The Mueller Report Thread

[seemslikeadream]

_________________________________________


When I am able to read the report I will comment on it ...MUELLER GRAND JURY "CONTINUALLY ROBUSTLY"


The report is finished?????

The Mystery Company
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=40179&p=670620&hilit=The+Mystery+Company#p670620

Grand jury investigation started by Mueller 'continuing robustly,' prosecutor says

It remains unclear what part of Mueller's investigation is ongoing and if more criminal charges could still come, but the hearing on Wednesday made clear that stones Mueller turned over in the last 22 months will continue to be part of federal court proceedings and possibly lead to new cases.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/27/politics ... index.html

Mr. IranContra Coverup Barr report was pre-written

[seemslikeadream]

still waiting for the Mueller Report 3-29-19


This is a time of suspended animation, after the investigators have finished their work but before it’s clear precisely what the conclusion of that work means.
- - Quinta Jurecic


The first selective leak after the Mueller report was given to Barr ......Barr decides to leak the number of pages ....Barr urgently needs to leak a smaller number of pages 300 than Fox News leak of 700 pages

just how many pages are there and what does it say?

REPORT ON THE INVESTIGATION INTO RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE IN THE 2016 PRESIDENT ELECTION: THE REDACTED MUELLER REPORT

March 29, 2019/10 Comments/in 2016 Presidential Election, Mueller Probe /by emptywheel

[redacted] confidential report explaining the prosecution or declination decisions [redacted]

[redacted]

19 [lawyers]

[approximately] 40 FBI agents, intelligence analysts, forensic accountants, and other professional staff

[more than] 2,800 [subpoenas]

[nearly] 500 [search warrants]

[more than] 230 [orders for communication records]

[almost] 50 [pen register orders]

13 [requests to foreign governments for evidence]

[approximately] 500 [witnesses]

[redacted]

[redacted] the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.

[redacted]

[redacted] coordination [redacted] agreement–tacit or express–between the Trump Campaign and the Russian government on election interference.

[redacted]

[redacted] thorough factual investigation [redacted]

[redacted]

difficult issues

[redacted]

[redacted] while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.

[redacted]

[redacted] the evidence does not establish that the President was involved in an underlying crime related to Russian election interference.

[redacted]
https://www.emptywheel.net/2019/03/29/r ... er-report/

The Marx Brothers De-Construct The Barr Letter

This Marx Brothers clip came to mind when it was announced the White House will be given an opportunity to redact the Mueller Report.


Meanwhile, at the White House, the Mutilation of the Mueller Report Begins

And just like in the movies, the Sanity Clause has gone right out the window.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUdvNkDA8_U

Even Congress Might Not Get the Full Mueller Report
And the public could be left with a shell of Mueller's original findings.

Natasha Bertrand is a staff writer at The Atlantic, where she covers national security and the intelligence community.
6:00 AM ET

Congressional Democrats are ramping up their efforts to convince Attorney General William Barr to release special counsel Robert Mueller's full report.Alex Brandon / AP
Now that Special Counsel Robert Mueller has submitted his report to Attorney General William Barr, the biggest questions are: Is the public ever going to see it? And, if so, how much? But at this point, it’s not even clear whether Congress will get to review the entire original document.

The findings from Mueller’s 22-month investigation, which came to an end last Friday, were revealed in bits and pieces through 215 criminal charges and 34 indictments. Mueller was tasked with investigating Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, as well as any coordination or links between President Donald Trump’s campaign and the Russian government. According to a four-page summary of Mueller’s conclusions that Barr released on Sunday, the investigation “did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.” Barr also said that Mueller had not made a decision on obstruction of justice, but both he and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein determined that Trump had not committed obstruction. Trump and his allies have declared themselves vindicated.

But the final findings, which reportedly run to at least 300 pages excluding exhibits, could offer important insights into Mueller’s legal reasoning and explain whether the evidence he collected in the obstruction and conspiracy cases was either substantial but not enough to rise to the level of a criminal offense, or flimsy and not even close to criminal. (The special-counsel regulations require that the office’s final report at the very least explain its prosecution and declination decisions, even if it doesn’t present all the underlying evidence the team amassed.)

For that reason, Democratic lawmakers are demanding to see Mueller’s findings in his own words—rather than summarized in the memo Barr wrote to Congress last weekend. There is nothing in the special-counsel regulations that prevents the report from being made public, let alone anything that would prevent it from being provided to Congress, according to Neal Katyal, the former acting solicitor general who helped draft the regulations in 1999. “The regulations set a floor, not a ceiling, on the amount of transparency,” he wrote in The Washington Post last week.

Read: The Trump scandals that have slipped by Congress

Making the full report available to Congress, however, let alone to the public, might be an uphill battle, experts tell me—so far, Barr and Rosenstein might be the only officials outside of the special counsel’s team who have seen the report itself. “The DOJ regulations really do leave it up to Barr to decide,” Katy Harriger, a professor at Wake Forest University and the author of The Special Prosecutor in American Politics, told me in an email. “The only constraints on that are public pressure, which, if loud and consistent enough, is likely to make him release more, rather than less, of the report.”

A Justice Department official who requested anonymity to discuss the internal deliberations said earlier this week, “We are hoping to have a public version of the report to Congress and to the public in weeks not months.” But a Democratic staffer who spoke with reporters on Thursday on condition of anonymity said that lawmakers still aren’t sure whether they will see the report itself or a summary of it, and what is in the “public version” of the report is still unclear.

Right now the main barrier standing in the way of Barr releasing Mueller’s report to Congress is the grand-jury material included in it, according to several Democratic staffers who spoke with reporters on Thursday on the condition of anonymity. Mueller empaneled a grand jury shortly after being appointed in May 2017. A grand jury hears testimony from witnesses, reviews evidence provided by the prosecutor, hears jury instructions that define the law, and then votes on whether a target should be indicted—as such, the grand-jury materials are key to understanding the full scope of the investigation. Federal rules of criminal procedure obligate Barr to redact the grand-jury material, although in some past instances, such material was released to Congress. The Watergate “Road Map,” for example, which was unsealed by the Washington, D.C., District Court in October, was written by the grand-jury foreman at the time specifically for Congress. It outlined the evidence the jury received over the course of the Watergate probe, but made no recommendation about the best course of action—only that the jury should “presently defer to the House of Representatives and allow the House to determine what action may be warranted at this time by this evidence.”

The House Democrats’ position now is that “there is nothing stopping Barr from giving us the grand-jury material” that informed Mueller’s findings, according to another Democratic staffer who spoke with reporters on Thursday on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. “If he doesn’t, then that amounts to a cover-up.” Another Democratic staffer said that, in a call with House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler on Wednesday night, Barr “would not commit to releasing the full report”—including grand-jury material—to the House. A spokesman for House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy did not return a request for comment about the House Republicans’ position on seeing the full report. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, a close Trump ally, indicated on Wednesday that he will accept whatever redactions Barr makes, including of grand-jury material.

Read: The ongoing investigations surrounding Trump

Between the withholding of grand-jury and privileged material and the redaction of classified information, the public could be left with a shell of the original report.

