https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/trump-obstruction-justice-whitaker-796417/?fbclid=IwAR0ADTMeYjvFrG9hVFvbWZLtGsZ_UazIynMOtO2I-Aa6uSw14otraKmsLLc
"The Times also reported on Tuesday that White House lawyers wrote a confidential memo “expressing concern about the president’s staff peddling misleading information in public” regarding Michael Flynn, the national security adviser who resigned after it was revealed that he lied about his contact with a Russian official. According to the report, when Trump and his advisers were searching for a way to explain Flynn’s resignation, the president allegedly instructed then-Press Secretary Sean Spicer to tell the public that Trump asked for the resignation. When Spicer asked if that was true, Trump repeated the directive without elaborating. “That sounds better,” Trump said. When Spicer ultimately took the podium to address the press, White House lawyers included all of his misstatements in a memo. It was a day after Spicer’s press conference that Trump met with Comey to tell him to end the investigation into Flynn. “I hope you can let this go,” Trump said, as Comey noted in a memo he took of the meeting. The fallout from Flynn’s resignation — which Trump believes would bring an end to “the Russia thing” — was only the beginning. The Times details the president’s prolonged campaign to humiliate and oust Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who recused himself from overseeing Mueller’s investigation. Trump even asked former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski to pressure Sessions into resigning. Last September, the Times reported that Mueller was considering Trump’s incessant public harassment and intimidation of Sessions as part of a possible obstruction of justice case. Despite the president’s wishes, “the Russia thing” did not end with Flynn’s resignation, and in an effort to cultivate public skepticism of Mueller’s investigation, Trump reportedly had private conversations with Republicans to strategize about how to discredit the probe."
