'That's not true': Santorum gets pounded on CNN for saying Trump can't obstruct justice without an 'underlying crime'
CNN conservative analyst Rick Santorum on Sunday insisted that President Donald Trump could not be charged with obstructing justice in special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation because the president was accused of no underlying crimes.
During a panel segment on CNN, host Jake Tapper noted that Republican Rep. Justin Amash (MI) said last week that Trump committed impeachable acts by obstructing justice in the Mueller investigation.
"First of all, Robert Mueller didn't find obstruction of justice," Santorum insisted incorrectly. "He didn't find collusion and the fact that Justin Amash did, great."
"He didn't not find [obstruction of justice]," Tapper told Santorum. "He basically laid out a case for Congress to decide."
"Again, he didn't make the conclusion that it was," Santorum argued. "The reality is that it's very hard to obstruct justice when there was no underlying crime to obstruct."
"That's not true," CNN contributor Bakari Sellers chimed in.
"Well, I think it is true," Santorum snapped back.
"It does happen," Tapper said, agreeing with Sellers.
"It's always under the president's purview as the leader of the country to do the things that he did," Santorum insisted. "He can hire people, he can fire people. He doesn't have to have an excuse that fits your excuse to do so."
"So the reality is," the former GOP senator continued, "in my opinion and I think most Americans, there was no obstruction of justice here. And the fact that Amash is doing this, look, we see this in the Senate all the time when [Kentucky Republican] Rand Paul joins the Democrats. That doesn't make it bipartisan. You have a libertarian who is very much outside the scope of where the Republican Party is. And he's joined the Democrats. This is not unusual."
Santorum concluded by calling impeachment hearings a "bonus for Donald Trump."
Watch the video below from CNN.