There’s more to yesterday’s Papadopoulos-Stephanopoulos interview than meets the eye. Here’s the only way to make sense of it.

1/ Papadopoulos is still spinning and lying, thinking he can get away with the ploy (common to all guilty defendants in his position) of resorting to: “I cannot remember,” “I don’t remember.” It is much easier for prosecutors to find evidence that a statement is false than it is to convict a defendant for lying when he says he cannot remember something.

2/ It is inconceivable that Papadopoulos did not tell anyone in the campaign about the the “dirt” on Clinton that Mifsud had told him the Russians had. The chance of it actually being true that Papadopoulos didn’t notify the campaign about this conversation is effectively zero.

Note that Papadopoulos doesn’t even pretend that Mifsud’s disclosure didn’t make a huge impression on him:

STEPHANOPOULOS: But this news about the e-mails is pretty big.

PAPADOPOULOS: It was very big, but because of his [Mifsud’s] inability to really connect me the way I wanted him to, when he did state this, you know, I guess it was a momentum [sic: momentous] statement, at the time I thought how could this person possibly hold the keys to the kingdom of such a massive conspiracy when he couldn’t even introduce me to the people I wanted.

So I was — of course I was shocked, but at the same time, this wasn’t a Russian official telling me this either.

But of course Papadopoulos did think it worth mentioning this “shocking” and “momentous” allegation (which held “the keys to the kingdom of such a massive conspiracy”) to the Greek Foreign Minister. If it was worth relating to the Greek Foreign Minister (despite Papadopoulos’ alleged doubts at that point in time about Mifsud’s bona fides) why wasn’t it worth mentioning it to the campaign? And if he did have doubts about the veracity of the allegation, wouldn’t he have been remiss not to at least tell Manafort and others about what Mifsud had told him, so that they could evaluate it?

John K. Mashburn, a campaign official, reportedly testified in March behind closed doors to the Senate Judiciary Committee that he received an email from Papadopoulos that mentioned the Clinton email dirt.

Papadopoulos says he cannot remember sending such an email to the campaign, and that if there were such an email, a copy of it would exist. He is probably right about that, but wrong in implying that because none has turned up, he mustn’t have sent one. Why? Because we don’t know that Mueller doesn’t have it. Mueller hasn’t yet fired a single shot about “collusion” (i.e., conspiracy), but that doesn’t mean that Mueller hasn’t collected an enormous amount of incriminating material about Trump campaign collusion — including quite possibly this particular email.

In the government’s sentencing memo re Papadopoulos, Mueller says:

According to the government’s sentencing document, then, Papadopoulos harmed the investigation because (among other things) his lies in January 2017 hindered the government’s ability to determine what he did with the information about the emails. The government even alleges in the sentencing memo that Papadopoulos intended to harm the investigation by giving false, misleading, and partial information in his January 2017 interview.

The allegation that Papadopoulos intentionally harmed the investigation was challenged by Papadopoulos’ lawyers when responding to Mueller in Papadopoulos’ own sentencing memo, arguing that Mueller had presented no evidence to support these allegations. As I have argued in a previous paper, Papadopoulos’ lawyers were acting appropriately and competently in pointing out that the prosecution had not presented any evidence to support the allegations; as defense attorneys they would have been remiss if they hadn’t. But it is significant for those of us who are trying to discern what Mueller might know and what he apparently believes that there is clear evidence in the government’s sentencing memo that Mueller believes Papadopoulos hindered the investigation into what he had done with the emails and even did so deliberately; and Mueller, clearly, is not letting the matter rest.

In fact, Mueller’s sentencing memo asserts, contrary to what Papadopoulos tells Stephanopoulos in his interview yesterday, that Papadopoulos was not even a cooperating witness for the investigation. Papadopoulos told Stephanopoulos that he disagreed with that assessment, saying he was not going to lie and make things up, and that he told the investigators what happened as he remembered it. But this is unconvincing when viewed against the details given in the government’s sentencing memo about the many ways that Papadopoulos failed to be a fully cooperating witness for the investigation.

Presumably, Papadopoulos is hoping that if the Mashburn email (or similar evidence) does show up he won’t be caught up in the collusion prosecution that is coming, on the grounds that he could not *remember* sending it. He’d better hope he is right about this, because if he isn’t, he’s going to end up spending a lot more than just 14 days in jail. And Papadopoulos’ hedging and demeanor in the interviews tells me that he is worried about this possibility.

Senator Mark Warner says he cannot believe that Papadopoulos didn’t notify the campaign of what he had been told by Mifsud. In fact, Warner doesn’t even believe that Papadopoulos can’t remember telling the campaign about it. No wonder Warner now wants the Senate Intel Committee to interview Papadopoulos.

3/ Papadopoulos distinctly remembers telling the Greek Foreign Minister on a campaign-approved trip he made to Greece about the emails, but can’t remember having told UK High Commissioner Alexander Downer about it in a London bar. Of course, we can trust Downer’s memory here and not Papadopoulos’, for two reasons. First, Papadopoulos has a motive for claiming that he can’t remember it, whereas Downer lacks a plausible motive for making it up. And it is certain that the FBI has interviewed Downer, and that the FBI is convinced that the conversation took place. (It was, after all, Papadopoulos’ disclosure about the Clinton emails to Downer that triggered Crossfire Hurricane.)

4/ Papadopoulos is very cagey about what he can and cannot remember about his campaign contacts and activities. There is a highly suspect pattern to it. In general, Papadopoulos cannot remember stuff that would be particularly incriminating for him and for Trump, but does remember some things that are less incriminating.

