Conservative media joined a certain former president last week whipping up the political right over what they claimed was a smoking gun: proof from an ongoing investigation by special counsel John Durham that Hillary Clinton and other Democrats “spied” on Donald Trump while he was president. Trump called it worse than Watergate! He suggested someone should be executed.
Small problem: The filings by Durham that sparked it all don’t say what Fox News and others claim they do — which Durham himself has now clarified. Since our colleagues on the right are unlikely to correct the record for their readers and viewers, we will.
Durham is the former assistant U.S. attorney who then-Attorney General William Barr appointed as special prosecutor in 2019 in accordance with Trump’s vindictive order that his administration “investigate the investigators” — that is, probe the origins of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Trump’s ties to Russia. Contrary to MAGA mythology, the Russia investigation was clearly justified by Trump’s repeated and bizarre acquiescence toward a dangerous U.S. adversary. Though Mueller’s probe didn’t prove collusion, it revealed Trump’s corrupt attempts to thwart the investigation itself. Vengefully unleashing Durham on those involved in the Mueller probe was Trump at his Trumpiest.
