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Post by Old Badger on Sept 14, 2018 11:17:09 GMT -5
UPDATE: Manafort already is cooperating with the Special Counsel. He has agreed not to appeal his VA convictions, while Mueller will not re-try him on the counts that were not decided. He's agreed to be interviewed without legal counsel, meaning he now has immunity from further prosecution. linkTick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock.
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Post by Old Badger on Sept 14, 2018 16:22:10 GMT -5
I just picked up this tidbit on TV: To date, the Mueller investigation has cost a bit under $17 million. Today's agreement with Manafort alone will yield $46 million in forfeitures of cash and property, and that does not count any back taxes that may be collected. So, while this investigation is not a "witch hunt" it' is a money-maker for the taxpayers. Truth, Justice, and Generation of Revenue: The American Way!
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Post by Old Badger on Sept 14, 2018 21:33:04 GMT -5
Three high-level criminal attorneys on the implications: "Mr. Manafort’s cooperation obviously represents an enormous pivot from the previous strategies he had seemed to be pursuing — trying to persuade a jury to ignore the strong evidence against him based on personal sympathies or, if that failed, to obtain a pardon from President Trump. In our estimation, this about-face represents a realistic judgment on his part, not to mention vindication of Mr. Mueller’s strategy so far. A quick pardon was always a long shot. It would be hard for Mr. Trump to justify politically, even given his willingness to use the pardon power with seeming abandon. A pardon would not protect Mr. Manafort from the wide array of state charges that could be brought against him. "Mr. Manafort now has the ability to trade all of the valuable information he has regarding the president and those close to him for a significantly reduced prison sentence. He is the first Trump campaign participant in the now-infamous 2016 Trump Tower meeting to break with the president. Mysteries around that meeting abound. They include whether then-candidate Trump knew about the meeting in advance and why Mr. Trump announced after the meeting had been scheduled that he would soon be giving a major speech on 'the things that have taken place with the Clintons.' Now that Mr. Manafort is cooperating, we may soon have answers... "Mr. Manafort may also be able to shed light on other episodes during his tenure at the helm of the Trump campaign. Those include the 80-plus contacts between the campaign and other associates and Russia-linked individuals; the campaign’s possible collaboration with WikiLeaks; and the amendment of the Republican National Committee platform on arming Ukraine. Mr. Manafort may also be able to shed light on obstruction of justice by the president. If the reports of pardon negotiations between the president’s personal attorneys and Mr. Manafort’s lawyers are true, that raises the question of whether any of these discussions could be construed as offering a pardon in exchange for Mr. Manafort’s silence. "Cooperation can be like dominoes. Mr. Manafort’s cooperation is not limited to actions of the president, and if he can help the special counsel bring charges against others close to Mr. Trump, they too may end up cooperating and further strengthening the case that Mr. Mueller is seeking to build." linkAs nearly as I can tell, Trump hasn't tweeted about this yet. But the rats are jumping ship because rats always know when the ship's gonna sink. Meanwhile Capt. Queeg is up on the bridge giving senseless orders that his officers are quietly shelving, all the while ranting and raving about the disloyal, incompetent, dishonest crew. Someday he'll get to testify about them, too:
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Post by Old Badger on Sept 20, 2018 22:26:40 GMT -5
"Michael D. Cohen, President Trump’s former personal lawyer, has been interviewed repeatedly in the past month by prosecutors in the special counsel investigation into whether the Trump campaign conspired with Russian operatives, according to two people with knowledge of the sessions." linkThe thing about Trump is that he doesn't email, and doesn't write memos, so it's hard to find a paper trail of any wrong-doing from those sources. However, he does talk--a lot. And the people he's talked to now are talking to Mueller's team about what they discussed with Trump. Cohan + Manafort + the accountant = a lot of conversation with Trump to which they can testify. Plus, Cohen likes to record those discussions. Long story short: this is very bad news for Trump.
