The Russia Investigations and other Trump-related cases

[Frelga]

Do you think it will end in anything but the usual nothingburger?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

No, not really. I do see one possibility, remote though it may be. Trump's attorneys claim that he hasn't produced any documents because he personally doesn't have any, since he doesn't personally text, or email or anything like that. The judge asked why he didn't then provide a declaration to that effect under oath, and the attorneys said that they would have him do so. If he does, and the attorney general has clear evidence from other sources that it isn't true, I could see James going after Trump for perjury. Beyond that, I do think that there are going to be some civil ramifications from the appraisers being forced to comply, but I doubt it will lead to any criminal charges against Trump.

[N.E. Brigand]

A House committee reviewing the government's Covid-19 response says that that the Treasury Department made a $700 million loan for "national security" reasons to the Yellow Trucking company during the pandemic, despite the Defense Department having informed Treasury that such a loan was not necessary for national security. That $700 million amounted to 95% of the funds that had been allocated for this relief program. White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin personally intervened to push for this loan to be approved, and the committee says there is evidence indicating that they did so at Trump's request.

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In September 2015, security guards at Trump Tower in New York roughed up some anti-Trump protesters outside. Some of those protesters sued Donald Trump, his company, and his security chief, Keith Schiller. In a deposition taken last fall, Trump said under oath that he didn't personally order his security team to roust the protesters, but Trump's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, was also deposed, and he testified that Trump told Schiller to "get rid" of the protesters.

There is probably room between the two statements for Trump to claim he didn't commit perjury (and I think it's pretty uncommon for perjury charges to start in a civil case anyway) but this presumably helps the plaintiffs' case -- although as we've seen from the Manhattan decision to drop the criminal probe into Trump's finances (CNN is reporting that the grand jury will not be renewed), Cohen is apparently viewed as an unreliable witness.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Being a convicted felon who pleaded guilty to among other things making false statements to a bank generally makes one be considered an unreliable witness.

[N.E. Brigand]

Being a convicted felon who pleaded guilty to among other things making false statements to a bank generally makes one be considered an unreliable witness.

Indeed. What makes it harder to prosecute mob bosses is that the witnesses who know the most are themselves criminals.

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Meanwhile:

Judge holds former President Trump in civil contempt for failing to comply with document subpoenas from New York attorney general

And then later in the day, the same judge also ordered that Donald Trump's appraisers, Cushman & Wakefield, must obey subpoenas issued the attorney general in that investigation and turn over the documents requested by May 27.

In the judge's actual written order, he says that Cushman & Wakefield appear to have broken their own internal policies when making valuations of Trump properties.

[N.E. Brigand]

The Department of Justice is suing Paul Manafort for $3 million.

Edited to add: These are funds in offshore accounts that Manafort failed to disclose when he pleaded guilty in 2018, as he should have done. The government's position is that Donald Trump's pardon of Manafort doesn't include stuff like this.

[N.E. Brigand]

Not a Trump-related case except that it's the kind of case that wasn't often charged before the Trump era:

Ex-US ambassador to Pakistan Richard Olson to plead guilty for helping Qatar

Olson was an Obama appointee, but he broke the law after leaving office during the Trump presidency.

[N.E. Brigand]

Trump settles lawsuit over inauguration funds spent at his hotel

"Donald Trump's company and inauguration committee agreed Tuesday to pay $750,000 to the District of Columbia to resolve allegations that they illegally misused nonprofit funds while staging events surrounding Trump's inauguration. D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine had accused the Trump Organization of overcharging Trump's inauguration committee for services at the Trump International Hotel, where more than $1 million was spent in January 2017, including for a private party for Mr. Trump's three older children."

However, Trump doesn't have to admit any wrongdoing.

Edit: And this article describes the resolution as mostly a victory for the Trump Organization and the Trump family and friends, including Trump Org. CFO Allen Weisselberg, who audited the inaugural committee's books; Ivanka Trump, who disclaimed any knowledge of the finances despite emails indicating otherwise; and Apprentice producer Mark Burnett, who got $25 million in apparently inflated costs for entertainment.

[N.E. Brigand]

Mark Esper, who was U.S. Secretary of Defense from July 2019 to November 2020, says in his new memoir that President Trump asked him if the U.S. could fire missiles into Mexico to "destroy the drug labs" and then pretend it never happened: "no one would know it was us."

[Dave_LF]

Sort of like a special military operation or something?

[RoseMorninStar]

Yeah. Right outta the same playbook.

