing and then believing his own version of reality, which will inevitably conflict with testimony from other witnesses and other objective evidence.  If these charges are brought against POTUS, I predict the House Republicans will continue to try to discredit the Mueller investigation and will not bring impeachment charges, but that this will further energize Democrats to take back control of the House in 2018. If that happens, I predict there will be impeachment proceedings and ultimately probably impeachment (depending to some extent on the size of the Democratic majority). This will further tear the country apart along political lines. What happens after that is really anyone’s guess. The Democrats will not have a super majority of the senate even if they retake the majority, which I think is still an uphill climb from here. Therefore they will not have enough votes to convict and remove Trump. Whether enough Republicans decide that they would be better off with Pence than Trump in the oval office at that point will depend on how Republican public opinion shifts in light of impeachment. There would also be the possibility of Trump’s resignation, and he may just be sufficiently fed up with everything by then to decide to cut his losses and bolt!

There you have it! In the well worn and vastly overused words of our glorious leader, “we’ll see what happens”!