Barr is currently operating within the confines of the special-counsel regulations, which were written as a reaction to the independent-counsel rules. Those rules expired in 1998 at the end of the Whitewater investigation. Unlike Mueller, Ken Starr, the independent counsel at the time, was obligated to send his final report to Congress rather than the attorney general. Congress then made the report public, which prompted a backlash among those who were angry that Starr had aired details of President Bill Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinsky—an episode that went well outside of Starr’s original mandate to probe a land deal in Arkansas. “We believe that information obtained during a criminal investigation should, in most all cases, be made public only if there is an indictment and prosecution, not in lengthy and detailed reports filed after a decision has been made not to prosecute,” Janet Reno, Clinton’s attorney general, told Congress at the time. “The final report provides a forum for unfairly airing a target’s dirty laundry.”

Whereas the old rules required that the independent counsel tell Congress about “substantial and credible information that an impeachable offense may have been committed,” the new rules are much more narrow: The special counsel’s office, in its report, need only explain to the attorney general its prosecution or declination decisions. In other words, Mueller’s “solemn obligation is not to produce a public report,” Starr wrote for The Atlantic earlier this month. “He cannot seek an indictment. And he must remain quiet.”

The Democrats, meanwhile, argued that the Republican-controlled 115th Congress set a precedent for asking for and receiving highly sensitive and classified material related to the probe into Russia’s interference in the U.S. election, which Mueller then took over— and they’re demanding the same degree of transparency now. For instance, the DOJ turned over roughly 880,000 pages of internal investigative records from the Hillary Clinton email probe in July 2018, one staffer said, as well as “thousands of pages from highly sensitive documents, including classified and law-enforcement-sensitive information, related to the ongoing Russia investigation that Mueller took over.”

The Democrats have set an April 2 deadline for Barr to turn over the report, but will consider issuing a subpoena if the Justice Department blows that deadline, the Democratic staffers said on Thursday. Nadler asked Barr on Wednesday night whether he would meet the April 2 deadline, according to one of the staffers, and Barr said it was “very unlikely” because the department is in the process of redacting the document. The Democrats said that they are also willing to go to court to get the grand-jury material.

Read: Trump’s opponents have one assignment now

Katyal argued in the Post that Congress would “almost certainly win” a subpoena battle. But the Justice Department could still claim that portions of the report are subject to executive-privilege protections, Harriger explained. A legal battle would probably ensue, but the courts are typically reluctant to get involved in privilege disputes between Congress and the executive branch, and usually encourage “negotiation” in those instances, Harriger said. It is also at Barr’s discretion, according to Starr, “to share whatever he intends to report to Congress with the president and the president’s lawyers … to ensure that the president’s constitutionally recognized privilege—executive privilege—is dutifully safeguarded.”

The Democratic staffers declined to comment on Thursday when asked whether Nadler and Barr had discussed the issue of executive privilege. “It may be that executive privilege becomes an obstacle to getting the report released,” one staffer, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said. “It’s not clear to us how the attorney general will litigate those questions, but we don’t think it would be appropriate for him to show the report to the White House before Congress sees it.”

The FBI, meanwhile, is reportedly preparing to brief the Gang of Eight—House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, House Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Devin Nunes, Senate Intelligence Committee Chair and Vice Chair Richard Burr and Mark Warner, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer—on Mueller’s counterintelligence findings, which are classified. But the House Intelligence Committee believes that all of its members are entitled to review any classified information Mueller included in his report.

The Democrats still want to know, above all else, whether the president was compromised by Russia—a question House Intelligence Committee Republicans have reportedly already closed the book on. GOP members told Politico that Barr’s summary “conclusively refutes” the idea that Trump or anyone in his orbit was compromised in 2016, despite the same Republicans’ concluding last year that the campaign’s contacts with Russians were “troubling” and “inconsistent with U.S. national security interests.”

All of this still leaves open the question of how much of the report the public will actually be able to read. Regardless, the Democrats intend to continue pursuing their own probes. “Barr’s letter is very narrow in describing the scope of the investigation,” one Democratic staffer said on Thursday. He explained that while Mueller’s job was “primarily to determine whether a crime was committed,” the question of whether the president or anyone on his campaign team was targeted and compromised—which is not in itself illegal—still stands. “There are risks that our foreign policy right now is not designed to be in our national interest, but in the president’s interests,” the staffer said. “We will continue to investigate this.”

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... ic/586060/

New letter on the Mueller report redaction process from the Attorney General to Nadler and Graham—says it’s nearly 400 pages long exclusive of appendices and he didn’t mean his last letter as a summary.




Who are these “peripheral third parties” and who decides if they’re peripheral?


Compare/contrast March 24 letter vs March 29 letter

AG: Mueller report to be released 'by mid-April, if not sooner'
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/03/ ... er-1243851

BARR says he's redacting Mueller's report for four things:

-Grand jury info
-Intel sources/methods
-Ongoing investigations
-"Reputational interests" of "peripheral third parties"

The fight with Dems may be over how broadly he construes these things.

And Dems will want to see what's underneath the redactions regardless. They've already emphasized that Republicans were given access to pretty much all of this kind of info when they demanded documents from DOJ over the last two years.

NADLER says Congress' April 2 deadline for the full report "still stands."

[BenDhyan]

So the letter explains that Mueller is helping the Barr DOJ in the review process, so bar any complaints from Mueller after this process is complete, this report to Congress should satisfy everyone..

[seemslikeadream]

So the letter explains that Mueller is helping the Barr DOJ in the review process, so bar any complaints from Mueller after this process is complete, this report to Congress should satisfy everyone..

next week is going to be fun

What are the odds that Robert Mueller looked at William Barr's unsolicited 19 page memo to Donald Trump and said Yeah, let's let that guy decide about my two years of work product?

Congress has asked for the entire Mueller report, and underlying evidence, by April 2. That deadline stands.

In the meantime, Barr should seek court approval (just like in Watergate) to allow the release of grand jury material.

Redactions are unacceptable.
-Rep. Adam Schiff

Bill Barr Cover-Up Part Two
Josh Marshall

Simple point on the day’s events. The only legitimate way this concludes is for Congress or some subsection of Congress to get the complete and un-redacted Mueller Report. Full stop. Precedent is on the side of this approach. The Congress also have various models to accommodate. It can be released only to the committees of jurisdiction. It can be released only to the Gang of Eight, though that strikes me as far too restrictive. It can of course be released to the entire Congress, which seems most reasonable. What redactions are included in the publicly released Mueller Report is something reasonable people can disagree over. But as long as the substance of the redactions remain secret from the Congress the whole thing is illegitimate. If the redactions of the public version are reasonable we need members of the opposition party to confirm that that is the case. We need leadership of both chambers to confirm that. This is shaping up to give Bill Barr broad latitude to hide all the details that President Trump wants kept secret.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/bi ... p-part-two

Ted Boutrous
‏
Ted Boutrous Retweeted Deadline White House
If the Mueller prosecutors obtained the information, then there has been a waiver of Executive Privilege, by definition. So any claims of Executive Privilege regarding Mueller’s report are frivolous.
Ted Boutrous added,

Deadline White House

“Don’t be surprised if the attorneys... come out now and say to Barr, ‘Hey, listen, I know the president said he wanted the whole thing to come out, but we’ve got problems with executive privilege, we want to see…

The Trump team may argue that since Mueller and DOJ are part of the Executive Branch there has been no waiver but under that theory if Trump had done an interview with Mueller THAT would have been privileged. That can’t be right. Revealing info to antagonist = waiver.

By the way, Rule 6(e)(3)(D) expressly allows Attorney General Barr to disclose grand jury material to federal intelligence officials like @AdamSchiff to assist them in performing their official duties to combat hostile activities by a foreign government. This is not complicated.
https://twitter.com/BoutrousTed/status/ ... 5793906688

[Belligerent Savant]

.

