Reports surfaced today that President Donald Trump is openly discussing firing Ty Cobb, one of his personal attorneys defending him from the Robert Mueller investigation.

John Dowd, the another personal lawyer in charge of Trump’s defense, is thinking of stepping down, now that he clearly has no control over his client. Yeah, the guy who thinks that the President of the United States is legally incapable of obstructing justice is thinking that maybe Trump is too ridiculous for him to represent.

Jay Sekulow, the third member of the personal defense team and easily the most insane, appears to be safe.

We don’t know if Trump is talking about this as a “test balloon” to gauge public reaction, or if he’s already made the decision to fire Cobb and is waiting for the right time.

Our friends at Dealbreaker say that connected people already expect Cobb to be fired and are pricing that into their expectations.

We do know that Trump recently hired lawyer and conspiracy theorist Joseph diGenova. Given Trump’s history of listening to the last person who talked to him through the medium of Fox News, diGenova’s aggressive stance of undermining the special counsel likely holds sway with the President for at least the next 12 to 18 seconds.

Losing Cobb, and Dowd to a lesser extent, would herald a major shift in the posture of the administration towards the Mueller investigation.

Cobb has been a voice for cooperation with the probe. His clear goal has been to keep Mueller from issuing a subpoena for the President. Cobb likely knows that Trump’s testimony under oath would be a disaster. His client is incapable of answering questions without outright lying. Keeping Trump out of the witness box would be the most important thing Trump lawyers can accomplish.

But we must remember that Trump himself doesn’t appear to be afraid of testifying in front of Mueller. Trump thinks that he can just clear everything up with a little chat, no matter that 19 people or entities have already been indicted — including Trump’s former campaign chairman — and some of those people have already pleaded guilty and are cooperating. Trump thinks he can just get up there and say “no collusion” and make it all go away.

Cobb has the unenviable job of basically telling Trump that he’s too stupid to testify in front of the grand jury, without Trump noticing that his own lawyer thinks he’s incapable of testifying in his own defense.

Of course, there is more than one way to prevent Trump from testifying. One is to cooperate with investigators, as Cobb has been doing. Another way would be to simply ignore the subpoena and trigger a constitutional crisis. Still another way would be to fire Department of Justice officials until he finds one willing to fire Robert Mueller and end the special counsel’s investigation.

Moving away from Cobb would be more evidence that Trump intends to see what’s behind doors number 2 or 3.

I suspect that the reports are spot-on and that Cobb is not long for this world. Trump has gotten into this whole purge with the clear intent of removing people who constrain him. Trump wants to testify, Cobb tells him that’s a terrible idea, Cobb is on his way out. Trump wants to slander Mueller on Twitter, Dowd tells him that’s a bad idea, Dowd is thinking of leaving the team. Trump says it’s a “witch hunt,” diGenova says “no no no, you’ve been FRAMED buddy,” Trump hires diGenova. Trump just wants to surround himself with what he wants to hear.

As I said yesterday, we’re not a nation of laws. Trump is removing people who believe that laws constrain the President, and is replacing them with people who think Trump has unlimited power.

Ty Cobb is probably the only lawyer and likely the only person whose reputation has improved from working for Trump. He seems to have conducted his defense honorably, while hewing towards established principles of legal ethics and constitutional norms.

SUCH MEN ARE NOT ALLOWED TO EXIST IN TRUMPWORLD. Ty Cobb, who was once so reckless that he discussed confidential details loudly over lunch not knowing he was sitting just across the way from a reporter, turns out to be the best of all of them.

And so, most likely, he has to go. Our failed state has still not found the bottom.

Trump Considers Reshuffling Legal Team as He Takes On Mueller More Aggressively [New York Times]

Elie Mystal is the Executive Editor of Above the Law and the Legal Editor for More Perfect. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at elie@abovethelaw.com. He will resist.