Ever since Trump was elected U.S. President in November 2016, many Americans have wrestled with the question as to whether he is being unduly influenced by Russia’s President Vladimir Putin. The question of Russia’s influence over Trump grew into a crescendo prompting the launching of a formal investigation (Mueller probe) to look into whether Trump’s campaign colluded with Russia in 2016.

Even though the official finding of the Mueller probe was that there was not enough evidence to prove that TeamTrump colluded with Russia, questions about Trump’s ties to Russia have persisted, partly because Mueller never completely shut that door. Remember, Mueller never concluded that TeamTrump never colluded with Russia. What he said was that he never collected enough evidence to prove it. One of the key witnesses he had relied on to prove his case, Paul Manafort, totally stonewalled his investigation.

Beyond Trump’s strange ties to Russia, a lot of Americans have also been confounded by the extreme measures congressional Republicans have taken and continue to take, all in an effort to shield President Trump from any congressional oversight. This has led a lot of people to validly speculate that congressional Republicans are privy to some wrongdoings (potentially criminal) by Trump, and have made a conscious decision to hide this from the public–which has given rise to this notion that Trump’s GOP is a criminal enterprise.

Yours Truly raised this very question way back in August 2018 in a blog post titled Proof That Congressional Republicans Have Become A Criminal Enterprise, a post which you probably summarily dismissed as “yet another conspiracy theory” pushed by “radical liberal @Emolclause.” The blog post was based on an August 27, 2018 piece by Jonathan Chait of the Intelligencer, which made the bombshell revelation that congressional Republicans had essentially sworn to shield from any oversight, a list of things they figured would be harmful to Trump’s presidency. Some of the items in GOP’s shield-at-all-costs list included surprise surprise, Trump’s tax returns, Trump’s family business, White house clearances, and shockingly, issues dealing with election security/Russians hacking our elections.

Any reasonable person reading this bombshell Intelligencer piece would have concluded as Yours Truly did, that congressional Republicans had not only become a criminal enterprise, but that they were certainly not working in the interests of the American people.

A lot has transpired since August 2018 and what many of you summarily dismissed as “wild conspiracy theories by radical @Emolclause” is now playing out right in front of our very eyes. It has become impossible to continue assuming that congressional Republicans are just naively defending Trump. Many are now starting to to state publicly that Trump’s GOP has indeed become a criminal enterprise.

There are many reasons as to why people have become more comfortable in publicly calling Trump’s GOP a criminal enterprise but the best reason by far is the shocking conduct we witnessed during the recent impeachment hearings, when Republican members of congress, in an effort to defend Trump, kept repeating a debunked conspiracy theory pushed by Russian intelligence officials, that it was Ukraine who interfered with our 2016 elections. This shocking behavior by congressional Republicans drew sharp rebuke from Trump’s former adviser on Russia, Dr Fiona Hill, who castigated them to their faces, telling them they were doing Putin’s work.

Senator and Democratic Presidential candidate Kamala Harris(CA) is no longer biting her tongue either regarding this topic and recently called Republicans a “criminal enterprise” on CBS’ Steven Colbert show, an assertion she gladly repeated on her Twitter account.

We are witnessing a criminal enterprise involving all the President’s men. I encourage my Republican colleagues to put country over party. Our democracy deserves justice. pic.twitter.com/2W8WyR4zPV — Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) November 22, 2019

For the record, neither the Intelligencer nor Yours Truly were the first to start labelling Trump’s GOP a criminal enterprise. Shining lights like Author Sarah Kendzior were already warning about this right after Trump won the election–an assertion many in the mainstream media dismissed. Just today the aforementioned Sarah Kendzior stopped by MSNBC’s AMJoy show where she dropped this bombshell totally in keeping with her previous warnings.

Bottom line folks, we cannot keep kicking the can down the road over the very serious queston as to whether sitting Republican members of congress are engaged in some kind of criminal conspiracy with a hostile foreign power(Russia). There’s enough smoke at this juncture for Democrats and indeed the mainstream media to start publicly asking the question Speaker Nancy Pelosi recently posed to President Trump and that is, why all Trump’s/GOP’s roads seem to lead to Russia, and more importantly, what is so rotten with their Russia dealings that they are terrified of the public finding out?

For those of you very happy with @Emolclause’s activism don’t shy away from the “tip jar” below on your way out.

You may reach the author via email at author@grassrootsdempolitics.com or author@emolumentsclause.com