According to Scott Dworkin, the founder of the Democratic Coalition and a long-time political operative with deep ties inside Washington, a Republican lobbyist dropped a bombshell on Thursday afternoon:
BREAKING: A Republican lobbyist just told me that “@realDonaldTrump intends to use lie detector tests on his own cabinet and staff members,” in an effort to try and uncover who was behind the scathing New York Times op-ed. They also said “he wants them to be arrested when found.”
— Scott Dworkin (@funder) September 6, 2018
This would represent a stunning breach of trust inside the White House and mark the latest landmark in what has become a map of Donald Trump’s road to madness as his administration crumbles around him.
The fact is, it is a damning statement against the President that someone anonymously penned the piece that ran in the New York Times on Wednesday essentially calling him completely unfit for public office, and he can’t even narrow the field down without a polygraph. That would indicate that it is likely that nearly anyone inside the West Wing is capable of such thought, or at least incapable of convincing an increasingly paranoid chief executive that it was not them that wrote the op-ed.
CNN’s Jim Acosta tweeted a running tally of the network’s account of those in Trump’s inner circle who have thus far released statements to the effect of saying it was not their work in the Times:
Current CNN tally of Trump officials denying they are anonymous NYT writer… Pence, Pompeo, Mattis, Mnuchin, Haley, Coats, Sessions, Azar, Alex Acosta, Wheeler, Nielsen, Haspel, Wilkie, Perdue, Perry, Mulvaney have all released statements personally or through their offices.
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) September 6, 2018
A lie detector, for the record, is not admissible in court, and could never result in the arrest of anyone who is merely suspected of leaking information that was not considered classified or top secret.
Featured image via screen capture
