Sen. Dick Durbin said Tuesday he's having a hard time keeping up with President Donald Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani's "theories of defense," on collusion, but he pointed out that obstruction of "is clearly a crime."
"I can't keep up with Giuliani's theories of defense, and they change almost by the hour, the Illinois lawmaker and Senate Democratic Whip told CNN's "New Day."
"[He says] collusion at one point never happened, the next point, if it happened, it's not serious. The bottom line is this: We have to wait until the Mueller investigation is complete."
Durbin said he's known Mueller, a former FBI director, for almost 20 years, and "his life story tells us that he is an honest, sincere, professional man who loves his country. Whatever his conclusion is on the issue of collusion, stand by it."
Mueller's report, however, could be a matter of interpretation in Congress, Giuliani has suggested, but if the rulings go against Trump and Democrats take control after the November midterms, Durbin was cautious about talk of impeachment.
"Impeachment has happened very seldomly in the history of the United States, and it's a very serious part of our constitutional process," said Durbin. "I wouldn't presume for a minute in terms of where this might go until all the facts are in and the investigation is complete. We have sworn to uphold this Constitution and we should take it seriously."
Impeachment would be the "highest bar," and it's never been used successfully in U.S. history, he pointed out.
"I think we ought to focus on the reality of the moment, and that is a professional investigation underway by a professional investigator and prosecutor in Bob Mueller," said Durbin. "Let him complete that without intimidation from either the president or any members of Congress."
Also on Tuesday, Durbin addressed the issue of immigrant families that have not yet been reunited, saying there are still many questions. According to reports, more than 1,400 families have been reunited with children ages seven and older, but 700 remain in government custody.
"There's so many questions, 711 lost children?" he said, "This administration with the zero-tolerance policy decided they would forcibly separate children from their parents and to add insult to injury to disgrace, they didn't keep track of parents and their children. We literally lost track of the children. We don't know where the parents are. That is dereliction of duty."
Border security can be achieved without bullying, said Durbin, and "we can fight terrorism without taking toddlers into detention. We can have a bipartisan approach, comprehensive immigration reform but we need an administration that's driven by those goals as opposed to hatred for immigrants."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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