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Post by Old Badger on Sept 21, 2018 16:50:45 GMT -5
"President" Stumblebum was forced to back down from his latest effort to hurt the Mueller probe after officials pointed out that (a) it would harm national security, and (b) allies were apoplectic at their information being released without their consent: "President Trump on Friday walked back his order earlier this week to declassify information in the ongoing probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election, saying Justice Department officials and others had persuaded him not to do so for the time being. The retreat from his declassification decree issued just four days ago underscores the ongoing tensions between the White House and the Justice Department over the probe by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, who is examining whether any Trump associates may have conspired with the Kremlin to interfere in the election. "In a pair of Friday morning tweets, Trump said: 'I met with the DOJ concerning the declassification of various UNREDACTED documents. They agreed to release them but stated that so doing may have a perceived negative impact on the Russia probe. Also, key Allies’ called to ask not to release. Therefore, the Inspector General has been asked to review these documents on an expedited basis. I believe he will move quickly on this (and hopefully other things which he is looking at). In the end I can always declassify if it proves necessary.'” link
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Post by Old Badger on Oct 19, 2018 15:00:18 GMT -5
"Russians working for a close ally of President Vladimir V. Putin engaged in an elaborate campaign of 'information warfare' to interfere with the midterm elections, federal prosecutors said on Friday in unsealing a criminal complaint against one of them. The woman, Elena Alekseevna Khusyaynova, 44, of St. Petersburg, was involved in an effort 'to spread distrust toward candidates for U.S. political office and the U.S. political system,' prosecutors said...The conspirators seized on divisions in American politics, prosecutors said, including immigration, guns, race relations, women and even the debate over the protests by National Football League players during the national anthem...The conspiracy detailed in the complaint was part of broader political disruption effort known as 'Project Lakhta' that began in 2014." linkSo, the Russkies still are at it, right? But, you know. Trump likes Putin, so how bad can it be that they're trying to disrupt an election for the third straight cycle? Also of note: "Friday’s announcement echoed a warning two years ago. In October 2016, weeks ahead of the presidential vote, the director of national intelligence and the secretary of Homeland Security issued a statement saying the Russian government had directed compromises of emails from the American citizens and political organizations, a references to the hacks of the Democratic National Committee and John Podesta, the Clinton campaign chairman. The statement was largely overlooked. Hours later, the recording of President Trump boasting years earlier to an 'Access Hollywood' host about grabbing their genitalia became public. And soon after that, Mr. Podesta’s emails began to be released by WikiLeaks." So, it wasn't some 400-pound couch potato feeding WikiLeaks, after all, but the Russians? Wow!
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Post by Old Badger on Oct 19, 2018 18:24:00 GMT -5
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Post by Old Badger on Oct 19, 2018 22:11:35 GMT -5
I know that Mueller's been keeping a low profile during the run-up to the election, given DOJ guidelines (calling James Comey!), but that doesn't mean he hasn't been busy: "Special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation is scrutinizing how a collection of activists and pundits intersected with WikiLeaks, the website that U.S. officials say was the primary conduit for publishing materials stolen by Russia, according to people familiar with the matter. Mr. Mueller’s team has recently questioned witnesses about the activities of longtime Trump confidante Roger Stone, including his contacts with WikiLeaks, and has obtained telephone records, according to the people familiar with the matter. "Investigators also have evidence that the late GOP activist Peter W. Smith may have had advance knowledge of details about the release of emails from a top Hillary Clinton campaign official by WikiLeaks, one person familiar with the matter said. They have questioned Mr. Smith’s associates, the person said. Right-wing pundit Jerome Corsi was also questioned by investigators about his interactions with Mr. Stone and WikiLeaks before a grand jury in September, according to a person familiar with the matter. Mr. Corsi declined to comment. A lawyer for Mr. Stone said he hasn’t been contacted by the special counsel. Mr. Smith died last year." linkFor those who may not have been following this convoluted story, here's what this means: We know from charging documents that they've already looked at contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian intelligence agencies. We also know that they've been looking into how the Russians fed information to WikiLeaks. This confirms that they're also examining the links between WikiLeaks and the Trump campaign. You can imagine the connecting arrows below to understand the implications. They are not good for someone. Trump Campaign Russian Intelligence WikiLeaks
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Post by Old Badger on Oct 31, 2018 9:17:18 GMT -5
Ooops! Closing the Trump-Wikileaks-Russia plot:
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Post by Old Badger on Oct 31, 2018 22:17:13 GMT -5
Two years ago today the NYT published this article, which implied--incorrectly--that the FBI had established "no clear link" between the Trump campaign and Russia: Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia
WASHINGTON — For much of the summer, the F.B.I. pursued a widening investigation into a Russian role in the American presidential campaign. Agents scrutinized advisers close to Donald J. Trump, looked for financial connections with Russian financial figures, searched for those involved in hacking the computers of Democrats, and even chased a lead — which they ultimately came to doubt — about a possible secret channel of email communication from the Trump Organization to a Russian bank. Law enforcement officials say that none of the investigations so far have found any conclusive or direct link between Mr. Trump and the Russian government. And even the hacking into Democratic emails, F.B.I. and intelligence officials now believe, was aimed at disrupting the presidential election rather than electing Mr. Trump. www.nytimes.com/2016/11/01/us/politics/fbi-russia-election-donald-trump.htmlThat was then. Here's what the NYT said in May of this year: Code Name Crossfire Hurricane: The Secret Origins of the Trump InvestigationWithin hours of opening an investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia in the summer of 2016, the F.B.I. dispatched a pair of agents to London on a mission so secretive that all but a handful of officials were kept in the dark...The agents summarized their highly unusual interview and sent word to Washington on Aug. 2, 2016, two days after the investigation was opened. Their report helped provide the foundation for a case that, a year ago Thursday, became the special counsel investigation...The facts, had they surfaced, might have devastated the Trump campaign: Mr. Trump’s future national security adviser was under investigation, as was his