RussiaGate to the Gallows

Top Democrats say that the noose is tightening around the Trump family, and that it is now crucial to protect Special Counsel Robert Mueller so he can complete the investigation.

"As the noose starts to close around the White House and around the Trump family, a very different set of behaviors could emerge,” Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Rhode Island) told Politico on Tuesday. "It’s under those kinds of pressures that the special counsel needs to be able to continue its work.”

He was talking about two bipartisan bills introduced that block Trump from firing Mueller. One bill would requires a review of any termination by three federal judges, and the other would require top officials at the Department of Justice to go before a panel of judges to explain any decision to fire Mueller.

Whitehouse said that it time seek protective measures for Mueller. Whitehouse said the two bills likely would be merged.

“It doesn’t make sense to have competing ones so we’ll have to… work on a compromise version,” he told Politico.

The latest contribution to the Russia probe comes from the IRS, which this week has begun sharing information with Mueller. Though the FBI and the IRS were at odds early in the investigation, the latter is now sharing a decade worth of financial information about a former Trump campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, and about a former national security advisor, Michael Flynn.

On Monday, Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said Manafort and Flynn were “almost sure” to be hit with criminal charges. “I’m about 99 percent sure there will be some criminal charges from this investigation.”