His line from the Watergate hearings, “there is a cancer growing on the presidency,” is one of the most famous in American history.
The White House counsel to former President Nixon, John Dean, cut to the chase today in describing President Trump.
“I think we’ve established that we have a criminal president, and that is historic,” Dean said shortly after Trump’s longtime lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to charges of bank fraud, tax fraud and campaign finance law violations. “It’s a big day, it’s a bad day.”
Dean was the White House counsel during Watergate. And it was Dean who eventually turned on Nixon and helped put him in such legal jeopardy that he was forced to resign from the presidency.
“If Trump weren’t President, he probably would be named as a co-conspirator and indicted. It’s conspiracy,” said Dean. “Watergate was a conspiracy. This is a campaign conspiracy.”
Trump tweeted on Sunday, after the news came out that White House Counsel Don McGahn had cooperated with Mueller’s team, that McGahn wasn’t a “John Dean type ‘RAT’” because he wasn’t testifying behind the back of the White House.
“That just didn’t surprise me at all, every day, he throws invective at somebody,” said Dean. “I was trying to be the honest guy and stop all this nonsense of spinning and lying and twisting history. I was more distressed or annoyed by him calling the true public servants who have taken salary cuts to go to work for Bob Mueller ‘thugs.’ That’s just so uncalled for. These are men who are committed to the rule of law, who are doing the honorable thing. It’s just disappointing coming out of the President of the United States. He’s just denigrating the office every day he’s there.”