campaign chairman. One adviser appeared to have Russian intelligence contacts. Another was suspected of being a Russian agent himself...But in the face of questions from Congress about the Trump campaign, the F.B.I. declined to tip its hand... In late October, in response to questions from The Times, law enforcement officials acknowledged the investigation but urged restraint. They said they had scrutinized some of Mr. Trump’s advisers but had found no proof of any involvement with Russian hacking. The resulting article, on Oct. 31, reflected that caution and said that agents had uncovered no “conclusive or direct link between Mr. Trump and the Russian government.” The key fact of the article — that the F.B.I. had opened a broad investigation into possible links between the Russian government and the Trump campaign — was published in the 10th paragraph...the article’s tone and headline — “Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia” — gave an air of finality to an investigation that was just beginning. www.nytimes.com/2018/05/16/us/politics/crossfire-hurricane-trump-russia-fbi-mueller-investigation.htmlThe 2016 article was cited repeatedly by Trump and the right-wing media in the final weeks of the campaign as showing the campaign had been exonerated, even though this was materially false, and the campaign, at least, knew it to be false. Yet the NYT said nothing to clarify the story, leading to well-deserved criticism of Executive Editor Dean Baquet as one of a number of questionable decisions the paper made during the campaign. Eventually the WP's media columnist took up the issue: New York Times acknowledges it buried the lead in pre-election Russia-Trump story
That’s one heck of a concession: We buried the lead! In their book “Russian Roulette,” authors Michael Isikoff and David Corn report that editors at the New York Times “cast the absence of a conclusion as the article’s central theme rather than the fact of the investigation itself,” contrary to the wishes of the reporters. The article in question was published on Oct. 31, 2016, and it has received a great deal of hindsight-aided scrutiny for the role it may have played in easing voters’ concerns about ties between Donald Trump and Russia...[It] hit the public sphere just as other outlets — Slate and Mother Jones — published reports that began poking at the outlines of possible collusion. Following the election, then-New York Times Public Editor Liz Spayd knocked the newspaper for proceeding too timidly...Comey trashed the piece: “At least with respect to what the goals of the Russian effort were, it’s just wrong.” The article had indicated that “even the hacking into Democratic emails, F.B.I. and intelligence officials now believe, was aimed at disrupting the presidential election rather than electing Mr. Trump.” In response to Comey’s blast, Baquet told this blog, “I think the headline was off but if you read the story I think it was NOT inaccurate based on what we knew at the time." www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2018/05/16/new-york-times-acknowledges-it-buried-the-lead-in-pre-election-russia-trump-story/?utm_term=.812397c28a16Yeah, well the headline was "off" and the most important fact in the story was buried, but hey AFTER THE ELECTION we got some stuff right! Thanks, Dean.
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Post by goldenbucky on Nov 1, 2018 7:21:20 GMT -5
I canceled my NYT subscription not long after that article.
Journalistic malpractice.
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 7, 2018 12:10:48 GMT -5
"Last year, Donald Trump Jr. testified that he never informed his father of a meeting with Russian officials promising 'dirt' on Hillary Clinton. It seemed hard to believe that the ne’er-do-well son would neglect to seek credit for his expected campaign coup from the father whose approval he so obviously craves. And now it seems that Robert Mueller has obtained proof that it is not in fact true. The Trump family lies all the time, of course, but doing it under oath is a crime. Two days ago, Gabriel Sherman reported that White House officials are concerned about Donald Jr. 'I’m very worried about Don Jr.,' a former West Wing official told Sherman, who fears Mueller will be able to prove perjury. Deep in a report about Trump’s 2020 campaign plans, Politico drops the news this morning that Trump Jr. 'has told friends in recent weeks that he believes he could be indicted.'” linkElection's over. Now.
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 7, 2018 16:35:23 GMT -5
Assuming Trump doesn't shut Mueller down (a self-defeating move if he tries it--there are records and Democratic House Committee Chairs will get them if that happens), it seems that there's been a lot of activity during the campaign down time" "Behind the scenes, Mueller’s investigators have been intensively gathering evidence and questioning witnesses in recent weeks. The grand jury hearing evidence in the Russia investigation has been seen meeting at a federal courthouse in Washington on six of the last eight Fridays. Based on witnesses who have been called to the grand jury, the special counsel appears to be intensely focused on Stone. The longtime Trump friend and former adviser is under scrutiny for claims he made in the 2016 campaign that suggested he was in contact with WikiLeaks. In the final months of the White House race, the group published Democratic emails that prosecutors allege were hacked by Russian military operatives. "Stone has repeatedly maintained that he was not in touch with WikiLeaks and did not have advance knowledge of its plans. He said he based his comments on publicly available interviews with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and tips from associates, including New York comedian and radio host Randy Credico, who interviewed Assange on his program in August 2016. Credico has denied serving as a back-channel to Assange for Stone. "In recent weeks, two more Stone associates testified before the grand jury — among at least nine people connected to Stone who have been contacted by prosecutors so far. Filmmaker David Lugo and lawyer Tyler Nixon both told The Washington Post last month that Credico acknowledged to them that he gave Stone information from Assange. Lugo, who appeared before the grand jury Oct. 19, said he turned over text messages and emails to Mueller’s team. Nixon said he testified last week. "Separately, conservative writer Jerome Corsi was interviewed by investigators over three days last week and appears to be emerging as a key witness in the Mueller investigation into Stone’s activities. In an appearance on his live-streamed Internet show Monday, Corsi told viewers that he has been in near-continuous contact with Mueller’s team in recent weeks. 'It’s been two months, on a really constant basis in the Mueller investigation. It’s been one of the biggest pushes of my life,' said Corsi, who added that he could provide no specifics of his interactions with Mueller." linkWatch for indictments soon, including of Stone and Donny, Jr., both of whom have been alerting friends that they expect just that. I assume there will be others. Acting quickly and publicly would make it harder for Trump to kill the investigation, as even he seems to intuit: “I could fire everybody right now, but I don’t want to stop it because politically I don’t like stopping it.” Indeed, it's probably safer for him to leave Mueller in place and just continue to use him as a punching bag: “It’s a disgrace. It should never have been started, because there is no crime.” That's a lot better for him (always the standard) than trying to defend firing a prosecutor who's just indicted his son.