So, from perpetual 'breaking news' -- whether we liked it or not -- on the developments leading up to the charade known as the Mueller Report, we are now graced with newsflash updates of the charade to be known as post-Mueller Report activity.

Looks like I'll need to christen that ignore button. One can only endure for so long...

[seemslikeadream]

Neal Katyal


Or, instead of subpoena, if Barr won’t turn over Mueller Report to Congress, House should defund the Office of the Attorney General and Barr’s salary

Congress appropriates funds paid by US taxpayers. If the People are kept in the dark by this lawlessness, we shouldnt pay for it
https://twitter.com/neal_katyal

[RocketMan]

.

So, from perpetual 'breaking news' -- whether we liked it or not -- on the developments leading up to the charade known as the Mueller Report, we are now graced with newsflash updates of the charade to be known as post-Mueller Report activity.

Looks like I'll need to christen that ignore button. One can only endure for so long...

It has done marvels for my mental health (and forum readability) ever since I finally realized that it's an option.

[seemslikeadream]

thanks Ben for being a gentleman ....you always show how to disagree without being disagreeable...always staying on topic never a personal attack and I really appreciate that..... I am really glad you are here and I consider you one of my best RI friends. Did you see I wished you a happy birthday in the lounge?

So the letter explains that Mueller is helping the Barr DOJ in the review process, so bar any complaints from Mueller after this process is complete, this report to Congress should satisfy everyone..

AttorneyGeneral agrees to release Mueller Report saying “don’t read too much into it”.



This is how Ken Starr delivered his IC report to Congress in 1998.

[RocketMan]

[seemslikeadream]

Rep. Schiff: You Might Say That's All OK. But I Don't Think It's OK.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8gAYUupm2k

WITHOUT OBJECTION. I'M GOING TO TURN TO OUR WITNESSES, THE SUBJECT OF THE HEARING TODAY. BEFORE I DO, AND AS YOU HAVE

CHOSEN, INSTEAD OF ADDRESSING THE HEARING, TO SIMPLY ATTACK ME, CONSISTENT WITH THE PRESIDENT'S ATTACKS, I DO WANT TO

RESPOND IN THIS WAY. MY COLLEAGUES MAY THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE RUSSIANS OFFERED DIRT ON THE DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE FOR

PRESIDENT AS PART OF WHAT WAS DESCRIBED AS THE RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT'S EFFORT TO HELP THE TRUMP CAMPAIGN. YOU MIGHT

THINK THAT'S OKAY. MY COLLEAGUES MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY WHEN THAT WAS OFFERED TO THE SON OF THE PRESIDENT AT A PIVOTAL

ROLE IN THE CAMPAIGN, THAT THE PRESIDENT'S SON DID NOT CALL THE FBI, HE DID NOT ADAMANTLY RE ADAMANTLY REFUSE THAT

FOREIGN HELP. NO, INSTEAD THAT SON SAID THAT HE WOULD LOVE THE HELP OF THE RUSSIANS. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT HE

TOOK THAT MEETING. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT PAUL MANAFORT, THE CAMPAIGN CHAIR, SOMEONE WITH GREAT EXPERIENCE IN

RUNNING CAMPAIGNS ALSO TOOK THAT MEETING. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE PRESIDENT'S SON-IN-LAW ALSO TOOK THAT

MEETING. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THEY CONCEALED IT FROM THE PUBLIC. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THEIR ONLY

DISAPPOINTMENT AFTER THAT MEETING WAS THAT THE DIRT THEY RECEIVED ON HILLARY CLINTON WASN'T BETTER. YOU MIGHT THINK

THAT'S OKAY. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT WHEN IT WAS DISCOVERED A YEAR LATER THAT THEY LIED ABOUT THAT MEETING, AND

SAID IT WAS ABOUT ADOPTIONS, YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE PRESIDENT HAS REPORTED TO HAVE HELPED DICTATE THAT LIE.

YOU MIGHT THINK THAT'S OKAY. I DON'T. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE CAMPAIGN CHAIRMAN OF A PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN

WOULD OFFER INFORMATION ABOUT THAT CAMPAIGN TO A RUSSIAN OLIGARCH IN EXCHANGE FOR MONEY OR DEBT FORGIVENESS, YOU

MIGHT THINK THAT'S OKAY. I DON'T. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THAT CAMPAIGN CHAIRMAN OFFERED POLLING DATA. CAMPAIGN

POLLING DATA TO SOMEONE LINKED TO RUSSIAN INTELLIGENCE. I DON'T THINK THAT'S OKAY. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE

PRESIDENT HIMSELF CALLED ON RUSSIA TO HACK HIS OPPONENTS' E-MAILS IF THEY WERE LISTENING. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT

LATER THAT DAY, IN FACT, THE RUSSIANS ATTEMPTED TO HACK A SERVER AFFILIATED WITH THAT CAMPAIGN. I DON'T THINK THAT'S OKAY.

YOU MIGHT THINK THAT IT'S OKAY THAT THE PRESIDENT'S SON-IN-LAW SOUGHT TO ESTABLISH A SECRET BACK CHANNEL OF

COMMUNICATIONS WITH THE RUSSIANS THROUGH A RUSSIAN DIPLOMATIC FACILITY. I DON'T THINK THAT'S OKAY. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S

OKAY THAT AN ASSOCIATE OF THE PRESIDENT MADE DIRECT CONTACT WITH THE GRU THROUGH GUCCIFER 2 AND WIKILEAKS THAT'S

CONSIDERED A HOSTILE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY A SENIOR CAMPAIGN OFFICIAL WAS INSTRUCTED TO REACH

THAT ASSOCIATE AND FIND OUT WHAT THAT HOSTILE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY HAD TO SAY IN TERMS OF DIRT ON HIS OPPONENT. YOU

MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER DESIGNATE SECRETLY CONFERRED WITH A RUSSIAN AMBASSADOR

ABOUT UNDERMINING U.S. SANCTIONS AND YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY HE LIED ABOUT IT TO THE FBI. YOU MIGHT SAY THAT'S ALL OKAY.

YOU MIGHT SAY THAT'S JUST WHAT YOU NEED TO DO TO WIN. BUT I DON'T THINK IT'S OKAY. I THINK IT'S IMMORAL. I THINK IT'S UNETHICAL. I

THINK IT'S UNPATRIOTIC. AND YES, I THINK IT'S CORRUPT. AND EVIDENCE OF COLLUSION. NOW, I HAVE ALWAYS SAID THAT THE QUESTION

OF WHETHER THIS AMOUNTS TO PROOF OF CONSPIRACY WAS ANOTHER MATTER. WHETHER THE SPECIAL COUNSEL COULD PROVE

BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT THE PROOF OF THAT CRIME WOULD BE UP TO THE SPECIAL COUNSEL AND I WOULD ACCEPT HIS

DECISION, AND I DO. HE'S A GOOD AND HONORABLE MAN AND HE IS A GOOD PROSECUTOR. BUT I DO NOT THINK THAT CONDUCT CRIMINAL

OR NOT IS OKAY. AND THE DAY WE DO THINK THAT'S OKAY IS THE DAY WE WILL LOOK BACK AND SAY THAT IS THE DAY AMERICA LOST ITS

WAY. AND I WILL TELL YOU ONE MORE THING THAT IS APP-- I DON'T THINK IT'S OKAY THAT DURING THE PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN MR.

