Trump supporters and conspiracy theory - Part 2

[Rick Plant]

For anyone who is confused, this is what a coup looks like.

A new batch of John Eastman emails from Dec. 2020 shows his advice to state legislators seeking to rescind Joe Biden's electors — including his suggestion that they simply retabulate the popular vote to put Trump on top.



'Provide some cover': New Eastman emails shed light on his push to overturn Biden's win
He suggested a way for Pennsylvania legislators to cancel Joe Biden's win.

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/05/10/eastman-emails-pennsylvania-legislators-biden-00031668

[Rick Plant]

Feds looking into Trump's intentionally confusing network of super PACs: 'All of this is totally unprecedented'



The inquiry is linked back to a super PAC named “Make America Great Again, Again!” that was set up after former top aide Corey Lewandowski got fired from another pro-Trump super PAC after allegedly sexually assaulting a major donor but refused to step down, and federal election officials are looking into why some of these groups aren't properly reporting their payments, reported The Daily Beast.

“It is worth emphasizing: All of this is totally unprecedented for a former president,” said Brendan Fischer, deputy executive director of good government group Documented. “Even if Trump kept it simple, and just had one hard money PAC, a single super PAC, and a pair of 501(c)(3)/501(c)(4) nonprofits, there would be no parallel with any former president in American history.”

Trump's personal financial disclosures reveal ties to more than 500 entities, including nearly 400 that use his name or initials, and many of them have tangled links to one another, and this intentionally confusing structure makes it difficult to trace the billions of dollars he and his accountants move around -- and he has brought the same practices to his political operations.

“Typically, former presidents focus on their presidential library, or start a charitable foundation, but Trump is staying in the political game and raising a staggering amount of cash,” Fischer said.

Trump-aligned super PACs raised hundreds of millions of dollars last year, but it won't be clear how much so-called dark money groups raised or how they spent those funds until after the midterms, and filing on Wednesday showed the Trump campaign isn't even able to follow its own money.

“The central lesson of Watergate is ‘Follow the money,’” said Brett Kappel, a specialist in campaign finance and nonprofit law at Harmon Curran, "and this byzantine structure of different types of legal entities — which are subject to different fundraising restrictions and file different reports with different agencies according to different filing schedules — appears to be designed to make that task as difficult as possible.”

Read more here: https://www.thedailybeast.com/even-donald-trump-cant-make-sense-of-his-own-dark-money-maze?ref=home

[Rick Plant]

Katie Porter raises awareness about Donald Trump's alleged bribery scheme

Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.) is raising awareness about Donald Trump's latest financial debacle: a newly uncovered bribery scheme.

On Wednesday, May 11, Porter appeared on MSNBC News where she offered details about the latest developments involving former Trump Secretary of the Interior, Ryan Zinke, former Deputy Secretary of the Interior, David Bernhardt, and real estate developer, Mike Ingram.

Bernhardt and Ingram reportedly had an off-the-record meeting that is believed to have led to a form of quid pro quo. According to Porter, three major occurrences happened shortly after that meeting. The Army Corp. of Engineers reportedly announced they were reopening the permit process for an area in Arizona that was previously deemed environmentally sensitive

Around the same time, Ingram and a dozen of his business acquaintances donated nearly $250,000 to the Trump Victory Fund and to the Republican National Committee (RNC).

Shortly after the donation was made, a top-ranking Fish and Wildlife official received a call where he was told that a "high-level Politico" wanted him to "reverse his decision that this development would harm the environment.

The Democratic lawmaker also made it clear that this appears to be a quid pro quo because the real estate developer and his friends received a kickback after donating to the former president's "Victory Fund." "This developer was basically able to buy his away around environmental protection law," Porter emphasized.

Porter also tweeted details about the scheme. "New from [Rep. Raul Grijalva] and me: After a real estate developer and his friends made $241,600 in campaign donations, the Trump Administration overruled local environmental experts to greenlight a development near an endangered river," she tweeted. "We're making a criminal referral for bribery."

Porter's remarks on MSNBC came as the House Natural Resources Committee filed a criminal complaint against the U.S. Department of Justice. Porter made it clear that this type of "egregious" situation should indicate to Congress that “reestablishing the rule of law and the expectation that administration officials are going to follow it.”

https://www.rawstory.com/katie-porter-raises-awareness-about-donald-trump-s-alleged-bribery-scheme/

[Rick Plant]

Trump could face criminal prosecution for espionage – according to a Harvard Law professor



Legendary constitutional law expert Laurence Tribe offered his analysis to MSNBC viewers after The New York Times published a bombshell story under the headline, "prosecutors pursue inquiry into Trump's handling of classified material."

Tribe is a professor emeritus at Harvard Law School, where he taught constitutional law for fifty years.

"On this day of truly historic escalations in those investigations into the ex-president and his inner circle, questions now arise about how the Justice Department will juggle all of it and weather all of it," MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace reported.

"The five sitting House Republicans and close allies of the ex-president are the first members of Congress to receive subpoenas from the Jan. 6th select committee and the DOJ moving ahead with its probe of Donald Trump's sensitive including sensitive government documents. Our next guest says we should see all of it and reassurance that Attorney General Merrick Garland is taking steps to hold Trump accountable. Joining me is Laurence Tribe, professor (emeritus) of constitutional law in Harvard and has argued and won 35 cases in front of the Supreme Court," Wallace said, not noting his loss against her old boss in Bush v. Gore.

Tribe explained his thoughts on the DOJ investigation.

"Nicole, I find that quite reassuring and it really brings back memories back from 2017, I think it was, when Donald Trump, right after firing the FBI director called [Russian Foreign Minister] Sergey Lavrov and [Russia Ambassador to America] Sergey Kislyak into the Oval Office by revealing the identity of a Mossad Israeli agent who was involved in an undercover operation to discover an Islamic plot to create methods of going through American airports without detection and carrying bombs," he said. "So we know we're dealing with a guy who is not particularly careful about classified information and if he can get some bragging rights by sharing it with adversaries he's willing to do it.

"Now when we find all of this apparent top secret information finding his way to unsecured boxes to Mar-a-Lago, it's very encouraging that the Department of Justice isn't simply asking who packed the boxes, but what did the president then of the United States on his way out of the Oval Office have in mind in taking that information? Did he use it for his own benefit?: he wondered.

"That would be a serious crime of espionage so there is both a national security angle and a potentially criminal angle and the most encouraging thing to me, because I'm worried about accountability so that we don't have a repeat of all of these things in 2024 of the attempted coup and insurrection," Tribe said. "What is most important to me is that no one should be above the law and the attorney general and his top deputy and associate attorneys general, people like Lisa Monaco should be taken at their word when they say they're going to follow the evidence wherever it leads right into the Oval Office, right into the former guy, so stay tuned."

[Rick Plant]

Grand jury convened to investigate Trump's mishandling of classified documents: NYT

Donald Trump facing another grand jury investigation.

The New York Times reports that prosecutors have convened a grand jury to investigate Trump's mishandling of classified documents that he improperly removed from the White House and brought with him to his resort at Mar-a-Lago after his term ended in January 2021.

"In recent days, the Justice Department has taken a series of steps showing that its investigation has progressed beyond the preliminary stages," the paper writes. "Prosecutors issued a subpoena to the National Archives and Records Administration to obtain the boxes of classified documents... The authorities have also made interview requests to people who worked in the White House in the final days of Mr. Trump’s presidency, according to one of the people."

The Times notes, however, that "charges are rarely brought in investigations into the handling of classified documents" and that the DOJ "typically conducts them to determine whether any highly sensitive information may have been exposed so the intelligence community can take measures to protect sources and methods."

The investigation into Trump's handling of classified documents came after the National Archives revealed that it had to go to Mar-a-Lago to obtain documents that were being requested by the House Select Committee investigating the January 6th riots at the United States Capitol building.

The National Archives sent a letter to Congress back in February in which it confirmed that it has "identified items marked as classified national security information within the boxes" that were removed from Mar-a-Lago earlier this year after the Supreme Court ruled that Trump could not shield January 6th-related documents from the committee.

Read more here: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/12/us/politics/justice-department-trump-classified.html

[Rick Plant]

Legal expert: DOJ believes there 'could be some level of criminality' in how Trump handled classified documents

On Thursday's edition of CNN's "OutFront," former federal prosecutor Elie Honig walked through the significance of the DOJ convening a grand jury to examine former President Donald Trump's handling of classified information.

The development, he argued, is a sign that they are taking seriously the possibility the former president may have broken the law.

"When you take the issue of being subpoenaed on, Trump taking documents to Mar-a-Lago, what does it say to you?" asked anchor Erin Burnett.

"This tells me the Justice Department believes there could be — and I want to stress that, could be — some level of criminality here," said Honig. "As a federal prosecutor, if you're going to issue a grand jury subpoena, you can't do that based on nothing, you have to have what prosecutors call predication, which basically just means, some fact or belief that there has been a crime. It's a low bar, but it's not nothing."

"I think what prosecutors are going to be focused on here is that it is a federal crime to remove or destroy classified documents," said Honig. "We know the documents down at Mar-a-Lago were classified, but you have to show, A, a person knew they were classified, and you also have to show a person knew that was wrong. So that's where I think DOJ is really going to be focusing here on the criminal side of things."

The National Archives first confirmed Trump removed boxes of classified information to Mar-a-Lago in February. While the president is the top classification authority in the country, many of these removals may have occurred after Trump left office.

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Kevin McCarthy is facing up to 3 years in prison if he refuses to testify about Trump: ex-prosecutor



House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy of California could be facing legal exposure if he ignores a subpoena from the House Select Committee Investigating the Jan. 6 Attack on the U.S. Capitol and it is established that he had knowledge Donald Trump committed a crime, a former federal prosecutor explained on MSNBC on Thursday.

MSNBC's Chris Hayes interviewed former federal prosecutor Glenn Kirschner after the select committee subpoenaed McCarthy along with Reps. Scott Perry (R-PA), Jim Jordan (R-OH), Andy Biggs (R-AZ), and Mo Brooks (R-AL).

Kirschner noted, "subpoenas are supposed to be taken seriously, they're not party invitations."

"But I think the other thing at risk right now, Chris, is that the legal landscape has shifted not so subtly in recent weeks, because a federal judge in California did announce in his finding, that after litigating the John Eastman email issue, that there was evidence — by a preponderance of the evidence, 51% — that Donald Trump and John Eastman committed two felony crimes together," he noted.

"So now, I suggest that ups the ante on the McCarthys of the world, if they decide to refuse to testify against Donald Trump, when a federal judge has already announced by a preponderance there's evidence that he committed crimes -- that actually constitutes to federal felonies in and of itself, if you refused to come forward and talk about the crimes that have been committed against the United States, accessory after the fact and misprision of a felony," he explained.

"Which we haven't talked about a lot, but that comes directly into play, because a crime has been committed that is cognizable by a court of the United States, and you conceal it? Which is what McCarthy and the others would be doing if they refused to testify. You have committed a three-year federal felony," he said.

The host noted that discussions of pardons from Trump could indicate consciousness of guilt.

"Yeah, exactly," Kirschner replied. "You don't need a pardon for a peaceful protest or a normal tourist visit. You need a pardon for a crime."

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Outrage boils over after it's revealed that Trump’s DOJ issued 'egregious' secret subpoena



The Department of Justice has revealed that it subpoenaed records of a journalist during a leak investigation following negative stories about Donald Trump's administration.

"Leak investigators issued the subpoena to obtain the phone number of Stephanie Kirchgaessner, the Guardian’s investigations correspondent in Washington. The move was carried out without notifying the newspaper or its reporter, as part of an attempt to ferret out the source of media articles about a review into family separation conducted by the Department of Justice’s inspector general, Michael Horowitz," the British newspaper reported. "It is highly unusual for US government officials to obtain a journalist’s phone details in this way, especially when no national security or classified information is involved. The move was all the more surprising in that it came from the DoJ’s inspector general’s office – the watchdog responsible for ethical oversight and whistleblower protections."

That wasn't the only irregularity.

"The leak inquiry was conducted on behalf of the DoJ by the inspector general’s office of an outside government department, housing and urban development (HUD). Its investigation focused on allegations that an employee within the DoJ’s inspector general’s office had leaked sensitive information to three news outlets – the Guardian, the New York Times and NBC News. The Guardian was the only one of the three outlets to have a subpoena issued relating to its reporter’s phone account," it noted.

Katharine Viner, the Guardian’s editor-in-chief, blasted the subpoena as “an egregious example of infringement on press freedom and public interest journalism by the US Department of Justice."

The Guardian published two stories on Trump's family separation policies during the heart of the 2020 election.

"The Guardian published two sensitive reports by Kirchgaessner within the timeframe of the DoJ review into child separation covered by the leak inquiry. On 23 July 2020 she revealed that the DoJ’s former deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein had personally advised that migrant parents should be prosecuted, no matter how young the children accompanying them. On 2 September 2020, Kirchgaessner reported that a senior justice department official nominated by Trump to be a federal judge had participated in the removal of a Texas prosecutor who had sounded the alarm over child separation," The Guardian reported.

The documents were released following a Freedom of Information Act request by reporter Jason Leopold of BuzzFeed News.

Read more info below:

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/21996102-leopold-doj-oig-foia-zero-tolerance-policy-leak-investigation