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 9, 2018 11:46:14 GMT -5
People get what Trump is up to: "Tens of thousands of protesters nationwide spent Thursday evening decrying President Trump’s removal of Jeff Sessions as U.S. attorney general, a move they fear threatens the independence of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation. Those gathered in cities and towns from Boston to Houston to Seattle said Trump 'crossed a red line' when he picked Matthew G. Whitaker as acting attorney general after asking and receiving Sessions’s resignation on Wednesday. Whitaker, a political loyalist, has criticized the special counsel’s probe into possible collusion between Russia and Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign." link
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 12, 2018 19:12:51 GMT -5
Another indictment to anticipate: "Conservative author Jerome Corsi said Monday that he expects to be indicted by prosecutors working for special counsel Robert S. Mueller III on a charge of lying to investigators probing Russian interference in the 2016 campaign. Corsi, a writer who has promoted political conspiracy theories, provided research during the White House race to longtime Trump adviser Roger Stone, who Mueller has been scrutinizing for possible ties to WikiLeaks. "On Monday, Corsi told listeners of his daily live-stream web program that he turned over two computers, emails and other communications to Mueller and sat for six interviews totaling more than 40 hours since receiving a subpoena two months ago. But he said that his cooperation had 'exploded' in recent weeks and that Mueller’s team has said he will be criminally charged...Corsi did not tell his viewers precisely what he had been told by special counsel prosecutors, but made an appeal for donations to his legal defense fund." linkCorsi is believed to be the go-between linking WikiLeaks to the Trump campaign via Roger Stone. Now that he's about to be indicted Stone says, “He has his own demons.” Well, yeah, he does. Like he insists that the Twin Towers fell not because of the planes that hit them but because of explosives hidden inside the buildings that, for some inexplicable reason, law enforcement refuses to acknowledge. (Does that make Rudy Giuliani a member of The Deep State?) He was one of the Swift Boaters who went after John Kerry, who was awarded the Silver Star, Bronze Star, and Purple Heart, on behalf of a guy who fought his war in a Texas Air National Guard unit to which he almost never reported. And he was one of those who came up with the "birther" lie to harass Barack Obama--after he'd also gone after John McCain as having links to al-Qaeda. So, year, lots of problems. Yet, there he was working for the Trump campaign. What does that tell you about the Trumpists? Anyway, I can't wait to read the indictment when it comes down.
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 23, 2018 15:42:49 GMT -5
"Conservative writer and conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi is in plea negotiations with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, according to Corsi and another person with knowledge of the talks. The talks with Corsi — an associate of President Trump and GOP operative Roger Stone — could bring Mueller’s team closer to determining whether Trump or his advisers were linked to WikiLeaks’ release of hacked Democratic emails in 2016, a key part of his long-running inquiry. Corsi provided research on Democratic figures during the campaign to Stone, a longtime Trump adviser. For months, the special counsel has been scrutinizing Stone’s activities in an effort to determine whether he coordinated with WikiLeaks. Stone and WikiLeaks have repeatedly denied any such coordination. Stone has said that Corsi also has a relationship with Trump, built on their shared interest in the falsehood that President Barack Obama was not born in the United States." linkThat sound you hear is another rat jumping ship.
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 26, 2018 23:34:41 GMT -5
"Prosecutors with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III said Monday that Paul Manafort breached his plea agreement, accusing President Trump’s former campaign chairman of lying repeatedly to them in their investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. Manafort denied doing so intentionally, but both sides agreed in a court filing that U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson of the District should set sentencing immediately. The apparent collapse of Manafort’s cooperation agreement is the latest stunning turnaround in his case, exposing the longtime Republican consultant to at least a decade behind bars after he pleaded guilty in September to charges of cheating the Internal Revenue Service, violating foreign-lobbying laws and attempting to obstruct justice. "The filing also indicated that Mueller’s team may have lost its potentially most valuable witness in Manafort, a top campaign official present at discussions at the heart of the special counsel’s mission to determine if any Americans conspired with Russia’s efforts to sway the U.S. election. Still, prosecutors may know more about Manafort’s interactions than he realized, allowing them to catch him in alleged lies. Separately Monday, conservative author Jerome Corsi, who has ties to a longtime Trump adviser, said he rejected a deal offered by Mueller to plead guilty to one count of perjury because, he said, he did not intentionally lie to investigators." linkSo, neither guy denies lying. They just say they didn't lie "intentionally". I think they're both hoping that Trump fires Mueller before Jan. 3 and gives them a reprieve.
