With the government shutdown consuming the majority of the news and with Donald Trump tweeting about things like Jeff Bezos and Elizabeth Warren, it’s easy to get distracted from one of the biggest stories in American political history. Let’s face it, that may very well be Trump’s intention. But make no mistake about it, the headlines from the New York Times (“F.B.I. Opened Inquiry Into Whether Trump Was Secretly Working on Behalf of Russia“) and Washington Post (“Trump has concealed details of his face-to-face encounters with Putin from senior officials in administration“) on the connections between Trump and Russia are extraordinary and unprecedented. As Dan Rather said:

A respectful suggestion as we get deeper into this grave year for our country: Remember and remind others of that core American value: no one—not even a President—is above the law. And carved into stone at our Department of Justice are the words, “Where law ends, tyranny begins.”

Legendary journalist Carl Bernstein pointed this out on CNN. In a conversation with Brian Stelter, the Watergate reporter reminded people that the Russia story should be front and center. He also said inside sources help him conclude that “he (Trump) has done what appears to be Putin’s goals.” Here are a few of the things Bernstein said that should be especially of note:

“I think you have to wait until the end of a very deliberative investigation that Mueller is making and what we know and what that Washington Post story and The New York Times stories show is that Mueller is operating, as has been members of the president’s own national security team, Mattis, among others, some people who are still there, some who have left, that indeed he has become a pawn of the Russians. Now, whether that is a witting pawn, an unwitting pawn, a half witting pawn, that is something that perhaps Mueller’s report will tell us.”

“We now know that there are more and more questions being asked is the President of the United States, is Donald Trump, fit to be the President of the United States and what this Mueller story and what the Washington Post story and the New York Times story reflects is the question of whether he is fit to be the president, as does the government shutdown.”

“There is a question of competence. We do not have an effective governance from the White House right now. We have chaos, misinformation, disinformation, lying and never before has lying — look, Nixon lied. Nixon lied to further the coverup. He was a criminal president, but throughout his presidency, Nixon did not lie about virtually everything of importance. We have — and Fox News reporters know this, too — we have a President of the United States who lies. It sounds pejorative when I say this. And one of the problems we have as reporters is it’s so unique to be saying these things that sound pejorative when, in fact, they’re based on hard repertoire contextual fact.” 

Watch what else Bernstein said above.