President Donald Trump has taken his "assault on the rule of law to a new level" by demanding that the Justice Department look into allegations that it or the FBI improperly surveilled his 2016 presidential campaign for political purposes, former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" on Monday.
Yates, who was fired by Trump in January 2017 after refusing to defend the president's controversial executive order banning travel from seven countries with Muslim majorities, warned that it is "really shocking" that Trump "has taken his all-out assault of the rule of law to a new level and this time he is ordering up an investigation of the investigators who are examining his own campaign."
She also cautioned about the danger of society becoming used to the president's improper statements and actions.
"One of the things we have to look out for is the old 'boiling the frog slowly issue'," she said. "We have become accustomed to things that the president does, in directing DOJ… I can remember a time when he would issue a tweet or directive and the reports would be: 'In an unprecedented act, the president did X or Y.'
"It's not so unprecedented anymore and oftentimes it doesn't even make it through the full 24-hour news cycle."
Yates has been a frequent critic of the president, and just last week said that attacks on the Department of Justice are "tearing down" its legitimacy, according to Yahoo.
She warned: "There is a time-honored tradition at the Department of Justice, at least since Watergate, that is nonpartisan. There is a wall between the Department of Justice and the White House when it comes to criminal investigations and prosecutions," but bemoaned that "nobody's rolling their eyes anymore" as Trump hammers away at that wall, because he has been doing it so often.
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