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RUSH: PMSNBC reporting that Sean Spicer has just resigned. Fox News has picked it up. It probably goes together with the naming of Scaramucci as the new communications director in the White House, Anthony Scaramucci. This guy looks 22, he’s probably 50. He does. He is one of these guys that has a little boy look. That’s not a criticism; it’s just an observation.

So Spicer has resigned. Scaramucci, Anthony Scaramucci, if the name rings a bell, he was the subject of that fraudulent lying POS story that CNN had. (laughing) Sorry. It’s been a long week, and I am worn out. I have to tell you, I’m worn out. I didn’t get to bed ’til three o’clock last night ’cause I couldn’t tear myself away from what I was doing.

Anyway, CNN ran that lying, distorted POS story on Scaramucci being tied to the Russians. Remember, this is the one they had to withdraw, they had to delete, they had to apologize, and three people at CNN resigned over it. If that rings a bell, that’s who Anthony Scaramucci is. Now, there’s a story out today that the Trump administration, that Trump and his family are asking experts who among them can be pardoned, and can the president himself be pardoned? I mean, I don’t think anybody knows the answer to that, as I don’t think a president’s ever tried to pardon himself.

Pardons, everybody misunderstands these things. They are not always given as an exoneration. Just because you’re pardoned doesn’t mean you were guilty of something. You could have been wrongly convicted and a pardon is actually an exoneration. A pardon in this case of what Mueller is doing — see, I think Mueller’s the story. I don’t think Trump is. Mueller’s the story, this out-of-control investigation that is obviously a political opposition research program underway with all the liberal Democrats supporting Obama and had Hillary that Mueller has hired. And the no parameters and the wide open playing field, they go anywhere back in time to any point they want. There’s no limits on them.

And one way Trump could shut it down, there’s speculation, why don’t you just fire Mueller? And our good buddies at National Review Online, which, for the most part, are Never Trumpers, are now wagering on the odds that Trump will fire Mueller. And some of them are saying it’s a hundred percent, others say 70%, some say 50%. One way to end this is just pardon everybody that Mueller is investigating. Right now. Just pardon them. It would shut down the investigation. If there’s not going to be any punishment, whatever charges are brought eventually, if allegations are made, they’ve been prepardoned here. It’d be one way of shutting it down.

If Trump were to fire Mueller — and believe me, the conventional wisdom is that he’s going to at some point because — one thing, Mr. Snerdley, we’d all have to agree here. Trump ran for president for a whole bunch of reasons, but I think it’s probably safe to say that the one thing Trump did not want to happen is because he wins the presidency, there now begins an open-ended investigation of his entire business life.

There is no way that Donald Trump is gonna sit here and put up with that. That’s not why he did this. And that’s why learned experts are engaging in taking odds on how long it is before Mueller gets fired. And there are ways, folks, of getting there before that kind of drastic step, either firing Mueller or pardoning everybody that might be involved.

By the way, the Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, is getting amused at all this stuff. He can’t believe that everybody’s making such a big deal that Trump sat next to Putin for a second time, maybe for 15 minutes at the G20 dinner. CNN reported that it was a secret meeting, when it was right out in the open. Three different CNN infobabes and anchorettes reported it as a secret meeting and it’s happening right in front of everybody’s eyes, and our old buddy Chris Cillizza got offended.

He said, “Nobody at CNN ever said it was secret.” And somebody had to point out to him in a humiliating Reddit thread and Twitter thread, “Chris, your own network referred to it as a secret meeting, three different people.” He wasn’t even aware of what was on his own network. His instincts were to just defend any journalist against any allegation. “Nobody called it secret.”

Anyway, the Russian foreign minister said (paraphrasing), “Maybe Trump and Putin had an even more private meeting. How do you know they didn’t go to the bathroom together? Maybe there was a third secret meeting that they had.” And of course the Democrats, rather than realizing they’re being trolled, are going, “Oh, yeah! Were there cameras on the way to the bathroom? I know there probably are.” They’re looking at this as a possibility.

Funny line. I got an email from a friend last night. “Have you seen Drudge?” he said? I said, “Well, no, not since the radio show.” He said the most amazing thing. There are some women transgendering to men who want to join the SEALs. Yeah. Women transgendering to men who want to join the SEALs. Now, wait. My friend said, “Besides whether or not they’re gonna alter the qualifications,” he says, “based on the way wives treat husbands and women treat men, why would a woman want to become a man?”

I had to read it twice to get the joke. Why would a woman knowingly want to become a man, given the way they deal with men already. It’s stereotypical humor. It’s based on the stereotype of the never-ending nagging and backseat driving. I guess you had to have been there. So the big narrative of the day is Trump and pardons or firing Mueller.

There’s another way of going about this. Andy McCarthy — I mentioned him yesterday — he’s written about this I can’t tell you how many times. That the way to rein Mueller in is to simply have Rosenstein, who’s the deputy attorney general, establish some parameters based on existing law. The way the special counsel appointment and behavior, the way it’s supposed to work is this: The deputy attorney general — in this case, it has to be deputy because Sessions has recused himself. But normally it would be the attorney general. But in this case it would be the deputy attorney general. Rosenstein would tell the special counsel what crimes he is permitted to investigate.

