Former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer on Wednesday argued against allowing President Trump to sit for an interview with special counsel Robert Mueller, noting that the president is “constantly contradicting himself.”
Fleischer, who served in the George W. Bush administration, warned of the possible pitfalls of Trump agreeing to an interview.
“My problem with Donald Trump sitting down is that Donald Trump talks in such loopy ways, and he’s constantly contradicting himself and saying things,” Fleischer said on Fox Business Network.
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“There’s a massive amount of risk. The risk of losing his office. That’s the risk,” he added. “The risk is they trip him up over something innocuous. Where he says something that is contradicted by something and they call it perjury. And that goes to Congress, and then Congress goes to the Democrats in the fall and he gets impeached.”
Fleischer’s comments came shortly after Trump’s lawyers rebuffed Mueller’s conditions for an interview with the president, and counteroffered with a more limited line of questioning.
The New York Times reported that attorneys Jay Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani provided a new proposal that rules out potential questions about obstruction of justice.
Mueller had reportedly agreed to limit questions about obstruction of justice, and would allow Trump to answer some of them in writing.
Wednesday’s response is the latest in a series of proposals and counter-proposals in an effort to establish ground rules for a presidential interview.
Trump has insisted publicly that he wants to speak with Mueller, as he maintains he did not collude with Russia in the 2016 election. He has simultaneously blasted the special counsel’s investigation as a “witch hunt,” and called Russian interference in the election a “hoax.”
His legal team has consistently cautioned against Trump sitting down with Mueller, warning that investigators could catch Trump perjuring himself if he contradicts other witnesses.