The highest-ranking Democrats in the land have long been outraged and appalled by the notion that Russian cyberwar against America contributed to the election of Donald Trump as president and commander in chief.
The highest-ranking Republicans, with the exception of a few courageous GOP leaders such as Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), have been weak and incoherent when responding to the Trump-Russia relationships, whatever they are.
Even when Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, who was leading the investigation of Russian attacks against American democracy, most Republican leaders declined to unequivocally condemn the president.
Nevertheless, the Comey firing triggered a quiet alarm among leading Republicans throughout official Washington, who have increasingly tied their political fate to Trump’s and worry with great trepidation what Trump might do next that could endanger their party (not to mention our country).
{mosads}Then Trump appeared to threaten Comey with disclosures of tape recordings he may or may not have made of his conversations with the FBI chief, which raised the growing alarms a notch higher.
If the firing triggered a quiet alarm among leading Republicans, and the threat of potential tapes has escalated the alarm, the latest imbroglio over Trump allegedly disclosing classified information to the Russian foreign minister and Russian ambassador to America has triggered a virtual panic among top Republican leaders — as it should!
The allegation, first reported in The Washington Post and then The New York Times and other media organizations, is that Trump disclosed code-word-clearance classified information to the Russians at their meeting last week. Code-word-clearance is a higher level of classification than top-secret. If Trump did, in fact, disclose code-word-clearance information, it should generate a stampede of Republicans abandoning the president and American allies with whom we share secret information reacting with fury.
If Trump did disclose code-word-clearance classified information to the Russians, it could be considered a criminal act unless Trump had personally declassified this information — which any president has the technical authority to do — before disclosing it. Even if Trump did declassify the information, the resulting firestorm would be almost as severe, and the potential damage to American intelligence and American security would be just as grave, if the allegations are proven true.
The growing panic among GOP leaders — and panic is not too strong a word — results from the fact that so many high-level Republicans have been enabling Trump, and making excuses for Trump, and offering defenses of Trump, that they have locked themselves into a political embrace that is so tight it has the potential to destroy the GOP majorities in the House and Senate.
The Senate Intelligence Committee should issue subpoenas requiring Trump to produce all tapes of any conversations he may have recorded in the White House, and Republican leaders would be wise to support this. They should support subpoenas requiring Trump to produce all aspects of his tax returns and financial information as well, including any business, loans or deals with Russia, China and other unfriendly foreign nations.
Republican leaders should join Democratic leaders in calling for a fully independent special prosecutor to fairly and effectively investigate all aspects of Russian attempts to attack our democracy and influence our government, and to determine whether or not there was collusion or coordination between the Russians and anyone associated with Trump.
It remains unlikely that Republican leaders will take the action this crisis demands to reassure the American people and our allies. But make no mistake, Republican leadership panic is growing to extreme levels. All bets are off about how much longer GOP leaders will accept Trump endangering our country and potentially leading their party to an electoral armageddon in 2018.
Brent Budowsky was an aide to former Sen. Lloyd Bentsen (D-Texas) and Rep. Bill Alexander (D-Ark.), then-chief deputy majority whip of the House. He holds an LL.M. in international financial law from the London School of Economics. He can be read on The Hill’s Contributors and reached at brentbbi@webtv.net.
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