Folks, the reason this is outrageous is that there has to be, under normal circumstances, an underlying crime before a special counsel can be appointed, and there isn’t one here. Nobody has found a crime. All we have are seven months of open-ended leaks and allegations that are not provable, that do not even have named sources behind them. We don’t have any evidence of actually tampering with votes or collusion or obstruction. All we’ve got is that dossier and the firing of James Comey. That is it!

The firing of James Comey is what has led here to a special counsel. But there’s no crime. And I am not making this up. With no underlying crime, there’s really no reason for a special counsel. But, as we know, Mueller is already an eager beaver. He’s at it. He’s hiring all these liberal Democrat lawyers and investigators.

So after the deputy attorney general tells the special counsel who’s been named what crimes he is permitted to investigate, that establishes parameters. And if in the investigation of that specific crime, if other crimes are found, the special counsel cannot, by statute, investigate them. He has to go back to the deputy attorney general and get permission to.

He has to take the evidence that he’s found of additional crimes outside the original crime parameter, go to the DAG and say and, “I found this crime, this crime. I want permission to go there and investigate.” It probably would be granted, but he just can’t go off the reservation on his own. Of course, this is not widely known because the Drive-Bys are not interested in this kind of knowledge being in the domain, public domain. They don’t care that you understand this.

They want you to believe that Mueller is perfectly fine doing a witch-hunt and going anywhere he wants in any aspect of Trump’s life because of the seriousness of the charge. But there isn’t yet an underlying crime. There really is no reason for a special counsel other than nobody in the Trump Justice Department wanted to deal with this. It is reg 600.4(b). If the special counsel stumbles upon additional crimes, he’s not allowed to investigate them. He has to first go back to the deputy attorney general for permission to expand his jurisdiction.

So the Regulations on Grounds for Appointing the Special Counsel requires the attorney general or the deputy — or, in this case, it’d be Rosenstein, again — to determine that there are grounds for a criminal investigation. That means there has to be an underline lying crime, and to the best of my knowledge there isn’t an underlying crime here. That’s what they’re trying to find. That’s not what this special counsel provision is for. They don’t get to go out there and just turn everything upside down looking for a crime.

There has to have been a crime committed, and then the DAG determines the grounds of that criminal investigation, thereby establishing the parameters outside of which the DAG and the special counsel cannot go. The regulation on defining the jurisdiction of the special counsel… All of this is written out. This is all law. It’s in the U.S. Code. In this case, I’m citing 28 CFR 600.4, just to let you know what the tag is. The regulation on defining the jurisdiction of the special counsel requires, in this case, the deputy attorney general to “provide a special counsel specific factual statement of the matter to be investigated.”

That’s in quotes. That is from the regulation. That is from the law. That hasn’t been done. So there has to be an underlying crime, and then the DAG has to provide a specific factual statement of the matter to be investigated, which also thus limits what the special counsel can do. That hasn’t happened. And as the 28 CFR 600.1 notation here requires — again, the Regulations on Grounds for Appointing the Special Counsel requires the DAG to determine there are grounds for — has to determine there is a crime.

That regulation makes clear the matter must be a criminal investigation. The letter from the deputy attorney general, Rosenstein, appointing Mueller refers to Comey’s March 20th testimony, which described a counterintelligence investigation not a criminal investigation! And that was during a time when Comey was telling the president and Congress there was no criminal investigation of the president. That’s why this is outrageous. Mueller should be the story.

This entire array that has resulted in the appointment of the special counsel has occurred outside the bounds of regulations governing it. There is no underlying crime. There is no list of areas related to that crime that limits the investigative powers of the special counsel. In addition, the letter that Rosenstein sent to Mueller authorizing his investigation references Comey’s March 20th testimony, which was about a counterintel investigation not a criminal investigation. And remember, on March 20th, that was during a period of time Comey had told Trump already — and Congress — three different times that Trump was not a target of a criminal investigation.

Therefore, if the White House wants to, they can push back on every item I’ve just shared here with you. They can push back, and they can illustrate how out of control this is, how outside the bounds of the law this whole thing has been set up and how it’s operating, and there is every reason in the book. The Drive-Bys today are apoplectic that the Trump team has now decided to conduct investigations of Mueller’s team. Have you heard that? Oh, this is great. As though they didn’t investigate Ken Starr.

They didn’t only investigate Ken Starr, they ended up claiming Ken Starr was a sex pervert selling Joe Camel cigarettes to your kids on the grounds of your public school! So here comes Trump saying, “We’re gonna investigate the special counsel, his people.” “You can’t do that! You can’t you can’t investigate the special council.” That’s like ,”Well, you can’t investigate journalists! You can’t investigate us! We’re immune.” No. This is such… In my mind, Trump would be perfectly within his rights to shut this down.