TRUMP SOUGHT THE KREMLIN'S HELP TO CONSUMMATE A DEAL THAT WOULD MAKE HIM A FORTUNE, HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF

DOLLARS, I DON'T THINK IT'S OKAY HE CONCEALED IT FROM THE PUBLIC. I DON'T THINK IT'S OKAY THAT HE ADVOCATED A NEW AND MORE

FAVORABLE POLICY TOWARDS THE RUSSIANS, EVEN AS HE WAS SEEKING THE RUSSIAN'S HELP, THE KREMLIN'S HELP TO MAKE MONEY,

YOK IT'S OKAY THAT HIS ATTORNEY LIED TO OUR COMMITTEE. THERE'S A DIFFERENT WORD FOR THAT. THAN COLLUSION. AND IT'S CALLED

COMPROMISE. AND THAT IS THE SUBJECT OF OUR HEARING TODAY.

Forget what William Barr wrote about collusion. Listen to Adam Schiff instead
By Virginia Heffernan
Forget what William Barr wrote about collusion. Listen to Adam Schiff instead
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., speaks at a hearing in Washington on March 28. (J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press)
Twelve years ago, Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Burbank) called on then-President George W. Bush to recognize the 1915 Armenian genocide. He asked that the history of the Ottoman government’s extermination of 1.5 million Armenians be written into the record so future administrations making foreign policy would take that genocide into account.

Schiff’s resolution passed in committee. But after powerful American politicians of both parties enabled a lobbying blitz by the Turkish government, Schiff’s resolution never made it to the House floor.

"When you think about what we have against us — the president, a foreign policy establishment that has condoned this campaign of denial," Schiff said at the time, "against that you have the truth, which is a powerful thing but doesn't always win out."

Schiff, now chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, is faced with another campaign of denial.

Whatever the legal niceties, for most sane observers, the Barr letter is the latest entry in the administration’s effort to, shall we say, avoid a reckoning.

Share quote & link

This time, what’s being denied is not the past but the present. President Trump and his huffy apparatchiks in Congress and the media insist on trying to skirt what’s self-evident: the facts of Trumpworld’s commitments to the Kremlin.

These have emerged in public testimony (Michael Cohen), in emails in the public record (Don Jr.’s), and the many indictments and court documents produced by the office of the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, which delivered its Trump-Russia report to the attorney general on March 22.

Because persisting in denial means censoring anyone who tells the truth, Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee have been calling on Schiff to resign.

All week they waved Atty. Gen. William Barr’s meager and fuzzy four-page letter, claiming it faithfully represents Mueller’s findings, which Barr says runs some 400 pages.

Of course, we need to see the actual Mueller findings to see how faithful Barr’s letter is. But legal analysts from Jed Shugerman (Fordham Law) to Ken White (former federal prosecutor) to Neal Katyal (Georgetown Law) have questioned Barr’s use of weasel words and his delay in turning over the whole report to Congress.

Against that you have the truth.

So on Thursday, Schiff, as he has done many times before, patiently spelled out the state of play between Trumpworld and the Russians to the members of the Intelligence committee and anyone watching on C-SPAN.

There was none of Barr’s fuzziness or torque in what Schiff said. He didn’t hypothesize. He didn’t speculate. He just laid it all out.

“The Russians offered dirt on a Democratic candidate for president as part of what was described as the Russian government’s effort to help the Trump campaign,” he said.

“When that was offered to the son of the president, who had a pivotal role in the campaign, the president’s son did not call the FBI, he did not adamantly refuse that foreign help. Instead that son said that he would love the help of the Russians.

“Paul Manafort, the campaign chair, someone with great experience in running campaigns, also took that meeting…. The president’s son-in-law also took that meeting…. They concealed it from the public…. Their only disappointment after that meeting was that the dirt they received on Hillary Clinton wasn’t better.”

And Schiff kept going. Through Manafort’s offer of campaign information in exchange for debt forgiveness; through his offer of campaign polling data to someone linked to Russian intelligence; through Jared Kushner’s attempt to open a Russian back channel; through Trumpworld contacts with the GRU (“a hostile intelligence agency”); through denied-but-true Moscow Trump Tower negotiations and the promulgation of a “new and more favorable policy toward the Russians” as Trump sought “the Russians’ help — the Kremlin’s help” to make himself a fortune.

Call me crazy, Schiff said, but it all strikes me as immoral, unethical, corrupt — and, yes, as collusion, even if it isn’t part of a criminal conspiracy.

Throughout his incantation, Schiff repeated the phrase: “You might think it’s OK that…” as he walked through the facts. Since he delivered the litany, no one has called him on a single error. And yet, Republicans on the committee seemed to find all the evidence of Trump’s treachery OK.

So that’s it. We can all agree on what happened. The president encouraged computer crimes. Trumpworld has a pattern of back channeling with, digging dirt with, murky real-estate dealing with and swapping favors with Kremlin types. And Trumpworld lies about it.

Whatever the legal niceties, for most sane observers, the Barr letter is the latest entry in the administration’s effort to, shall we say, avoid a reckoning. Barr has suppressed Mueller’s findings, and he may have spun them hard, letting Trump spin that spin and claim, laughably, that he’d been, “Totally EXONERATED.” (Barr letter: The report “does not exonerate” Trump.)

The American people aren’t buying the president’s tweet, at least not yet. For any conclusion that big, we need the real report. And, according to a CNN poll this week, 87% of Americans want all of the Mueller findings released to the public, including 80% of Republicans.

In the meantime, if you’re interested in understanding the Trump-Russia findings, ignore what Barr wrote. Watch the Schiff speech instead.
https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/l ... story.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcMG0C0v-3E

[seemslikeadream]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_y7gs4QTTU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2yOpGrA14k



April 1 2019
Still Waiting for the Mueller Report

The committee will vote on subpoenaing Donald McGahn, Steven Bannon, Hope Hicks, Reince Priebus and Ann Donaldson. Each "may have received documents from the WH related to the Muelelr or committee probe, waiving any applicable privileges, Nadler says

Still Waiting for the Mueller Report
The need for the entire report to be made public has only been made more urgent by President Trump’s recent series of attacks on the very idea of the investigation.

Victoria Bassetti
March 28, 2019


Eighty-eight words. That’s all we have of the Mueller report. After 22 months of near-total silence, Robert Swan Mueller, III, has spoken — just not to us. Last Friday, he submitted a report of unknown length on his investigation into Russian interference with the 2016 election to Attorney General William Barr. Barr in turn has deigned to make public a few extracts of the report, sprinkling a bit of it into his own letter to Congress.

The crux of the Mueller report, as conveyed by Barr, lies in two sentences. The first, that the investigation “did not establish” that the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government. As to whether the president obstructed justice when he tried to derail the investigation, Mueller notes that “while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.”

With his feral flair for spin, President Donald Trump moved quickly to ignore the actual conclusions and market the Barr letter with its grand total of 88 words from Mueller as a “complete and total exoneration.” Or as one Twitter wag put it: “Classic Trumpian paradigm: ‘I got away with it = I didn’t do it.’”

