Yes, Donald Trump is indeed a “criminal target” in Robert Mueller’s Trump-Russia investigation

Special Counsel Robert Mueller told Donald Trump’s attorneys last month that while Trump is still under investigation in the Trump-Russia scandal, he’s not a criminal target in the investigation, according to a new Washington Post report. The thing is, that’s not at all the case. We’re not disputing what the Post is reporting, or what Mueller said to Trump’s attorney. We’re simply referring to the way these kinds of investigations really work.

Last year Donald Trump kept asking then-FBI Director James Comey whether or not he was personally under investigation as part of the Trump-Russia probe. Comey told him “no.” Down the road we learned that at a later point, Trump was indeed personally under investigation. It’s not that Comey was lying to him. It’s that in multi-level investigations like this, it’s initially the lower-rung underlings that are under investigation. Only later are the higher-up underlings considered to be under investigation, and the “kingpin” figure is the last to be considered under investigation.

The same applies when it comes to who is considered a “criminal target” and when. During the Trump-Russia investigation, there was likely a point at which Paul Manafort was not considered a criminal target, and then at a later point he was deemed a criminal target. The same is true of everyone else who has been indicted or arrested to date.

So just because Mueller is telling Trump’s attorneys that Trump is not a “criminal target at this point,” it doesn’t mean anything. Of course Trump is a criminal target. In fact he’s the criminal target; the kingpin always is the criminal target in these kinds of investigations. In practical terms, Trump has been the target from day one. It’s just that, as these dominoes fall, Trump will not be officially labeled a “criminal target” until the investigation has advanced to the point that he’s the next criminal target – and he’s the last domino.