There’s nothing about this that has followed regulations — and the big deal that they’re investigating Trump for criminal activity? There isn’t. There hasn’t been an underlying crime mentioned. And the letter that gives Mueller the authority, which is what Rosenstein’s letter said? It cites Comey at a period of time where Comey had already told everybody Trump was not a target of a criminal investigation, so what is this? Well, we all know what it is. At the very least, it is a Democrat Party, an American left and media opposition research effort.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Just to be clear, when I’m reading these reg CFR 28 and CFR 600.1, CFR is the code of federal regulations, is what that stands for. Code of Federal Regulations. They pertain to the Department of Justice. And they’re regulations; they’re not laws. They’re not, for example, Title 18 United States Code. These are federal regulations that govern the DOJ. They’re rules, and very few of them have been applied and abided by in the appointment of the special counsel here, and in charging him with his responsibilities.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: The White House is making it clear they’re not happy at all with this special counsel.

There is a story today from Breitbart: “Loose Lips Sink Ships: Mueller Probe Team Starts Leaking Special Counsel Investigation Details to Press.” Did you know this was happening? No, no, that’s not supposed to happen. The special counsel is supposed to hold all of his cards close to the vest. He’s not supposed to tell anybody diddly-squat, but they’re starting to leak it because everybody this guy’s hired is either an Obamaite or a Clintonista.

They’re fundraisers; they are donors; they’re lawyers. This is the team of people investigating Trump. And the people investigating the Russia-Trump connection are nothing more than Clinton-DNC donors. And they’re being given access to something that not even Podesta and Hillary could get their hands on, despite all of their opposition research. You know what these people are gunning for, don’t you? Among many other things they’re gunning for Trump’s tax returns. They think Trump’s tax returns hold the key to getting rid of him in any number of ways.

But this is a giant opposition research operation here disguised as an investigation. There’s no underlying crime. As such, there should not be a special counsel. You don’t appoint special counsels without an underlying crime to investigate, and there isn’t one here. They’re trying to criminalize Trump firing Comey. But what they now have is access to the most personal details of Trump’s life, and now they’re starting to leak all of that with the sole purpose of destroying him. This is not an investigation. It’s a political assassination. It is a coup, silent coup, or what have you.

It’s being made to look like any other independent counsel investigation. It’s being made to look like any other special counsel that we’ve ever had, legal, filled with jurisprudence, and totally aboveboard, being conducted by people with the utmost integrity and honor, you know, all the usual bromides we get about these. But that’s not what’s happening here. The establishment wanted a special prosecutor to slow-walk this investigation all the way into 2020, even if they find nothing, in order to be able to leak what they hope will be damaging information all along the way in an attempt to convince voters they should not have voted for Trump. And to see to it that they don’t ever vote for Trump again.

Look at it this way. The Mueller investigation is an effort by Clinton’s donors to get inside the lives of everybody close to Trump and leak their personal details in order to destroy him. To make sure that nobody ever votes for him again and to make sure that Trump sees the best course of action for him would be to resign. And because of this, given these truths, Trump will have no choice but than to fire Mueller or to pardon everybody involved.

Because, folks, I don’t care what you think, Donald Trump did not set aside everything he was doing and decide to run for president so that the entire Washington establishment could conduct an investigation into every day of his life for the purposes of destroying him. That’s not why he did this. And if they keep on with this and if they keep leaking things, I don’t see how he doesn’t fire them. I don’t see how he doesn’t shut this down.

And I think if he does it after certain things happen, I think most of his supporters are gonna applaud it, because his supporters didn’t sign up for this, either. They didn’t elect somebody who hasn’t done anything that’s gonna be investigated for the entire number of years that he serves as president. And it’s open-ended. They didn’t specify a crime, and they didn’t specify parameters where the investigation must go and can’t go outside, none of that.

There’s no limits on anything this guy can do. There are literally no limits to this investigation. And that makes this investigation way, way, way outside the code of federal regulations governing these events in the Department of Justice. There would be justification upon justification upon justification for shutting this down. But they’re not gonna do it. I think they’re first gonna focus on what I’ve been talking about here, actually. I think they’re gonna make the case that the appointment of the special counsel was erroneous and mistaken because there was not an underlying crime.

I think they’re gonna focus, in a public relations effort, making the point that the deputy attorney general didn’t spell out the guidelines for the special counsel to follow. I mean, a slam-dunk point for me is that the letter from Rosenstein, the DAG, who named the special counsel, the letter he wrote to Mueller telling him what to do occurred at a time when James Comey was telling everybody, including Trump, that Trump was not the target of a criminal investigation. Therefore, what is this about?

If Comey had told everybody Trump was not a target, that he was not being investigated, then why is there a special counsel? Well, the reason is Trump fired Comey. And they’re trying to criminalize that. And because of some of the things Trump said after he did it, they’re saying, “Hey, he opened the door; he invited us in with his loose lips.”

So that’s where all of this stands. A person familiar with the probe told Bloomberg the special counsel is examining a broad range of transactions involving Trump and his associated businesses and even apartments he has rented to Russians and sold to Russians in Trump Tower all the way back to 2008.

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