So what was Trump’s real beef with Mueller? According to the Post, after Mueller’s appointment in May, Trump “spoke with a number of friends and advisers who convinced him that Mueller would dig through his private finances and look beyond questions of collusion with Russians. They warned that the probe could last years and would ruin his first term in office.”

That doesn’t prove Trump meant to obstruct justice. But it does show that when Trump tried to fire Mueller, the reasons he offered were fake ones concocted by his lawyers. And this echoes Trump’s behavior throughout the investigation. When Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, he initially claimed to base his decision on a memo from Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein about the Hillary Clinton investigation. Then, in an NBC interview, Trump admitted that the Rosenstein story was an excuse. Trump said his real reason was that Comey was a “showboat” and was wrecking the FBI. Then Comey told the Russian foreign minister that Comey was a “nut job” and that Trump, by firing him, had relieved “pressure” on the U.S.-Russia relationship. Then it turned out that Trump, in his initial draft of the termination letter to Comey, had begun by calling the Russia investigation “fabricated and politically motivated.”