Former Vice President Joe Biden has said he would advise President Donald Trump not to meet with special counsel Robert Mueller for fear he would be caught lying to investigators.
‘If I were the president’s lawyer I would probably tell him not to sit down with the special counsel,’ Biden said in an interview on Tuesday night with CNN’s Chris Cuomo.
‘The President has some difficulty with precision,’ Biden added. ‘And one of the things that I would worry about if I were his lawyer is him saying something that was just simply not true without him even planning to be disingenuous.’
‘I just marvel at some of the things he says and does, like two days ago anybody who didn’t stand up and clap for him was un-American and maybe even treasonous,’ Biden said, in reference to Trump’s comments about Democrats who remained sitting while he covered positive economic news during the state of the union address.
Former Vice President Joe Biden said he doesn’t think Trump should speak with investigators
Trump has said publicly that he’d look forward to speaking with Muller under oath, but his lawyers reportedly have the same concern that Biden does
When Cuomo mentioned that the White House has said the treason remark was in jest, Biden replied: ‘Well let me tell you, he’s a joke.’
Trump has said publicly that he’d look forward to speaking with Muller under oath as part of the special prosecutor’s probe into potential Russian interference in the election.
However, on Monday the New York Times reported that Trump’s lawyers are concerned that the president, who has a history of making false statements and contradicting himself, could be charged with lying to investigators.
Refusing an interview could lead to Mueller subpoenaing Trump to testify before a grand jury, setting up a potential court fight.
Robert Muller (above) was appointed by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein in May 2017 to investigate any potential links between the Russian government and the Trump campaign
Biden also attacked Trump’s recent decision to approve the declassification of a House Intelligence Committee memo describing impropriety in the FBI’s 2016 court application to eavesdrop on Trump campaign aide Carter Page.
‘This is the first president to make a full-throated, unvarnished attack on the entirety of the FBI. Not going after J. Edgar Hoover, who was one person… this was to discredit the FBI and discredit his own Justice Department,’ said Biden.
The declassified memo, authored by Republican Congressional staffers, describes actions taken by specific high-level FBI and Justice Department officials, including Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, former Director James Comey and Andrew McCabe, who hastily resigned as FBI deputy director last week.
Biden continued: ‘This is doing everything that Putin ever wanted, sowing doubt about whether or not our justice system is fair, sowing doubt about whether or not there is anything that’s remotely consistent with our Constitution, is just, it’s a disaster.’