Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor and U.S. Attorney-turned-personal lawyer for Donald Trump, argued on Sunday that the president could pardon himself. But not to worry, he added, Trump doesn’t intend to do so.
This Week host George Stephanopoulos asked him about a legal memo from two of Trump’s other lawyers that argued the president can terminate any Department of Justice investigation — including Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into whether the president’s 2016 campaign improperly colluded with Vladimir Putin’s Russian regime — “at any time, and for any reason.” Giuliani answered that he would not go so far as to say that Trump could protect himself from an investigation for murder, but claimed that the president’s pardon power is virtually absolute.
“He has no intention of pardoning himself, but yeah, he probably does. It doesn’t say he can’t,” Giuliani said. “It would be an open question. I think it would probably be answered by, ‘Gosh, that’s what the constitution says and if you want to change it, change it’.”
He conceded that he thinks the “political ramifications of that would be tough.”
In a separate interview on NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, Giuliani argued that the president can terminate any investigation. “It could lead to impeachment, to terminate an investigation of himself.” But he said, “constitutionally, it sure looks that way.” He also argued that Trump has the power to order an investigation at any time, as long as it doesn’t take away the person’s constitutional rights.
“The Department of Justice is a creature of the president,” he told host Chuck Todd.