Presidential historian Jon Meacham: Trump could be an 'agent of a foreign power' who committed 'definition of treason'

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published 18 December 2018

Presidential historian Jon Meacham says former President Richard Nixon's Watergate scandal looks a bit like what's happening today.

Meacham, who has written biographies on Thomas Jefferson and eulogized former President George H. W. Bush earlier this month, brought some historical context to MSNBC's Morning Joe Tuesday morning. He described how Nixon's downfall coincided with an ongoing investigation and falling markets — much like what President Trump is seeing right now.

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Then, Meacham brought the conversation into the present day by discussing Russian efforts to influence the 2016 election in favor of Trump. "If in fact Donald Trump knew about" these efforts, that raises the "live question" of whether these actions fit "the definition of treason in the Constitution," Meacham explained. It all makes for an "existential Constitutional crisis" in which a president could be an "agent of a foreign power," Meacham added.

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Kathryn is a graduate of Syracuse University, with degrees in magazine journalism and information technology, along with hours to earn another degree after working at SU's independent paper The Daily Orange. She's currently recovering from a horse addiction while living in New York City, and likes to share her extremely dry sense of humor on Twitter.

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