CNN legal analyst Jeff Toobin noted that President Donald Trump might think of those who oppose him as treasonous, but it’s far from the truth.

“This was the illegal and treasonous ‘insurance policy’ in full action!” Trump tweeted about former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe.

“They weren’t illegal and treasonous,” said former NSA attorney Susan Hennessey said. “They weren’t particularly good ideas, which is why they didn’t actually happen.”

ADVERTISEMENT

She returned to the difficulties that those in the Justice Department and FBI were dealing with at the time. She said it was a group of career law enforcement public servants who saw “an absolutely disturbing, bizarre, number of contacts with the campaign of the individual who would become president.” It isn’t shocking to think some were panicked in that situation.

“They’re interviewing Michael Flynn for his contacts with Russians and lies about those contacts,” Hennessey continued. “The president of the United States asked the FBI director to see his way to ‘letting Flynn go,’ which the FBI believes is potentially obstruction of justice. Then the president actually fires the FBI director which they think might have been an effort to actually impede the Russia investigation. Itself, a national security issue, right? Sort of the obstruction is the collusion sort of theory. I think what we’re seeing is they were panicked.”

She noted it was clear that they were concerned about the president’s mental stability.

“It’s not different than any of us sitting around and talking about the 25th Amendment, except in one way, these are people who are actually seeing the president up close in private, the way he is conducting himself,” she continued. “So, yes, it’s shocking to hear that they were talking about this, but it’s not as shocking as the idea that they were concerned enough about the president’s mental stability that they actually thought that this was a reasonable discussion to have.”

That’s when Toobin stepped in, calling the men “patriotic” for putting the country ahead of their positions.

ADVERTISEMENT

“I think the correct term is not treasonous, but patriotic,” Toobin said. “I mean, they thinking about the national security of the United States. These are all career officials. These are not Democratic political appointees. These are people whose job it is to care about the national security about the United States and, remember, all this evidence has only gotten stronger over the past two years.”

Toobin noted that these gentlemen were talking about their concerns before the president’s financial information was revealed. It was only recently that Americans learned Trump had a deal in the works about building a Trump Tower, Moscow. He had a signed letter of intent that his attorney Rudy Giuliani denied existed.

“You know, Adam Schiff is now conducting an investigation to determine, in effect, if the president is a Russian asset,” Toobin continued. “This remains a serious concern, and there is much more evidence to support this idea. They didn’t even know at the time — during 2016 — all of those discussions about Trump Tower and Moscow, I mean, the idea that they were treasonous is 180 degrees wrong.”

ADVERTISEMENT

Watch the discussion in the video below: