Washington Post = The Logan Act is a centuries-old law aimed at keeping private citizens out of foreign affairs. Flynn was a private citizen in December of 2016, and in Friday's guilty plea, he basically admitted he urged the Russian ambassador not to retaliate after President Obama announced sanctions punishing Russia for meddling in the presidential election. Authorities indicated he was acting at the urging of other senior Trump transition officials, suggesting they could have violated it too.
That sure sounds like it's possible Flynn or other Trump officials was trying to meddle in foreign affairs before he was a representative for the government, said Stephen Vladeck, a law professor at the University of Texas. It's possible the special counsel could whack Flynn or other campaign officials with this charge to get them to cooperate in the investigation.
NY Times -Mr. Mueller’s investigators have learned through witnesses and documents that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel asked the Trump transition team to lobby other countries to help Israel, according to two people briefed on the inquiry. Investigators have learned that Mr. Flynn and Mr. Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, took the lead in those efforts. Mr. Mueller’s team has emails that show Mr. Flynn saying he would work to kill the vote, the people briefed on the matter said.”
Carl Bernstein - This means that Jared Kushner is at the center of what Mueller is
looking at. There’s no
getting around that. ... Trump has known for a while that his family is
under investigation. I’m told by people in the
White House where Jared Kushner’s wife, Ivanka Trump, went to her father
and pleaded with him to do something because of these investigation
closing in in a family way.
Washington Examiner - Vice President Mike Pence is being dragged into the speculative fog surrounding special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation.
As soon it was reported that former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, who pleaded guilty Friday to lying to the FBI, had been ordered by a senior Trump official in December 2016 to contact the Russians, several journalists speculated about Pence's possible complicity.
"The key folks in the transition who Flynn would have been 'directed by' were: Mike Pence (who was running the transition), Jared Kushner (who was basically the shadow transition chief on foreign policy and natsec) [Reince] Priebus who had already been named CoS and of course Trump," tweeted NBC's Chuck Todd.
Jed Handelsman Shugerman, Slate - Michael Flynn has offered a guilty plea, and he cannot rely on Donald Trump’s pardons to save himself or his son. There is broad consensus that the plea, to a single charge of lying to the FBI, is a clear sign Flynn has agreed to very significant cooperation against a very significant target. Reports indicate that Flynn has agreed to testify against Trump.
I write here to make three points. 1) The plea deal continues Robert Mueller’s strategy of neutralizing Trump’s pardon power. 2) The obstruction of justice charge against Trump just got a whole lot stronger. 3) Everyone is rightly focusing on Trump, but Vice President Mike Pence and White House Counsel Don McGahn are in bigger trouble than ever.
Mueller’s charges and Flynn’s plea still leave open the possibility of state charges, just in case Trump pardons Flynn federally. Presidential pardons apply only to federal crimes. I’ve written before about how Mueller’s prosecutorial strategy required him to navigate complicated state-level double jeopardy rules. His charges against Paul Manafort, Rick Gates, and George Papadopoulos reflected a sharp strategy to bring certain charges, while leaving plenty of others available to state prosecutors. (I’ve provided a long list of state crimes that relate to Trump-Russia allegations.)
The Hill - Former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said Friday that special counsel Robert Mueller's team is likely "looking at everyone up to" President Trump himself as it investigates Russia's meddling in the 2016 election.
"I think the Mueller team is looking at every member of the campaign," Bharara said on CNN. "I think they're looking at every member of the transition team. I think they're looking at everyone up to the president of the United States himself."
Washington Examiner - Former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn is planning to sell his Northern Virginia home to offset mounting legal costs associated with special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia probe.
Flynn has been increasingly concerned over “crippling legal costs” the case has brought and is now planning to sell his house to offset the costs, according to a source who spoke to ABC News. He pleaded guilty on Friday to lying to the FBI about his contact with Russian officials during the presidential transition.
PS: Watch the NY state attorney general Many things, including Russian involvement in Trump real estate, happened in New York. The president can not pardon himself or others for state crimes.
1 comment:
This whole thing is a witch hunt, fishing expedition, and a fabrication.
Its obvious after over 12 months and $300 Million dollars there was no collusion. There was no hacking of Democrat or Podesta files (this has been proved by forensic evidence - it a onsite download by someone at DNC as Wikileaks has told us.)
A phony dossier started by the Bush family PAID for by the Clinton campaign paying foreign nationals to make up dirt on Trump. Then this was used by the Obama admin to get the FBI involved and approve of wiretaps and surveillance on a rival political campaign. This - and the payoffs for Uranium One are the REAL COLLUSION.
How ironic - these are banana republic tactics similar to those used by the Cold War-era USSR.
This will lead to nothing but the destruction of Flynn - and a lot of dashed democrat dreams of impeachment.
This is a reprehensible political action to try to overturn an election.
If Bush had done something like this to Obama after the 2008 election - it would be the focus of the largest investigation since Watergate.
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