For example, he cannot remember sending any email or having any conversations with campaign members about the Clinton emails or discussing the emails with UK High Commissioner Alexander Downer (the incident that kicked off Crossfire Hurricane), but he can remember telling the Greek Foreign Minister about them. That’s part of the pattern, because acknowledging that he told the Greek Foreign Minister about the Clinton emails isn’t incriminating or threatening to either the campaign or himself in the way that acknowledging a disclosure to the campaign itself would be.

5/ Papadopoulos told Stephanopoulos that he does not believe he told anything to Mueller or the FBI that incriminated Trump. And in a striking exchange in the interview, Papadopoulos even dissociates himself from the claim made by his own lawyers in the sentencing hearing that President Trump has hindered the special counsel’s investigation far more than their client did.

Stephanopoulos says at one point: “Your lawyer said that President Trump hindered the investigation more than you did. Do you agree?” Papadopoulos demurred: “Those are their opinions. I have no idea about that.” And he then goes on to say that he thinks Trump has done a good job as president.

This provides some reason to think that Papadopoulos does not want to burn his bridges behind him, feeling that he might need a pardon from Trump somewhere down the line.

After all, Papadopoulos has already been sentenced to 14 days in jail for lying to the FBI, and no pardon is going to save him from that. But he might very well need a pardon down the line if he gets indicted for collusion (as seems likely).

6/ While he is protective of Trump (who can issue pardons), he is not similarly protective of others in the campaign. On the contrary, he seems more than willing to throw others in the campaign under the bus.

This emerges at a couple of points in the interview when the question of collusion comes up directly. Here’s one of them:

STEPHANOPOULOS; Based on everything you learned from those meetings [with Mueller and the FBI], do you believe they have evidence that people inside the Trump campaign, or advisers to President Trump colluded with Russia?

PAPADOPOULOS; I can’t really get into details about what I discussed with the special counsel because there’s still an ongoing investigation, of course.

Here’s another one:

STEPHANOPOULOS: Do you think when the entire Mueller investigation is finished that they will demonstrate that there was collusion between the Trump campaign, between Trump advisers and the Russians?

PAPADOPOULOS: You know what, George, I have no idea. All I can say is that my testimony might have helped move something towards that, but I have no idea.

This is interesting. We know that he has testified (in effect) against Sessions, claiming that Sessions was enthusiastic about the idea of setting up a meeting with the Russians. If this is true, it is hard to see how Sessions didn’t perjure himself before Congress when he gave directly contrary testimony about that March 31 meeting.

It is also important to connect the following dots about what Papadopoulos has said publicly and what we know about the campaign:

We know that he discussed MIfsud and his claim that he could facilitate a meeting between Trump and Putin with Clovis and others in the campaign before the March 31 meeting. (To be clear: Papadopoulos has testified that he told the campaign about this particular; Papadopoulos continues to deny that he ever told the campaign what MIfsud told him later about the Clinton emails.)

We know that Papadopoulos met with Paul Manafort, Steve Bannon, and Michael Flynn (maybe others) after the March 31 meeting and discussed with them his contacts and work for the campaign (which seems to have been mostly abroad).

As Papadopoulos points out in the interview, Manafort nixed the idea of Trump himself meeting Putin. (There is an email from Manafort to Gates saying that the campaign did not want to send such a “signal,” and that a low-level person should meet with the Russians instead.)

Papadopoulos (described falsely by the campaign later as a “coffee boy”) was such a low-level person. So it is understandable why he would have had contacts with high level officials like Manafort, Flynn, and Bannon after the March 31 meeting about the work he was doing for the campaign. And by his own admission, Papadopoulos continued to work on setting up a high level meeting even after Manafort ruled against trying to set up a high level meeting involving Trump himself.

It is, of course, of extreme interest to know what was said in the conversations Papadopoulos had later with others in the campaign like Bannon and Manafort. But we will have to wait to learn about that, because, as Papadopoulos told Stephanopoulos, he could not “get into details about what I discussed with the special counsel because there’s still an ongoing investigation.”

But there is a hint in his interview with Stephanopoulos that he may have given testimony to Mueller that incriminates Manafort in particular.

Here’s another exchange from the Papadopoulos interview:

STEPHANOPOULOS: But do you — you know, your lawyers describe you as the first domino in this investigation. Do you believe you’re going to be the last?

PAPADOPOULOS: I mean of course i’m not the last. There have been other guilty pleas and convictions. I think Paul Manafort is sitting in jail as we speak. So, of course, I’m not the last. But apparently I was the start.

Mentioning Manafort (and only Manafort) in this connection seems a bit gratuitous — except for the fact that Manafort’s name had already come up in two other places in the interview, and except for the fact that Manafort is reportedly in negotiations with Mueller about a plea agreement. (Keep in mind that Manafort is in jail at the present time for things that have nothing whatever to do with Trump campaign collusion.)

Mueller has Manafort over the barrel at this point and has no reason to make any concessions to Manafort in a plea agreement — unless Manafort is willing to spill the beans on Trump’s knowledge about, and approval of, his campaign’s collusion with Russia.

The next couple of weeks should be hell for Trump, because Manafort’s second trial is scheduled to begin in Washington DC on September 24; because Manafort does hold the “keys to the kingdom,” to use Papadopoulos’ phrase; and because Manafort is reportedly in negotiations with Mueller about a plea agreement.

Papadopoulos probably has a lot to be worried about in the next couple of weeks as well. After all, Manafort was campaign manager for a critical period of time when Papadopoulos was working for the campaign, and Papadopoulos had interactions with Manafort after the infamous March 31 meeting.

Who knows: if Manafort flips (as I expect he will eventually have to do), he will not hesitate to throw Papadopoulos and other campaign associates under the bus as well as Trump.