The president must be impeached

If the Mueller report doesn't detail obstruction of justice that merits removal from office, we might as well delete the statute altogether

President Trump.
(Image credit: Illustrated | BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/Getty Images. rootstocks/iStock, Rawpixel/iStock)

The long-awaited, 448-page report from Special Counsel Robert Mueller was released, in different versions, to the public and to Congress on Thursday. It contains unambiguously bad news for President Trump.

Despite the weeks-long premature touchdown celebration meltdowns in the wake of Attorney General Bob Barr's cursory March 24 summary by the president and his apologists, replete with preposterous threats to investigate the investigators and pursue vengeance against anyone who dared question the Mad King's machinations, the report very clearly establishes both that while no criminal conspiracy could be proven beyond reasonable doubt, the Trump campaign encouraged and benefited from Russian interference in the 2016 election, and that the president then flagrantly and repeatedly obstructed justice in an effort to conceal that collusion from public view during the subsequent investigation. It reads like an indictment because that's basically what it is. The Trump team has been partying on the 20-yard line.

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David Faris

David Faris is an associate professor of political science at Roosevelt University and the author of It's Time to Fight Dirty: How Democrats Can Build a Lasting Majority in American Politics. He is a frequent contributor to Informed Comment, and his work has appeared in the Chicago Sun-Times, The Christian Science Monitor, and Indy Week.