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 27, 2018 23:00:13 GMT -5
"Donald Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort held secret talks with Julian Assange inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London, and visited around the time he joined Trump’s campaign, the Guardian has been told. Sources have said Manafort went to see Assange in 2013, 2015 and in spring 2016 – during the period when he was made a key figure in Trump’s push for the White House...It is unclear why Manafort would have wanted to see Assange and what was discussed. But the last apparent meeting is likely to come under scrutiny and could interest Robert Mueller, the special prosecutor who is investigating alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia... "Manafort’s first visit to the embassy took place a year after Assange sought asylum inside, two sources said. A separate internal document written by Ecuador’s Senain intelligence agency and seen by the Guardian lists 'Paul Manaford [sic]' as one of several well-known guests. It also mentions 'Russians'. According to the sources, Manafort returned to the embassy in 2015. He paid another visit in spring 2016, turning up alone, around the time Trump named him as his convention manager. The visit is tentatively dated to March. Manafort’s 2016 visit to Assange lasted about 40 minutes, one source said, adding that the American was casually dressed when he exited the embassy, wearing sandy-coloured chinos, a cardigan and a light-coloured shirt... "The revelation could shed new light on the sequence of events in the run-up to summer 2016, when WikiLeaks published tens of thousands of emails hacked by the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency. Hillary Clinton has said the hack contributed to her defeat. The previously unreported Manafort-Assange connection is likely to be of interest to Mueller, who has been investigating possible contacts between WikiLeaks and associates of Trump including the political lobbyist Roger Stone and Donald Trump Jr." linkGosh, who could've seen this coming! Manafort-Assange-Ukraine? What could connect these...and link them to Trump? Nah, can't be. Hoax! LOL!
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 28, 2018 10:55:40 GMT -5
"Conservative author Jerome Corsi alerted longtime Trump adviser Roger Stone in early August 2016 that WikiLeaks planned to release material damaging to Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, including documents related to her campaign chairman John Podesta, according to a draft court filing. Corsi emailed Stone about WikiLeaks’s plans nearly 10 weeks before the group published Podesta’s hacked emails in October, according to the document, which was prepared by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s team as part of plea negotiations with Corsi that have collapsed. 'Word is friend in embassy plans 2 more dumps. One shortly after I’m back. 2nd in Oct. Impact planned to be very damaging,' Corsi wrote in the email quoted in the draft document, referring to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who has been living in the Ecuadoran Embassy in London since 2012. The email continued: 'Time to let more than [Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta] to be exposed as in bed w enemy if they are not ready to drop [Clinton]. That appears to be the game hackers are now about.'" linkThis is a key point in the narrative the Mueller team is developing that links the Trump campaign to WikiLeaks, which they also have linked to Russian intelligence agencies. This exchange came as part of a series of emails between Corsi and Stone that support that narrative: "According to the document, Stone wrote to Corsi on July 25, 2016, urging him to find out Assange’s plans. 'Get to [Assange] a t Ecuadorian Embassy in London and get the pending [WikiLeaks] emails,' Stone wrote to Corsi…[who] forwarded the email to Ted Malloch, a London-based author and Trump ally. Eight days later, Corsi wrote to Stone appearing to offer details of Assange’s plans...On Aug. 21, 2016, a few weeks after Corsi’s email, Stone tweeted, 'Trust me, it will soon the Podesta’s time in the barrel.'”
Corsi, Stone, and Malloch all have claimed they knew nothing and never spoke with Assange. Yet, somehow, they managed to be quite prescient about what WikiLeaks would publish and when, which kind of makes their denials suspect. It's not clear these guys know just how much Mueller has on them in the form of emails and other documentation, but they sure are not helping themselves by claiming they just were exchanging political gossip.
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 28, 2018 18:36:32 GMT -5
"A lawyer for Paul Manafort, the president’s onetime campaign chairman, repeatedly briefed President Trump’s lawyers on his client’s discussions with federal investigators after Mr. Manafort agreed to cooperate with the special counsel, according to one of Mr. Trump’s lawyers and two other people familiar with the conversations. The arrangement was highly unusual and inflamed tensions with the special counsel’s office when prosecutors discovered it after Mr. Manafort began cooperating two months ago, the people said. Some legal experts speculated that it was a bid by Mr. Manafort for a presidential pardon even as he worked with the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, in hopes of a lighter sentence." linkTechnically, this is not illegal, but let's just say it's frowned upon. It may have been Manafort trying to wheedle a pardon from Trump, but whatever the intent it's apparently why Mueller cut off further discussions and asked for a final sentence on the counts for which Manafort was found guilty. And according to some lawyers Giuliani's boast, quoted in the NYT, that these discussions were used to help inform Trump's defense strategy could result in charges of witness tampering and obstruction of justice against Trump.