[N.E. Brigand]

Mark Esper, who was U.S. Secretary of Defense from July 2019 to November 2020, says in his new memoir that President Trump asked him if the U.S. could fire missiles into Mexico to "destroy the drug labs" and then pretend it never happened: "no one would know it was us."

I wondered how this news would play on the right. Will this become the standard response or is this just a family thing?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

An interesting article about the case that provided the precedent for the continuing $10,000 a day fine against Trump for failing to provide documents to the NY AG's office, and failing to provide a detailed affidavit describing his efforts to locate responsive documents.

A New Jersey lawyer is amazed his 35-year-old personal injury case is now costing Donald Trump $10K a day

[N.E. Brigand]

Mark Esper, who was U.S. Secretary of Defense from July 2019 to November 2020, says in his new memoir that President Trump asked him if the U.S. could fire missiles into Mexico to "destroy the drug labs" and then pretend it never happened: "no one would know it was us."

William Cohen, who was Secretary of Defense in the Clinton administration, tonight described a similar interaction he was told of a by an official in the Trump administration:

"Adviser: Mr. President, you can’t do that.
Pres. Trump: Why not?
Adviser: It’s illegal.
Pres. Trump: So what?
Adviser: You could be prosecuted.
Pres. Trump: By who?"

It's not clear what particular incident that describes, but here's another one from Esper's book, as described in the New York Times, about top Trump aide Stephen Miller:

"In October 2019, after members of the national security team assembled in the Situation Room to watch a feed of the raid that killed the Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, Mr. Miller proposed securing Mr. al-Baghdadi's head, dipping it in pig's blood and parading it around to warn other terrorists, Mr. Esper writes. That would be a "war crime," Mr. Esper shot back."

As some commentators are noting, Esper's book had to be reviewed by the Dept. of Defense before publication, which makes it even likelier than usual that the incidents are accurately described.

Edited to add: Someone else who worked in the Trump White House confirms Esper's report about Trump wanting to bomb Mexico is true, and she adds:

People think those of us that served and now warn of how dangerous he is exaggerate the incompetence and unlawfulness.

Nope.

It’s incomprehensible how bad it was on a near hourly basis.

And some more: Esper actually writes that Trump twice asked Esper if the U.S. could shoot missiles into Mexico.

(Here's a tangential but somewhat amusing line from an Esper footnote: "The president often mistook Patriot missiles for Tomahawk missiles.")

[RoseMorninStar]

"Adviser: Mr. President, you can’t do that.
Pres. Trump: Why not?
Adviser: It’s illegal.
Pres. Trump: So what?
Adviser: You could be prosecuted.
Pres. Trump: By who?"

And he seems to be right. Therein lies the problem.

[N.E. Brigand]

Judge holds former President Trump in civil contempt for failing to comply with document subpoenas from New York attorney general

And then later in the day, the same judge also ordered that Donald Trump's appraisers, Cushman & Wakefield, must obey subpoenas issued the attorney general in that investigation and turn over the documents requested by May 27.

I do see one possibility, remote though it may be. Trump's attorneys claim that he hasn't produced any documents because he personally doesn't have any, since he doesn't personally text, or email or anything like that. The judge asked why he didn't then provide a declaration to that effect under oath, and the attorneys said that they would have him do so. If he does, and the attorney general has clear evidence from other sources that it isn't true, I could see James going after Trump for perjury. Beyond that, I do think that there are going to be some civil ramifications from the appraisers being forced to comply, but I doubt it will lead to any criminal charges against Trump.

Per this story in Business Insider, Donald Trump last night submitted an affidavit in which he swears that he cannot find four personal and business cellphones previously subpoenaed by Attorney General Letitia James's office. He says that one of them was "taken from me" at some point after he became president, an apparent reference to stories about how early in his presidency, he was using an unsecure phone that could easily be hacked. If he's telling the truth about that one, maybe James can get it from the Biden administration?

But also: why didn't Trump just say this in the first place when these items were subpoenaed? Or as soon as he was found in contempt, so that he wouldn't have to pay $10,000 per day for failing to comply? (He now owes the court more than $100,000.)

And more: how is it that Alvin Bragg's criminal investigation into Trump's business dealings apparently never subpoenaed these phones? If they had, then Trump would have had this "I lost them" answer for James ready long before. This makes it seem all the likelier to me that Bragg gave up without pursuing all the obvious avenues of investigation.

Finally, Trump says in the affidavit that "Since at least January 1, 2010, it has been my customary practice not to keep any documents, files, or papers relating to my business activities in my private residences." Which makes it all the more curious that he took a bunch of classified documents to Mar-a-Lago after leaving the White House.