Pay particular attention to two of Mueller’s phrases: “did not establish” and “did not exonerate.” Lawyers will know that those two phrases actually hint at the opposite of a complete Trump vindication. The first suggests that there was in fact some proof — just not enough to establish criminal wrongdoing beyond a reasonable doubt. We do not know how much evidence Mueller uncovered, but his wording intimates more than the bare minimum. Otherwise, he would have simply said there was no case to be made. He is, after all, a famously direct and to the point man. As for “did not exonerate,” that’s as close as a prosecutor gets to saying, “You were in the wrong, but we can’t convict.”

All told, the small parts of the Mueller report that peak out from Barr’s letter suggest difficulty building a criminal case but nothing even close to a clean bill of health. That’s why releasing the full Mueller report is so important. While the headline is clear — no more indictments — the details matter enormously. It’s not far different from a visit to the emergency room where an ER doctor tells you: “No, you’re not having a heart attack right now but look at that cholesterol level, artery blockage, shortness of breath, and, oh there’s a spot on the X-ray." Great to learn about no heart attack; not smart to walk out before hearing the rest of the diagnosis.

Mueller’s eighty-eight words of consultation filtered through a second party are not enough. And the need for a comprehensive account of what the investigation found has only been made more urgent by President Trump’s recent series of attacks on the very idea of the investigation. On Sunday he called the investigation “an illegal takedown that failed.” The following day he threatened retaliation. “There are people out there who have done very bad things, I would say treasonous things against our country. And hopefully, people that have done such harm to our country — we’ve gone through a period of really bad things happening — those people will certainly be looked at,” the president said.

Full disclosure of the Mueller report would reveal whether a host of concerns — about Russian attacks on our election system, Russian efforts to infiltrate and work with the Trump campaign, the campaign’s response to those efforts, and finally Trump’s efforts to pervert the administration of justice for his own purposes — were valid or not.

A decision on when and how much of the report to release rests in the hands of Barr — who is also, presumably, the man on the receiving end of the president’s demand to investigate the investigators. During his confirmation hearings earlier this year, Barr told senators that his goal with regard to the Mueller report “will be to provide as much transparency as I can consistent with the law.” A larger challenge lies before him: to provide as much transparency as he can for the health of our democracy.
https://www.brennancenter.org/blog/stil ... ler-report

Congress prepares for a battle over secret grand jury evidence in Russia inquiry; 'I intend to fight'
Bart Jansen, USA TODAY Published 6:00 a.m. ET March 31, 2019 | Updated 8:22 p.m. ET March 31, 2019

CLOSE
Speaker Pelosi calls attorney general's Mueller report letter 'condescending' Time

WASHINGTON – A historic clash is brewing between Congress and Attorney General William Barr over some of the most sensitive evidence in special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation.

Barr is reviewing Mueller's final report and said he hopes to reveal much of it by mid-April. House Democrats want it sooner. They signaled that their biggest fight won't be over how quickly they can read the report but whether they get access to some of the evidence Mueller gathered that did not lead to criminal charges.

The fight centers on evidence obtained using grand juries. Barr said federal law requires him to keep it secret, even though the government has disclosed it in previous high-profile cases. The evidence is particularly sensitive because grand juries give prosecutors the power to force reluctant witnesses to testify.

Democratic lawmakers said they need access to that evidence to get a clear picture of Russian interference in the 2016 election and how that benefited Donald Trump's presidential campaign, even if no Americans conspired with foreigners. They could launch a legal battle to obtain the information as soon as Wednesday.

“In many ways, I think the important thing is not so much the report, as the backup material,” said Paul Rosenzweig, who was a prosecutor on independent counsel Kenneth Starr’s team that investigated President Bill Clinton. When Starr's investigation ended, his team drove two cars loaded with boxes of paper and electronic files to Congress.

Mueller's investigation made extensive use of grand juries, but it is unclear how much of his final report relies on evidence they collected. His prosecutors summoned witnesses to testify before the grand jury about a meeting in 2016 at Trump Tower in which some of Trump's top aides were promised Russian "dirt" on Hillary Clinton and about overtures between Trump associates and WikiLeaks, the anti-secrecy group Russian intelligence used to publish emails it stole from Democratic political organizations. Some of those details could prove embarrassing to Trump, even if they do not amount to evidence of a crime.


The investigation led to charges against Russians accused of attempting to influence the election and against a half-dozen Trump aides who prosecutors said lied during the inquiry. Barr said Mueller's investigation did not establish that Trump or his campaign conspired with Russian's election interference campaign.

Barr announced Friday he expects to release the redacted report by mid-April. "Everyone will soon be able to read it on their own," he said.

Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., wants to see the full Mueller report.
Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., wants to see the full Mueller report. (Photo: Jose Luis Magana/AP)
House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., told Barr in a letter Friday that rather than wasting time and resources on keeping portions of the report from Congress, he should join lawmakers in asking a court to release all grand jury information, "as has occurred in every similar investigation in the past."

Democrats questioned Barr's motives for not turning over more.

“It’s a public document. It has to be turned over,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md. “But as the week goes on, it just seems like the smell of a whitewash and a cover-up is getting thicker and thicker.”

History of releasing secret evidence

Grand juries operate secretly to protect witnesses, to keep suspects from learning they are being investigated and to protect the privacy of people who are not charged with a crime. Federal law generally forbids the government from revealing grand juries' work. But in investigations into Presidents Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton, judges ordered the release of grand jury evidence because the public interest outweighed witness privacy.

Lawmakers of both parties urged the release of Mueller's entire report, so people can draw their own conclusions about what he found. Rep. Devin Nunes of California, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, told the Conservative Political Action Conference that he wants everything from Mueller – every email, every warrant "for all of America to see."

Trump said he has no objections, declaring Friday, "I have nothing to hide."