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 28, 2018 22:18:22 GMT -5
More from that Manafort court filing, and this time it's about Trump: "The calls almost always came deep into the night. Caller ID labeled them 'unknown,' but Roger Stone said he knew to pick up quickly during those harried months of the 2016 presidential campaign. There would be a good chance that the voice on the other end of the line would belong to his decades-long friend — the restless, insomniac candidate Donald Trump — dialing from a blocked phone number. "Those nocturnal chats and other contacts between the man who now occupies the Oval Office and an infamous political trickster have come under intensifying scrutiny as special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation bores into whether Stone served as a bridge between Trump and WikiLeaks as the group was publishing hacked Democratic emails. Mueller’s keen interest in their relationship was laid out in a draft court document revealed this week in which prosecutors drew a direct line between the two men — referring to Stone as someone understood to be in regular contact with senior Trump campaign officials, 'including with then-candidate Donald J. Trump.' The inclusion of the president by name in the draft filing rattled his legal team and indicated how closely the special counsel is scrutinizing what Trump may have learned from Stone about WikiLeaks’ release of emails that prosecutors say were hacked by Russian intelligence operatives." linkYes, the were rattled enough that they refused to send Trump's written answers to Mueller's questions back to the prosecutor for a week after they were alerted this filing was going to the court. And, yes they were apprised, and sure those answers were mostly written by lawyers not Trump (if they trusted him to avoid self-incrimination they'd have agreed to a live interview, after all), but it's clear that Mueller is nailing down all the connections: Russia ---> WikiLeaks ---> Trump, with guys such as Manafort, Stone, Corsi and others filling in those arrows. No wonder The Donald is in such a crusty mood these days!
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 29, 2018 10:38:49 GMT -5
"Michael Cohen, a former personal attorney to President Trump, pleaded guilty Thursday to one count of making false statements to Congress about a Moscow real estate project Trump pursued during the months he was running for president...Trump has repeatedly said that he had no business dealings in Russia, tweeting in July 2016 “For the record, I have ZERO investments in Russia” and telling reporters in January 2017 that he had no deals there because he had 'stayed away.' Such statements would be undermined if Cohen is now asserting conversations about the project continued past January 2016." linkDon't you wonder what else Cohen's been telling Team Mueller? I think we'll find out soon. EDIT: And, sure enough, the WP's Aaron Blake gives us three "key takeaways" from the filing already: 1) There are conspicuous mentions of Trump and his family
In written testimony to both the House and Senate intelligence committees last year, Cohen said the Trump Tower Moscow deal was abandoned in January 2016...The plea deal says that not only did Cohen continue to pursue the project through June 2016, but also that he briefed President Trump on it more than the three times he had originally claimed, and also that he briefed Trump’s family members. 2) Putin’s spokesman appears to have lied about contact with Cohen
It has been reported that Cohen emailed Vladimir Putin’s press office in January 2016 seeking to grease the skids for the deal. But Cohen had said he never heard back. Turns out, that was a lie. An assistant to Putin’s top spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, emailed him back, according to the plea deal, and then Cohen spoke with the assistant on the phone for 20 minutes. But Cohen wasn’t the only one who lied about it. So, too, apparently, did Peskov. Here’s what Peskov said of the matter back in August 2017: “ . . . Since, I repeat again, we do not react to such business topics — this is not our work — we left it unanswered.” 3) The deal apparently died the day The Post broke a story about Russian hacking
The plea deal indicates the last known discussion about the deal was “on or about June 14,” 2016, when Cohen told a Russian associate, Felix Sater, that he was canceling plans to travel to Russia. Why is that date significant? It happens to be the day The Washington Post broke a big story that Russia had hacked the Democratic National Committee.
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 29, 2018 10:52:09 GMT -5
The Moscow Project at the Center for American Progress presents a clear outline of the conspiracy case Mueller appears to be building (ignore the partisan hyperbole, such as the title): IT'S OFFICIAL: MUELLER HAS IDENTIFIED COLLUSIONA draft plea agreement that Special Counsel Robert Mueller sent to conspiracy theorist and Roger Stone associate Jerome Corsi confirms that, in investigating the hack and release of stolen emails, Mueller has identified collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia during the 2016 election. And Mueller identified that the man at the center of it was in regular contact with Trump himself. Mueller has identified the Trump campaign’s pipeline to WikiLeaks.
*Mueller has evidence that Stone was in “regular contact” with Trump and “senior members of the Trump campaign,” which suggests Stone was passing information to Trump and his inner circle. *Stone tasked Corsi to contact WikiLeaks about the stolen emails they received from Russia that could damage the Clinton campaign. Corsi and Stone were the conduits between WikiLeaks and the Trump team. *Through his intermediary Ted Malloch, Corsi contacted WikiLeaks about the stolen emails and then passed Stone advance information about the emails, information Stone could then pass to the Trump campaign. *The emails between Corsi and Stone show they knew WikiLeaks “possessed information that would be damaging to then-candidate Hillary Clinton and that Organization 1 [WikiLeaks] planned to release damaging information in October 2016.” Mueller has identified that WikiLeaks got the hacked emails from Russia.
