President Donald Trump has hit a "point of no return" that many authoritarian despots hit, former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul told MS NOW's Nicolle Wallace on Monday's edition of "Deadline: White House."
Specifically, he said, Trump's pattern of corruption and self-enrichment is now burned into the public consciousness in a way it has never been before.
"The depressing piece of it [is] that he's literally by the news cycle, thieving and stealing and selling American foreign interests for personal profit," said Wallace, turning to McFaul. "I wonder how much of this money could be retrieved for the American people, if any of it, Ambassador."
"It's a great question," he said. For now, it requires Democrats to win control of Congress — but additionally, he said, "I'm a little more optimistic" that progress will be made on the issue.
The key indicator, he said, is a new YouGov poll that revealed something profound about how the public now sees the Trump administration.
"When asked in a word association, what do you associate the Trump administration with? Corruption came up," said McFaul. "That to me is a positive sign that wasn't happening two years ago. That wasn't happening in his first term, even though the corruption was there."
Wallace's own work deserves some credit, McFaul added. "You'retalking about them. You'rewriting books about them."
"Ittakes a while for people tofigure out corruption," he said. "It'shard. And I've seen this inRussia. I've seen it in Hungary.I've studied those places. Ittakes a while, but then it getsto a point of no return, and itbegins to stick. And I thinkwe're getting there. I actuallydo think that associationbetween Trump and what they'redoing, using public office forprivate gain, is something thatmost Americans now see."