The president has called for the release of even more sensitive information that he and his allies said will show he was unfairly targeted by investigators. They focused in particular on secret surveillance warrants for a former campaign aide, Carter Page. Trump authorized the release of parts of those orders last year, the first time such information had been revealed publicly.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and his wife Ann, leave St. John's Episcopal Church, across from the White House, after attending morning services, in Washington on March 24, 2019.
20 Photos
Robert Mueller completes investigation into Russian interference in the ...
Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and his wife Ann, leave St. John's Episcopal Church, across from the White House, after attending morning services, in Washington on March 24, 2019.1 of 20
Robert Mueller departs St. John's Episcopal Church, across from the White House, after attending services, in Washington on March 24, 2019.
Robert Mueller, and his wife Ann, walk past the White House, after attending St. John's Episcopal Church for morning services on March 24, 2019 in Washington.
Robert Mueller, and his wife Ann, walk to their car after attending services at St. John's Episcopal Church in Washington on March 24, 2019.
U.S. Attorney General William Barr, right, leaves his house on March 24, 2019 in McLean, Va. Barr continues to review special counsel Robert Mueller's report on alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
An empty hallway at the U.S. Capitol on Saturday morning, March 23, 2019 in Washington, DC. Special Counsel Robert Mueller delivered the report from his investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election to Barr yesterday and Barr is expected to brief members of Congress on the report potentially as soon as this weekend.
U.S. Attorney General William Barr departs his home March 23, 2019 in McLean, Va.
William Simms places newspaper front pages from around the nation in display cases at the Newseum, Saturday, March 23, 2019, in Washington.
The U.S. Capitol is seen before sunrise, Saturday, March 23, 2019, in Washington. Special counsel Robert Mueller closed his long and contentious Russia investigation with no new charges, ending the probe that has cast a dark shadow over Donald Trump's presidency.
A bicyclist passes by the Justice Department on Pennsylvania Ave. where the media is set up, March 23, 2019 in Washington, DC.
U.S. Attorney General William Barr rides in the first black vehicle while arriving at the Justice Department on March 23, 2019 in Washington, DC.
Members of the press wait outside one of the office buildings used by independent prosecutor and former FBI director Robert Mueller on March 22, 2019 in Washington, DC. President Donald Trump went on air Friday to double down on his attempt to discredit a massive probe into his campaign's links to Russia, which is expected to be released shortly. Ever since the investigation run by independent prosecutor and former FBI director Robert Mueller began nearly two years ago Trump has insisted that it is a "witch hunt" and a "hoax."
A lone demonstrator departs after protesting outside the US Department of Justice March 22, 2019 in Washington, DC, shortly after the announcement that Special Counsel Robert Mueller had wrapped up his two-year investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 US election.
Bodyguards wait for the departure of the US attorney General outside the US Department of Justice March 22, 2019 in Washington, DC, shortly after the announcement that Special Counsel Robert Mueller had wrapped up his two-year investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 US election.
A copy of a letter from Attorney General William Barr advising Congress that Special Counsel Robert Mueller has concluded his investigation, is shown Friday, March 22, 2019 in Washington. Robert Mueller turned over his long-awaited final report on the contentious Russia investigation that has cast a dark shadow over Donald Trump's presidency, entangled Trump's family and resulted in criminal charges against some of the president's closest associates.
Journalists work outside of the House Judiciary Committee in the Rayburn House Office Building after the announcement that Special Counsel Robert Mueller had submitted his report to Attorney General William Barr, March 22, 2019 in Washington, DC. U.S. Attorney General William Barr told the House and Senate Judiciary Committees in a letter that Special Counsel Robert Mueller had completed his investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Attorney General William Barr leaves his home in McLean, Va., on Friday, March 22, 2019. Special Counsel Robert Mueller is expected to present a report to the Justice Department any day now outlining the findings of his nearly two-year investigation into Russian election meddling, possible collusion with Trump campaign officials and possible obstruction of justice by Trump .
President Donald J. Trump speaks to the media as he departs the White House for his Mar-a-Lago resort in Washington, DC, on March 22, 2019. The Trump administration, along with lawmakers, are awaiting the release of special counsel Robert Mueller's report into President Trump's behavior.
The White House early in the morning after a rainy night in Washington, DC, on March 22, 2019. The Trump administration, along with lawmakers, are awaiting the release of special counsel Robert Mueller's report into President Trump's behavior.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller arrives at his office on March 21, 2019 in Washington DC. It is expected that Mueller will soon complete his investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and release his report.
Next Slide
In previous investigations, special prosecutors and lawmakers asked federal judges overseeing the grand juries to release the evidence. In 1998, Starr released 8,000 pages of report, appendices and supplemental information about his investigation of Clinton that included transcripts of grand jury testimony and details about subpoenas. The release was approved by a special division of the D.C. federal appeals court.

Nick Akerman, an assistant special prosecutor during Watergate, said prosecutors got permission from a federal judge in Washington to release a “road map” of grand jury evidence to the House of Representatives for possible impeachment proceedings. Akerman, who is in private practice, said the public interest vastly outweighs the privacy interests of individuals in such cases.

“They certainly should go to court and get an order releasing this thing,” Akerman said of lawmakers seeking the Mueller report. “They’ve got an absolutely legitimate right to know what’s in there and should have every single fact that is in there and know exactly why Mueller made the decisions he made. Even worse, what you’ve got now is an attorney general who has basically sugarcoated the thing by making his own decision on obstruction of justice on a totally bogus ground.”

'I intend to fight'

House Democrats are preparing for just such a legal battle.

“The entire unfiltered report as well as the evidence underlying that report must be made available to the Congress and to the American people,” Nadler said. “I intend to fight for that transparency.”

The Justice Department declined to comment.

Barr said in a four-page notification to Congress on March 24 that he was working to protect “the integrity of grand jury proceedings.” Republican lawmakers agreed with the need to keep grand jury evidence confidential in cases where people weren’t charged with crimes.

The head of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said lawmakers should "give Barr a reasonable amount of time to go through the report and make sure the grand jury testimony isn’t disclosed, which would violate the law.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C, right, says Attorney General William Barr should be given time to sift through the Mueller report to protect grand jury information. (Photo: Chip Somodevilla, Getty Images)

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said the report could be a tool to combat Russian attempts to interfere in U.S. politics, which he called "dangerous and disturbing."

Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., a member of the House Intelligence Committee, said lawmakers must trace threads of Mueller's investigation that didn’t lead to criminal charges in an effort to protect the country from interference.

“The Russians helped elect Donald Trump. That is not subject to debate,” Himes said. “Donald Trump’s son and campaign were offered help, and instead of going to the FBI, they welcomed it. Turns out, that, according to Mueller, that doesn’t rise to the level of a chargeable conspiracy.”

The next step would be for the House Judiciary Committee to subpoena the report and its underlying evidence.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/pol ... 266131002/

House Democrats Will Subpoena Mueller Report
They says Barr’s pledge to release a redacted report later this month doesn’t cut it.

Dan FriedmanApril 1, 2019 8:39 AM

House Democrats say they will vote this week to subpoena Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s complete report, underlying evidence, and other material—rejecting as insufficient Attorney General William Barr’s pledge to produce a redacted version of the report later this month.

House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) announced Monday that the panel will meet Wednesday morning to consider a resolution that would authorize the subpoenas, after Barr said in a letter Friday that he expects to release a redacted version of Mueller’s report “by mid-April, if not sooner.” Barr said the report would be scrubbed to exclude grand jury testimony; information that could compromise intelligence “sources and methods”; material that could affect ongoing Justice Department investigations; and information that might “infringe on the personal privacy” or reputation of “peripheral third parties.”

Barr sent lawmakers a four-page letter on March 24 that said Mueller had completed his investigation into Trump campaign contacts with Russia. The letter said the probe “did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.” The letter also said Mueller had chosen not to reach a determination about whether Trump had obstructed justice, but Barr concluded that Mueller’s evidence “was not sufficient to establish that the President committed an obstruction of justice offense.” Trump and his allies have claimed this information vindicates him.

But Democrats say they they need to review the entire report as part of their own investigation into Trump’s Russian ties and alleged obstruction of justice. Nadler and other Democrats set an April 2 deadline for Barr to turn over the whole report—without redactions—and to start handing over underlying evidence.

Nadler said he will also subpoena documents from a number of ex-White House aides: former senior adviser Steven Bannon; former White House Communications Director Hope Hicks; former Chief of Staff Reince Priebus; former White House Counsel Don McGahn; and Ann Donaldson, McGahn’s former deputy. Nadler said those people “may have received documents from the White House relevant to the Special Counsel investigation, or their outside counsel may have, waiving applicable privileges under the law.”
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/20 ... er-report/

The House Must See the Whole Mueller Report
Someday, Trump will not be in office. Congress needs a full accounting of his misdeeds to ensure they don’t happen again.

By Jerrold L. Nadler
Mr. Nadler is the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.
April 1, 2019

Erin Schaff/The New York Times

Last Sunday, Attorney General William Barr sent us a letter summarizing what he says are the “principal conclusions” of the special counsel, Robert Mueller. The next day, together with five other committee chairmen, I wrote back to the attorney general, demanding that he provide us with the full Mueller report — not a summary, but the full report and all of the relevant evidence — by April 2.

