Why does Trump keep insisting there was "NO COLLUSION"?

[kentuck]

Is he trying to distract from a more serious charge? I'm sure there are other charges that Mueller could look at and may look at in the future besides "collusion".

But Trump is a master at distraction and diversion.

What is he trying to do?

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. Because there was collusion.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

13. Yup. 3rd indictment: TRUMP foreign policy advisor. (Think he set up Don Jr meeting) Unsealed today:

I think this was the "Russian dirt" that attracted Donald Jr., a man nearly as smart as his father.

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/george-papadopolous-trump-russia-probe_us_59f7354be4b07fdc5fbfa210
(emphasis added)

WASHINGTON ― A foreign policy adviser to President Donald Trump’s presidential campaign has pleaded guilty to a charge of lying to FBI agents.

George Papadopoulos, 30, pleaded guilty on Oct. 5, 2017, but the case wasn’t unsealed until Monday, when two other Trump associates were indicted by a federal grand jury. Papadopoulos reached a plea deal with prosecutors, and has since been cooperating with special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

Prosecutors’ statement of the offense alleges Papadopoulos “made material false statements and material omissions” during a Jan. 27, 2017, interview with the FBI. He was arrested July 27. Prosecutors agreed to recommend between no prison time to six months under the plea agreement.

Papadopoulos told the FBI an overseas professor had “told him about the Russians possessing ‘dirt’ on then-candidate Hillary Clinton in the form of ‘thousands of emails,’ but stated multiple times that he learned that information prior to joining the campaign,” according to court documents. In fact, Papadopoulos was contacted after he learned he’d be joining the campaign, and the professor only mentioned the “thousands of emails” after he’d been on the Trump campaign for more than a month.

[Zambero]

2. Indeed, if his lips are moving

Lies and/or diversion is taking place.

[PJMcK]

3. It's simple

Whenever Trump says one thing, you know it's the other. Ergo, when he says there was no collusion, you know there was. He's a terrible liar.

He's also an idiot. Consider that if he had stayed a private citizen-- rather than seeking elective office-- he could have probably spent the rest of his life keeping his businesses sliding in and out of the shadows. Instead, he let his ego get the better of him and now his whole life will be scrutinized.

Trump really is a stupid man.

[Bleacher Creature]

7. This as well.

I focused on his mental state in my reply, but you are exactly right as well. He is incredibly stupid, and he also doesn't get nuance at all. I'm sure he believes that criminal conspiracies and collusion require guys with trenchcoats and sunglasses exchanging paper bags of money behind street lights. As you said, he's been engaging in this kind of behavior all his life, sometimes in the shadows but often right in plain sight.

[smirkymonkey]

14. This, exactly!

A bad combination of stupidity and out-of-control ego.

[dalton99a]

4. Hitler's Big Lie technique

Repeat and repeat

[Bleacher Creature]

5. Because he's a sociopath who will do and say anything to protect himself.

He's probably convinced himself of it as well. I really believe that when all is said and done that he'll be remembered more for his mental illness than he will for his corruption, which is a shame.

[emulatorloo]

6. Because he's insisting there was COLLUSION between Clinton and Russia!1!!1

(Which as we know is false, as Steele worked with Russian whistleblowers, who were exposing Russian Govt's interference on behalf of Trump campaign

So it is an attempt to distract.

It is also classic Republican 101: accuse others of what you are guilty of.

My favorite example of that was in 2004 when Dick Cheney said John Kerry had no moral compass and did not understand the difference between right and wrong.

[WinkyDink]

10. "No Trump collusion! Clinton collusion! Gave Russia US nuclear codes! #LOCKHERUP!"

[smirkymonkey]

16. I think he actually believes his own lies which is why he continues to repeat them

with such conviction. The man is not dealing with reality.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

17. Collusion between Clinton and Russia to what?

Lose the election????
Teh stoopid it burns!!!

[meow2u3]

8. Collusion is the wrong word

There definitely is a conspiracy, though.

[WinkyDink]

11. As long as Mueller knows, we're good.

[librechik]

9. All lifelong criminals have one motto: DENY EVERYTHING

Everyone knows it;s too difficult to remember all the details of a big lie. Therefore, at the end of the day the safest course is to deny deny deny. Even if you know they have you dead to rights.

After all, they still have to prove it. And that is even more difficult.

Heh, Pappadopoulos betrayed them all. Tick tick tick.

[Wounded Bear]

12. Collusion isn't really a thing...There is no such crime.

Conspiracy? Yeah, that probably applies.

Money laundering? Yeah, that probably applies too.

Foreign contibutions for political actions? Yeah, we're getting into that realm also.

Trump is an idiot who thinks he can distract and obstruct. It will work on the Trumplodytes, but Mueller and the Dream Team won't be distracted.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

15. Interfering with elections is a crime. Using foreign enemies to do so is also a crime. . . nt

[Wounded Bear]

18. Yeah, but the term "collusion" is not the legal term...

That's all I'm saying.

[kentuck]

19. I've heard many times that "collusion" is not a crime...

But it is mentioned in the US Code.

[Wounded Bear]

20. Might be semantics...

but "conspiracy" is probably defined, in part, as "colluding, collaborating, or cooperating to plan a crime."

It's not a crime to collude with someone, unless the goal of the group collaboration is to commit a crime.

[Trekologer]

21. It makes get be pure ego at this point

In Trump's mind he is the greatest thing ever. So if he had to rely on help from the Russians to win the election, then he wasn't the greatest. So in his mind, it would be a personal failure to even accept that Russia was working on his behalf.

[Grammy23]

22. Indeed all these crimes likely did happen as suggested by the indictments we are

learning about today. I really believe (and think tRump believed) that he could make all of his troubles go away after he got the power of the Presidency. He misunderstood that there is power in the office but he did not take into account that there is also relentless and deep scrutiny. This is especially true if there are red flags everywhere you turn. This was/is the case with tRump. Some things just don’t look, sound or smell right.

So rather than sanitizing things and making it all go away, he brought more examination into his life and the campaign he had for the Presidency. As others have pointed out, trump has run a scheme his entire life. Nothing he has ever done has gone according to Hoyle. But he always managed to slip through and keep on pulling his stunts to get more money, even if he had to bend, twist and break laws to do it. So why would we expect him to run a clean campaign?

tRump has probably begun to wish he had never run for the Presidency. Howard Stern tried to warn him, but tRump’s ego won and now he might be starting to understand what Stern meant. His life is under examination and about to be exposed for the world to see, including those who LUV him so much. Expect more lies to his base as he scrambles to save himself from certain prison time. I swear, you can’t make this stuff up. What a book/movie this will be!

[gratuitous]

23. He says it because his supporters will believe it

We are not obligated to live in his carefully constructed fantasy bubble.