I*n an indictment from July, Mueller outlined in exhaustive detail how 12 GRU agents hacked the email inboxes of the DNC and Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta, naming the specific individuals involved and pinpointing how when they carried out the cyberattacks. *That indictment also describes how the GRU agents “used the Guccifer 2.0 persona to release additional stolen documents through a website maintained by an organization”—since identified as WikiLeaks—“that has previously posted documents stolen from U.S. persons, entities, and the U.S. government.” *Mueller has identified that the Trump campaign knew Russia was the source of the stolen emails. *Mueller’s first indictment, of Trump’s foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos, showed that the campaign learned months before anybody else that Russia had obtained “dirt” on Clinton in the form of “thousands of emails.” Mueller’s indictments and guilty pleas alone demonstrate that there was collusion between the Trump team, WikiLeaks, and the Kremlin. As we wrote earlier this year, the hack and release of emails is a textbook study in collusion: *Russia stole the emails and alerted the Trump campaign that they had done so. *Russia gave those emails to WikiLeaks. *Corsi got information on how WikiLeaks planned to use the emails and passed it to Stone, who he knew was in regular contact with the Trump campaign. In other words: Mueller has identified the conspiracy that facilitated collusion.
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 30, 2018 0:29:01 GMT -5
"In two major developments this week, President Trump has been labeled in the parlance of criminal investigations as a major subject of interest, complete with an opaque legal code name: 'Individual 1.' New evidence from two separate fronts of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation casts fresh doubts on Trump’s version of key events involving Russia, signaling potential political and legal peril for the president. Investigators have now publicly cast Trump as a central figure of their probe into whether Trump’s campaign conspired with the Russian government during the 2016 campaign. Together, the documents show investigators have evidence that Trump was in close contact with his lieutenants as they made outreach to both Russia and WikiLeaks — and that they tried to conceal the extent of their activities. "Some legal experts argued Mueller appears to be drawing a picture of a candidate who was beholden to the Kremlin. Emails released in the Cohen plea show Trump seeking a financial endorsement from the Russian government on a private project while Russian President Vladimir Putin was offering to say flattering things about Trump...Legal experts said prosecutors were not likely to build a guilty plea — a brick in the overall case — on the word of one person. The prosecutors’ filings show they have corroborated and buttressed Cohen’s account with contemporaneous emails, and people familiar with the probe say they have also obtained corroborating testimony from other witnesses." linkSurprisingly, perhaps, this is the first time that Trump personally has been referred to as a "person of interest" for the Mueller investigation. The fact that they basically forced Papadopoulos to go to jail, are withdrawing from their plea deal with Manafort, and have shown little interest in resuscitating their deal with Corsi may mean that Cohen is giving them a lot of the information the others have not. Consider: "Trump privately stewed as he followed news coverage of Cohen’s plea early Thursday morning, a White House official said. A Justice official called the White House Counsel’s Office on Wednesday evening to let personnel know that Cohen would be pleading guilty in a case the following day, according to one person with direct knowledge of the notice. They were not told the details, however, which they learned about shortly before Cohen’s plea Thursday morning...Among White House advisers, Cohen is seen as an existential threat — as much or more so than the Mueller investigation itself because of his longtime role as Trump’s fixer. Trump’s legal team did not learn until Thursday that Cohen had sat for dozens of hours of interviews with Mueller’s office, according to a senior administration official." [NOTE: I'll move this thread into the general Trump-Russia thread later, but thought it should be highlighted now.]
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Post by Old Badger on Nov 30, 2018 9:55:16 GMT -5
This must have annoyed Individual 1: "Acting attorney general Matthew G. Whitaker was notified in advance that President Trump’s former personal attorney would plead guilty Thursday to lying to Congress about a Moscow real estate project that Trump and his company pursued while he was running for president, a person familiar with the matter said. The notification could strain relations between Whitaker and Trump, who reacted to the plea by accusing his former attorney, Michael Cohen, of lying to spare himself prison time." linkThe implication is that Whitaker knew what was coming, but did not give a heads-up to the WH, which apparently was blind-sided yesterday. If this continues watch for Trump to issue unflattering tweets about his new A-G Relatedly, the linked article includes this interesting bit of info about what Whitaker can and cannot do under DOJ regulations, and policies: "Justice Department policies and special-counsel regulations call for Whitaker to be notified of significant events, including 'major developments in significant investigations' and 'events affecting the Department that are likely to generate national media or Congressional attention.' Importantly, though, the regulations do not require the attorney general to approve such steps. The attorney general can request that the special counsel explain a step that is being taken and can conclude that an action is 'so unwarranted under established Departmental practices that it should not be pursued.' The attorney general is supposed to give 'great weight' to the special counsel’s views, and at the end of the case Congress is supposed to be notified of any proposed action that was vetoed." In other words, Whitaker cannot arbitrarily stop or even hinder Mueller's investigation on Trump's behalf. I'm sure he's mindful that one day he won't hold that job, and if it comes out that he tried to do so he'd be subject to obstruction of justice prosecution. Trump seems not to understand this at all, which is why he was so frustrated by Sessions's inability to protect him from Mueller. If he's expecting Whitaker to flirt with possible imprisonment in order to save the boss's skin I suspect he's once more going to be disappointed.