For nearly two years, the country has waited to read the report. Over those many months, President Trump has raged against the institutions that make our democracy possible — among them, the free press, the courts and his own Department of Justice. When the special counsel indicted members of the president’s inner circle, his attacks got louder.

Before the formal investigation began, Mr. Trump fired his F.B.I. director. He later fired his attorney general. He reportedly attempted to fire the special counsel himself. Despite this profoundly unacceptable behavior, the special counsel persevered and wrote his report.

We — the members of the Judiciary Committee, the House of Representatives and the entire American public — are still waiting to see that report. We will not wait much longer. We have an obligation to read the full report, and the Department of Justice has an obligation to provide it, in its entirely, without delay. If the department is unwilling to produce the full report voluntarily, then we will do everything in our power to secure it for ourselves.

The entire reason for appointing the special counsel was to protect the investigation from political influence. By offering us his version of events in lieu of the report, the attorney general, a recent political appointee, undermines the work and the integrity of his department. He also denies the public the transparency it deserves. We require the full report — the special counsel’s words, not the attorney general’s summary or a redacted version.

We require the report, first, because Congress, not the attorney general, has a duty under the Constitution to determine whether wrongdoing has occurred. The special counsel declined to make a “traditional prosecutorial judgment” on the question of obstruction, but it is not the attorney general’s job to step in and substitute his judgment for the special counsel’s.

That responsibility falls to Congress — and specifically to the House Judiciary Committee — as it has in every similar investigation in modern history. The attorney general’s recent proposal to redact the special counsel’s report before we receive it is unprecedented. We require the evidence, not whatever remains after the report has been filtered by the president’s political appointee.

On its face, the attorney general’s letter raises more questions than it answers. He tells us, for instance, that he declined to charge the president with obstruction in part because there was no underlying crime to obstruct.

Did he discuss that conclusion with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein — who, while a federal prosecutor, routinely charged individuals with obstruction without charging the underlying crime? Did the attorney general forget that the special counsel indicted 37 other people, including the president’s campaign manager, deputy campaign manager and former national security adviser, for various crimes, including conspiracy against the United States? Did he lose track of his own prosecutors, who effectively named the president as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Southern District of New York?
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Second, we require the report because Congress has a role that is fundamentally different from that of the Department of Justice. The special counsel’s mandate was narrow: investigate allegedly criminal conduct stemming from links between the Trump campaign and the Russian government. Our job is to hold the president accountable any time he undermines the rule of law, and is not limited to his involvement with the Russian government during the campaign.

Whether or not the president could have been charged with a crime, even the attorney general acknowledges the existence of evidence that has so far been hidden from view. We have every reason to suspect that the unedited obstruction section of the Mueller report resembles the report that Congress received from the Watergate grand jury in 1974. That evidence showed that President Richard Nixon had attempted to obstruct justice. It did not recommend that the president should be prosecuted. It did not say the president should be impeached. It simply stated the evidence so that Congress could do its job.

Finally, we require the report because one day, one way or another, the country will move on from President Trump. We must make it harder for future presidents to behave this way. We need a full accounting of the president’s actions to do that work.

When the full scope of the president’s misconduct has been revealed, when his lies are debunked and his abuses have been laid bare, I believe that members of Congress on both sides of the aisle will draft legislation to curb the worst of his offenses. Put another way: If President Trump’s behavior wasn’t criminal, then perhaps it should have been.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/01/opin ... trump.html

[Belligerent Savant]

.

BREAKING NEWS

Johnstone: Leaked '401'-Page Mueller Report Proves Barr Lied, Collusion Theorists Vindicated

An unredacted copy of the Robert Mueller report has been leaked to theWashington Post, who published the full document on its website Monday.

The report contains many shocking revelations which prove that Attorney General William Barr deceived the world in his summary of its contents, as astute Trump-Russia collusion theorists have been claiming since it emerged.

For example, while Barr’s excerpted quote from the report may read like a seemingly unequivocal assertion, “[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities,” it turns out that the full sentence reads very differently:

“It is totally not the case that the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.”

The following sentence is even more damning: “It definitely did establish that that happened.”

The report goes on to list the evidence for numerous acts of direct conspiracy between Trump allies and the Russian government, including a detailed description of the footage from an obtained copy of the notorious “kompromat” video, in which Trump is seen paying Russian prostitutes to urinate on a bed once slept in by Barack and Michelle Obama, as well as other documents fully verifying the entire Christopher Steele dossier which was published by BuzzFeed in January 2017.

Other evidence listed in the report includes communication transcripts in which Russian President Vladimir Putin is seen ordering President Trump to bomb Syria, stage a coup in Venezuela, arm Ukraine, escalate against Russia in America’s Nuclear Posture Review, withdraw from the INF treaty and the Iran deal, undermine Russia’s fossil fuel interests in Germany, expand NATO, and maintain a large military presence near Russia’s border.

These things were done, according to Putin, in order to “keep things interesting.”

Mueller told reporters Monday morning that there would indeed be mass indictments of large numbers of Trump associates revealed in the near future, including Jared Kushner and Donald Trump, Jr, just as the diligent journalism of MSNBC and other respected news media outlets have been assuring. Mueller said the delay in the arrests, and the mountain of evidence which will surely lead to Trump’s impeachment, was due to the need to “cross a few ‘t’s and dot a few ‘i’s.”

When asked why he didn’t reveal to the public that Barr was misrepresenting the contents of his report, Mueller responded with a mischievous grin, “I didn’t want to spoil the surprise.” He then put on a pair of sunglasses and rode off on a motorcycle due east into the rising sun, while the smooth notes of a single saxophone resounded through the D.C. cityscape.

Needless to say, this completely vindicates the many alert reporters who rightly pointed out that Barr’s assertions about the Mueller report could be gravely dishonest, and that there was no way to know whether or not it had determined collusion between Trump and the Russian government. In a greater sense, it vindicates everyone who has spent the last three years focusing all public attention on the suspicion that the Kremlin could possibly have infiltrated the highest levels of the US government. In an even greater sense, it vindicates America, and it vindicates our very souls.

[seemslikeadream]

bullshit never mind

2 seconds after I read the word Johnstone I knew it was bullshit

The only fool is Caitlin

thanks for the crap...you never disappoint...man this ignoring thing is just not working out for you? PROMISES PROMISES


but hey thanks for the bump..

[alloneword]

.

BREAKING NEWS

Johnstone: Leaked '401'-Page Mueller Report Proves Barr Lied, Collusion Theorists Vindicated...

Thanks for sharing that BOMBSHELL, BSav...

I think it deserves a link to the original, if only because the choice of accompanying links is f***ing exquisite.

I feel a bit sheepish writing all this, because I’ve been a very vocal critic of the Russian collusion narrative from the very beginning. It turns out that by voicing skepticism and demanding evidence for a news story that dominated political discourse to the near exclusion of all else, I was actually assisting the Russian government in its war against democracy, truth, and justice.

Obviously I owe the world a very big apology. I’m sorry for calling the Russiagaters idiots, morons, drooling imbeciles, stupid, gullible sheep, foam-brained human livestock, tinfoil pussyhat-wearing delusional conspiracy theorists, demented cold war-enabling McCarthyite bootlickers, oafish slug-headed slime creatures, energy-sucking, CIA-coddling wastes of space and oxygen, and an embarrassment to the human species. Clearly, because of their indisputable vindication this April the first 2019, they are definitely none of these things.

