Moyers: Is there any way that Assange could be viewed as an agent of a foreign power at this point, or is he just a rogue player?
Harper: My opinion is that during the election, he was an agent acting for the benefit for Trump. He claims that he wasn't dealing with Russian documents. I find that difficult to believe. And certainly, as you said, the US intelligence community is of the view that WikiLeaks was the vehicle through which Russia distributed and disseminated its hacked documents. And I think he's clearly acting on behalf of interests that are Russian interests.
Moyers: What do you make of Assange and WikiLeaks urging Donald Trump Jr. to suggest to his father that if he loses the election, he should contest the election? What was that about?
Harper: Chaos. I think the goal was chaos. That's what takes me back to believing that at some level Russia was behind what WikiLeaks was proposing. Because for Putin there are two ways for him to improve Russia's standing. One is to figure out a way to bring his country up. One easy way would be to get some relief from the sanctions. But an equally powerful way to do it is to bring Western democracies, especially America, down. So what better way to foment chaos than a postelection trauma, if you will, in which Trump is contesting election results in various states and doing all of the things he certainly would have been capable of doing? And of course, WikiLeaks feeds right into Trump's soft spot by suggesting, in that same email that you just mentioned, that this could be good for him too, particularly if what he really wants to do is launch a new media network. So it all fits.
Moyers: What do you make of the fact that Donald Trump Jr. did not report to the FBI that WikiLeaks was soliciting him last year? Does that put him legally at risk?
Harper: The mere failure to report doesn't, but it certainly adds to the question about what Trump Jr.'s true motives and the motives of the Trump campaign were in pursuing the information WikiLeaks was offering. Now, let me give you something else to think about, and see if your reaction causes you some of the heartburn it causes me.
In June of last year -- quite a month, no? -- there was another "hot date." Jared Kushner -- Trump's son-in-law and close adviser -- assumed control of the digital campaign and hired the firm Cambridge Analytica. We talked about Cambridge Analytica a moment ago. Well, Cambridge Analytica's vice president had been Steve Bannon. And about the same time that Kushner hired Cambridge Analytica, the CEO of Cambridge Analytica is reaching out to WikiLeaks with an offer to help disseminate hacked documents.
And then you get to July 22 and WikiLeaks is releasing hacked documents. In August, George Papadopoulos is continuing to push Russia on the campaign team, Roger Stone is continuing to talk about his communications with Assange and WikiLeaks (and it certainly looks as if Stone is predicting more WikiLeaks releases of documents) and the daughter of the part-owner of Cambridge Analytica, Rebekah Mercer -- who is also a Trump donor -- tells its CEO to reach out to WikiLeaks too. And then Donald Jr.'s email exchange with WikiLeaks comes in September. See what I mean? There's a ramping up of the process that culminates in those email exchanges that Don Jr. had with WikiLeaks and that becomes, I think, an important narrative to understanding the story.
Moyers: I need some Tums. [laughter]
Harper: It's good and bad, I guess -- getting mired in all these details. The good news is we learn more facts. The bad news is we learn more facts -- and it may not be possible for Americans to put it all together and conclude that anything significant happened, when actually there's a grave threat to democracy.
Moyers: Let me pause right there. As Josh Marshall points out at Talking Points Memo, the Justice Department is directly overseeing Mueller's investigation. It has absolute power over the inquiry. Meaning that Mueller is now investigating his overseers. Isn't that certain to have some impact on the process?
Harper: I don't think so. Let me tell you why. I think the only thing that will affect the process, and this is the thing frankly that I fear more than anything else, will be if Trump fires Mueller. We know Attorney General Jeff Sessions has recused himself. If he should resign, that would be a great victory for Trump, who could then appoint someone else as an acting attorney general who could then fire Mueller, and the ball bounces to Rod Rosenstein. Rosenstein's been on record a couple of times saying that he hasn't seen any basis for firing Mueller. And at this point, I have competing views of Rosenstein in general, but I think on this issue, he realizes that his personal interest and his professional interest and even the country's interest requires that if Trump were to issue an order to fire Mueller or even if he were to try to interfere with Mueller's investigation in some way, allowing him to do so will be a very bad thing for Rosenstein personally. I don't think he'll do it.
Moyers: There's a precedent for this, of course. Nixon went ahead and fired the special prosecutor investigating Watergate.
Harper: Yes, but he had to go through [Attorney General] Richardson and [Deputy Attorney General] Ruckelshaus to do it. Trump would have to fire Rosenstein, then he'd have to fire an associate attorney general named Rachel Brand, who -- based on everything everything I've read about her -- would likely balk and not be inclined to follow an order unless she were satisfied that there was in fact good cause to do it.
Moyers: What might provoke Trump to risk everything -- firestorm, constitutional crisis, even impeachment -- to fire Mueller?
Harper: I think he'll do it if he thinks that things are getting too close. I think he's already been close to doing it in the past. And I think at some point, and I think it's probably a question of when [not if], he will fire Mueller. I really fear that's what's going to happen. And of course the irony is that for the amount of time Mueller has spent on the job, he's achieved remarkable results. He's working very quickly, very efficiently. The median life of a special counsel is just under two years. The average is three years. The Iran-Contra investigation went for six and a half years. Whitewater went for more than eight years. The Valerie Plame NSA leak went for two years. We're what? Just five months in?
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