[N.E. Brigand]

Special Counsel John Durham, who was appointed by William Barr to investigate the Trump-Russia investigation and whose investigation has lasted longer than the Russia investigation, last September charged an attorney named Michael Sussmann with lying to the FBI.

Sussmann went to the FBI on September 19, 2016 with what might be evidence of secret communications between the Trump Organization and a Russian company named Alfa Bank. (He reached out to the FBI on Sep. 18th and had follow-up calls with them on Sep. 21st and 22nd.) The internet researchers who discovered these apparent communications weren't sure whether they were suspicious or not. Eventually the FBI determined that the apparent communications weren't nefarious (although a subsequent Senate Intelligence Committee report explicitly took an agnostic view on the subject).

Durham claims that Sussmann lied in that meeting with FBI general counsel, James Baker, by saying that he wasn't there on behalf of a client. Durham says that Sussmann was actually there representing the Clinton campaign or a tech CEO friendly to the Democrats, and that this was part of a conspiracy to get a phony investigation launched into Clinton's opponent, Donald Trump. If the FBI had known Sussmann was there on behalf of the Democrats, says Durham, then they would have treated the investigation more skepticaly.

There were already lots of problems with Durham's claims. Baker himself couldn't remember whether or not Sussmann told him he was there on behalf of a client, and he didn't take notes, and when he briefed a colleague shortly after that on what Sussmann said, that colleague's notes described Susssman as a lawyer who worked for the Democratic Party. Baker himself supposedly remembered that Sussmann had not told him he was there on behalf of a client only years later after being shown his colleague's notes. Sussmann himself had already testified about all of this to a Congressional committee, before anyone dreamed of it leading to charges, and in that testimony he said that he was there both because he had received the information in his capacity representing clients and as a concerned citizen who didn't know what to do with the information the researchers had provided him. And Sussmann subsequently helped the FBI stall a New York Times story about the Alfa Bank investigation, which undercuts the notion that he was sharing the information to help Clinton beat Trump.

But now Durham's case is taking a turn much for the worse, because it turns out that on March 6, 2017, nearly six months after Sussmann allegedly told Baker he wasn't providing the information on behalf of a client, there was a meeting of top FBI and Dept. of Justice officials, including Baker, at which Andrew McCabe, the deputy director of the FBI, told Rod Rosenstein, the acting attorney general, that Sussmann had met with Baker "on behalf of a client." And Baker didn't dispute that in the March 2017 meeting.

So either in the meeting that Baker can't clearly remember, or in his subsequent phone conversations two and three days later, it seems that Sussmann did tell him that he was there for a client.

And what's more, whether due to Durham's incompetence or malice (in this instance, I incline toward the latter), those notes were only made available to Sussmann in March of this year, nearly two years after Durham would have reviewed them, six months after Sussmann was charged, and more than a month after any such material was supposed to be produced to Sussmann, and beyond that, they were buried in 22,000 pages of documents turned over at that time.

Sussmann is particularly keen for Durham to explain why he had Baker refresh his memory about the September 19, 2016 meeting by looking at one colleague's notes but didn't have Baker also look at another colleague's March 6, 2017 notes. It seems very much like Durham was deliberately trying to bury these facts.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

And what's more, whether due to Durham's incompetence or malice (in this instance, I incline toward the latter)

Often, the line is quite blurred.

[N.E. Brigand]

And what's more, whether due to Durham's incompetence or malice (in this instance, I incline toward the latter)

Often, the line is quite blurred.

I can well imagine. There are aspects of the Sussmann case that suggest that Durham has so convinced himself that Donald Trump was set up that he can't even see evidence to the contrary. In this particular instance, it's almost certain that Durham would have seen these exculpatory notes, but it's possible that he mentally explained them away as not being relevant.

Sussmann went to the FBI on September 19, 2016 with what might be evidence of secret communications between the Trump Organization and a Russian company named Alfa Bank. (He reached out to the FBI on Sep. 18th and had follow-up calls with them on Sep. 21st and 22nd.) The internet researchers who discovered these apparent communications weren't sure whether they were suspicious or not. Eventually the FBI determined that the apparent communications weren't nefarious (although a subsequent Senate Intelligence Committee report explicitly took an agnostic view on the subject).

This is interesting. Apparently the FBI's notes on Trump-Alfa connection as provided to Sussmann suggest that they didn't do much of an investigation.

[N.E. Brigand]

It now seems weirdly prophetic that the FBI's investigation into Trump was named "Crossfire Hurricane."