The president knows this, which is almost certainly why he has not and probably will not fire Mueller. He has spent the past 15 months doggedly attacking the legitimacy of Mueller’s probe, every day, from the comfort of his Twitter account. It is his only legal and political strategy. The president knows perfectly well what he did or didn’t do during the election. He knows whether or not he and his slimy associates at the Trump Organization spent decades breaking laws and laundering money. To believe that they all did nothing wrong is to believe that they have spent two years constructing a rickety Jenga tower of lies for no apparent reason other than the sheer joy of prevaricating. The end game has always been to convince MAGAworld that the probe is illegitimate, and to dare this supine Congress not to do anything about its findings.

So far that’s been a pretty smart gamble, as you will never go broke betting on the willingness of Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell to sell out the country for a chance to cut taxes on rich people one last time. As always, it will almost certainly be up to voters to hold Trump and the GOP accountable. Let’s hope they have more sense than the president and his lawyers.