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Post by Old Badger on Dec 6, 2018 10:50:04 GMT -5
Another big Friday coming from Mueller. Among other things, it appears they're investigating ties to Turkey. Stay tuned.
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Post by Old Badger on Dec 7, 2018 23:04:51 GMT -5
Today was a major inflection point in the various inquiries into the Trump campaign's criminal activity. In the Southern District of New York filing on Michael Cohen's sentencing, career federal prosecutors wrote about the payoffs to two women during the campaign: “With respect to both payments, Cohen acted with the intent to influence the 2016 presidential election. Cohen coordinated his actions with one or more members of the campaign, including through meetings and phone calls, about the fact, nature, and timing of the payments. In particular, and as Cohen himself has now admitted, with respect to both payments, he acted in coordination with and at the direction of Individual-1.” link Individual-1 has been identified as "the owner of a Manhattan-based real estate company" who ran a "successful campaign for President of the United States." Who could that be? Mueller added: "The defendant’s false statements obscured the fact that the Moscow Project was a lucrative business opportunity that sought, and likely required, the assistance of the Russian government. If the project was completed, the Company [Trump Organization] could have received hundreds of millions of dollars from Russian sources in licensing fees and other revenues. The fact that Cohen continued to work on the project and discuss it with Individual 1 well into the campaign was material to the ongoing congressional and SCO investigations, particularly because it occurred at a time of sustained efforts by the Russian government to interfere with the U.S. presidential election. Similarly, it was material that Cohen, during the campaign, had a substantive telephone call about the project with an assistant to the press secretary for the President of Russia. " In other words, Mueller is looking into Trump's business activities in Russia precisely because they are related to his campaign and Presidency. We learned today that these overtures began in 2015, a year before the infamous June 2016 meeting we already knew about, when "a Russian national who claimed to be a 'trusted person' in the Russian Federation who could offer the campaign 'political synergy' and 'synergy on a government level.'" Synergy is a euphemism for "collusion" as it has been discussed for the past two years. And in the Manafort filing we learn that he was in touch with the White House deep into 2018, when he ostensibly was cooperating with the Special Counsel. There's lots of redaction, but it appears Mueller is moving toward charges of witness-tampering and obstruction of justice. Under DOJ guidelines dating to the Watergate investigation the prosecutors likely will not seek an indictment of Trump. But they already have laid the basis for impeachment. The House Democrats likely will be forced to begin hearings on these findings, and many more, that will lead to the brink of impeachment. The only question is whether any GOP Members will stand up for the rule of law. Nonetheless, it is remarkable that federal employees working under Trump have now charged that he committed at least two felonies. Let that sink in.
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Post by goldenbucky on Dec 8, 2018 0:25:50 GMT -5
The smart move by more and more Republicans will be to cut their losses and dump Trump.
Four things seem to stand in the way:
1) already too tainted by Trump association - no going back 2) a critical mass of deluded, fact-intolerant voters (AKA Fox viewers) 3) fear of compromising information ("kompromat") 4) true believer (dumb and treacherous)
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Post by Old Badger on Dec 8, 2018 10:22:59 GMT -5
4) true believer (dumb and treacherous) Well, at least Dana Rohrabacher was "retired" by the voters, lol!
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Post by Old Badger on Dec 8, 2018 13:46:52 GMT -5
The weirdest reaction to yesterday's filings came from the alternate universe inhabited by the Twit-in-Chief: "Totally clears the President. Thank you!"
That generated this response: "Except for that little part where the US Attorney’s Office says that you directed and coordinated with Cohen to commit two felonies. Other than that, totally scot-free."
Who wrote that? Constitutional lawyer and conservative Republican George Conway, aka Kellyanne's better half. He knows--they all know--that Trump's a crook whose business is an organized crime racket, to which he has appended the Executive Branch of the United States Government. The plot's been hiding in plain sight all along because the Gang that Couldn't Think Straight aren't smart enough to hid it properly.
The irony is that after all the "Lock Her Up!" chants he's directed, it's quite possible that Trump is the one who ends his days locked up in a federal or state penitentiary. I can imagine Mueller, the avatar of public service rectitude, following the example of Leon Jaworski and leaving Trump hanging as an "unindicted co-conspirator" until he leaves office, at which he faces trial. And since it's likely that Trump won't quit, the odds are that the next President will be a Democrat. Unlike Gerald Ford, who was under pressure not to continue inflicting pain on the Republican Party by letting Nixon stand trial, a Democratic President would face even stronger pressure from his own supporters not to let Trump "get away with" his crimes. I even can imagine circumstanced under which I could see Mueller deciding that Trump's criminal behavior has left him so compromised and such a threat to national security that he decided to ignore the DOJ guidance against indicting a sitting President (written when Nixon was under investigation in a DOJ headed by his appointee) and just goes forward on the basis that "no one is above the law, not even the President of the United States."
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