I think she's being kind.

[MacCruiskeen]

HOWL

By Adam Schiff

I SAW THE BEST MINDS OF MY GENERATION DESTROYED BY MADDOW , STARVING HYSTERICAL NAKED,
ENTRANCED BY THE TELLY,

ADDICTED TO ASSHOLES, BEDAZZLED BY BALDWIN, CACKLING AT COLBERT, FNARING AT FRUITS AND COMMIES,

SLAVERING FOR WAR, MAINLINING SATURDAY NIGHT DEATH...

Rep. Schiff: You Might Say That's All OK. But I Don't Think It's OK.

WITHOUT OBJECTION. I'M GOING TO TURN TO OUR WITNESSES, THE SUBJECT OF THE HEARING TODAY. BEFORE I DO, AND AS YOU HAVE

CHOSEN, INSTEAD OF ADDRESSING THE HEARING, TO SIMPLY ATTACK ME, CONSISTENT WITH THE PRESIDENT'S ATTACKS, I DO WANT TO

RESPOND IN THIS WAY. MY COLLEAGUES MAY THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE RUSSIANS OFFERED DIRT ON THE DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE FOR

PRESIDENT AS PART OF WHAT WAS DESCRIBED AS THE RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT'S EFFORT TO HELP THE TRUMP CAMPAIGN. YOU MIGHT

THINK THAT'S OKAY. MY COLLEAGUES MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY WHEN THAT WAS OFFERED TO THE SON OF THE PRESIDENT AT A PIVOTAL

ROLE IN THE CAMPAIGN, THAT THE PRESIDENT'S SON DID NOT CALL THE FBI, HE DID NOT ADAMANTLY RE ADAMANTLY REFUSE THAT

FOREIGN HELP. NO, INSTEAD THAT SON SAID THAT HE WOULD LOVE THE HELP OF THE RUSSIANS. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT HE

TOOK THAT MEETING. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT PAUL MANAFORT, THE CAMPAIGN CHAIR, SOMEONE WITH GREAT EXPERIENCE IN

RUNNING CAMPAIGNS ALSO TOOK THAT MEETING. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE PRESIDENT'S SON-IN-LAW ALSO TOOK THAT

MEETING. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THEY CONCEALED IT FROM THE PUBLIC. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THEIR ONLY

DISAPPOINTMENT AFTER THAT MEETING WAS THAT THE DIRT THEY RECEIVED ON HILLARY CLINTON WASN'T BETTER. YOU MIGHT THINK

THAT'S OKAY. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT WHEN IT WAS DISCOVERED A YEAR LATER THAT THEY LIED ABOUT THAT MEETING, AND

SAID IT WAS ABOUT ADOPTIONS, YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE PRESIDENT HAS REPORTED TO HAVE HELPED DICTATE THAT LIE.

YOU MIGHT THINK THAT'S OKAY. I DON'T. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE CAMPAIGN CHAIRMAN OF A PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN

WOULD OFFER INFORMATION ABOUT THAT CAMPAIGN TO A RUSSIAN OLIGARCH IN EXCHANGE FOR MONEY OR DEBT FORGIVENESS, YOU

MIGHT THINK THAT'S OKAY. I DON'T. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THAT CAMPAIGN CHAIRMAN OFFERED POLLING DATA. CAMPAIGN

POLLING DATA TO SOMEONE LINKED TO RUSSIAN INTELLIGENCE. I DON'T THINK THAT'S OKAY. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE

PRESIDENT HIMSELF CALLED ON RUSSIA TO HACK HIS OPPONENTS' E-MAILS IF THEY WERE LISTENING. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT

LATER THAT DAY, IN FACT, THE RUSSIANS ATTEMPTED TO HACK A SERVER AFFILIATED WITH THAT CAMPAIGN. I DON'T THINK THAT'S OKAY.

YOU MIGHT THINK THAT IT'S OKAY THAT THE PRESIDENT'S SON-IN-LAW SOUGHT TO ESTABLISH A SECRET BACK CHANNEL OF

COMMUNICATIONS WITH THE RUSSIANS THROUGH A RUSSIAN DIPLOMATIC FACILITY. I DON'T THINK THAT'S OKAY. YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S

OKAY THAT AN ASSOCIATE OF THE PRESIDENT MADE DIRECT CONTACT WITH THE GRU THROUGH GUCCIFER 2 AND WIKILEAKS THAT'S

CONSIDERED A HOSTILE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY A SENIOR CAMPAIGN OFFICIAL WAS INSTRUCTED TO REACH

THAT ASSOCIATE AND FIND OUT WHAT THAT HOSTILE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY HAD TO SAY IN TERMS OF DIRT ON HIS OPPONENT. YOU

MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY THAT THE NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER DESIGNATE SECRETLY CONFERRED WITH A RUSSIAN AMBASSADOR

ABOUT UNDERMINING U.S. SANCTIONS AND YOU MIGHT THINK IT'S OKAY HE LIED ABOUT IT TO THE FBI. YOU MIGHT SAY THAT'S ALL OKAY.

YOU MIGHT SAY THAT'S JUST WHAT YOU NEED TO DO TO WIN. BUT I DON'T THINK IT'S OKAY. I THINK IT'S IMMORAL. I THINK IT'S UNETHICAL. I

THINK IT'S UNPATRIOTIC. AND YES, I THINK IT'S CORRUPT. AND EVIDENCE OF COLLUSION. NOW, I HAVE ALWAYS SAID THAT THE QUESTION

OF WHETHER THIS AMOUNTS TO PROOF OF CONSPIRACY WAS ANOTHER MATTER. WHETHER THE SPECIAL COUNSEL COULD PROVE

BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT THE PROOF OF THAT CRIME WOULD BE UP TO THE SPECIAL COUNSEL AND I WOULD ACCEPT HIS

DECISION, AND I DO. HE'S A GOOD AND HONORABLE MAN AND HE IS A GOOD PROSECUTOR. BUT I DO NOT THINK THAT CONDUCT CRIMINAL

OR NOT IS OKAY. AND THE DAY WE DO THINK THAT'S OKAY IS THE DAY WE WILL LOOK BACK AND SAY THAT IS THE DAY AMERICA LOST ITS

WAY. AND I WILL TELL YOU ONE MORE THING THAT IS APP-- I DON'T THINK IT'S OKAY THAT DURING THE PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN MR.

TRUMP SOUGHT THE KREMLIN'S HELP TO CONSUMMATE A DEAL THAT WOULD MAKE HIM A FORTUNE, HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF

DOLLARS, I DON'T THINK IT'S OKAY HE CONCEALED IT FROM THE PUBLIC. I DON'T THINK IT'S OKAY THAT HE ADVOCATED A NEW AND MORE

FAVORABLE POLICY TOWARDS THE RUSSIANS, EVEN AS HE WAS SEEKING THE RUSSIAN'S HELP, THE KREMLIN'S HELP TO MAKE MONEY,

YOK IT'S OKAY THAT HIS ATTORNEY LIED TO OUR COMMITTEE. THERE'S A DIFFERENT WORD FOR THAT. THAN COLLUSION. AND IT'S CALLED

COMPROMISE. AND THAT IS THE SUBJECT OF OUR HEARING TODAY.

ICONIC VOICE OF RESISTANCE: Congresspoet Adam Schiff