Mueller was sopping up on the Government Tit. I suspect he is awaiting a new job in the Biden Administration, ...
...and has the credentials for it.
- LexusLover
- 05-10-2020, 05:40 AM
- Why_Yes_I_Do
- 05-10-2020, 06:11 AM
Mueller was sopping up on the Government Tit. I suspect he is awaiting a new job in the Biden Administration, ....and has the credentials for it. Originally Posted by LexusLover$40M US taxpayer money flushed down the Demonicrat toilet bowl. Maybe they think it was a stimulus plan for their lackeys. All that time and $$ for chasing a fake story to look for gold at the end of a rainbow and what do they get besides egg on their face and Joe "Finger Bang" as a candidate? True to their masters desire, the media was the Pied Piper leading the whole charade.
- R.M.
- 05-10-2020, 06:19 AM
Fuck Obama with Biden’s limp dick.
- The_Waco_Kid
- 05-10-2020, 06:34 AM
Obama Alumni Association
- gnadfly
- 05-10-2020, 07:58 AM
Don't fret Barry, AG Barr is doing this "by the book."
- LexusLover
- 05-10-2020, 08:18 AM
- Why_Yes_I_Do
- 05-10-2020, 01:30 PM
I think Obammy went full pucker mode in his soiled panties after reading the below article. Probably did a harder swallow than after a BBBJ/NQNS session with Michelle.
Pence on Flynn Returning to the Trump Administration: ‘I’d Be Happy to See’ Him Again
https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2020...see-him-again/
In a preview clip of “Axios on HBO,” Vice President Mike Pence said that he welcomes the idea of bringing President Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn back into the administration in light of the Justice Department dropping the case against him.
1min
Pence on Flynn Returning to the Trump Administration: ‘I’d Be Happy to See’ Him Again
https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2020...see-him-again/
In a preview clip of “Axios on HBO,” Vice President Mike Pence said that he welcomes the idea of bringing President Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn back into the administration in light of the Justice Department dropping the case against him.
1min
- HedonistForever
- 05-10-2020, 01:54 PM
HF - I agree with you, but allow me to play devil's advocate. Would you be as outraged if an FBI guy in preparing a raid on Al Capone during the 1930s had taken notes saying "what's our goal - to get him for murder or tax evasion?"
And before you argue it's false equivalence to treat a 3-star general as harshly or leniently as a gangster-thug, remember we're all supposed to be given the same protections under the law.
I think the difference lies in probable cause. The FBI had no business pursuing Flynn in the first place. Whereas in Capone's case, they had plenty of reasons (murder, racketeering) to go after him. Originally Posted by lustylad
But that isn't what the note said now is it. Don't start leaving out words that matter like the left does.
The note said "what is our goal, "truth"/admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired".
Whether a suspected serial killer or an innocent person, no FBI agent should ever wonder if the goal of an investigation is to find the truth, period.
You are right about the probable cause. Just like if a law enforcement officer finds a dead body in my bed room when he didn't have a warrant to enter my bedroom. That evidence ( much to my chagrin ), is inadmissible.
While no lawyer here, my understanding of the Flynn case is that since there was no evidence that a crime had been committed, there was no predicate to question him and already having the conversation, there would have to be something in that conversation that they believed was a crime before going to question him and THEN, they would have needed to follow FBI guidelines in order to preserve the process so that it will not be used against the FBI which it surely will and should be.
Now some will argue, "how do they know there was a crime until they investigate"? While that sounds like a reasonable assumption ( I have to admit, I thought the same thing at first ), my understanding is that the FBI must have some evidence of a suspicion of a crime and they must be able to articulate what that crime might be. In this case, it appears the FBI was doing this when they were discussing using the predicate of the Logan Act. Even though they must have known that wouldn't fly, "maybe" it would satisfy the predicate but Flynn was never charged with violating the Logan Act which in hindsight, might have been the smarter thing to do.
So they charge him with lying. Has anybody read a transcript of the conversation that proves this lie, I haven't. This could be proven to some degree without an actual recording by the original 302 filed by Strzok after the interview but low and behold, they say they can't find the original and only have Strzok's word for it after the fact as to what it said as it appears in a "supplemental" 302.
https://www.realclearinvestigations....se_123520.html
Former FBI agents and federal prosecutors tell RealClearInvestigations that the documents show suspiciously irregular handling and editing of Flynn’s FD-302 form, the official document used to record what happens in FBI interviews. That form served as a key record used to charge Flynn with lying to federal agents. He pleaded guilty to that charge in December 2017 but had been trying to withdraw the plea, arguing, as his lawyer put it, that he was “deliberately set up and framed by corrupt agents at the top of the FBI.”
Since the documents were released last week, much attention has focused on a handwritten note by FBI counterintelligence head Bill Priestap in advance of the January 2017 interview with Flynn that would result in the retired lieutenant general being charged with lying to federal agents: “What is our goal?” Priestap asked, “Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?”
The new irregularities concern what happened after Flynn was interviewed by FBI agents Peter Strzok and Joe Pientka on January 24, 2017 – the interview in which Flynn was alleged to have lied about a December phone call with the Russian ambassador. FBI procedure is that one agent asks questions while another takes notes. Here, lead agent Strzok was the questioner and Pientka was responsible for memorializing the interview. After completing an interview, those notes are required to be organized and written up on an FD-302 form, which then becomes an official document used as evidence in an investigation.
FBI policy requires 302 forms to be submitted within five working days of an interview. The FBI took three weeks to deliberate on and compose Flynn’s 302 form, and it was mislabeled a “DRAFT DOCUMENT,” requiring a resubmission of the form three months later. A prosecutor working in the office of Special Counsel Robert Mueller, which eventually charged Flynn, was required to submit a separate document to a federal judge to explain that irregularity.
The new Flynn documents shed light on what happened during the unusual three weeks composing the 302. They include texts between Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who were communicating extensively during an extramarital affair in interchanges revealing anti-Trump bias and resulting in their later dismissal from Mueller’s investigation.
In one text, dated February 10, Strzok tells Page he is heavily editing Pientka’s 302 form to the point he’s “trying not to completely re-write” it. Other messages reveal that Page, who did not attend the interview, reviewed the 302 form and made editing suggestions. On February 14, Page texts Strzok, "Is Andy good with the 302?" – presumably referring to FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe. The next day, February 15, the Flynn 302 was officially submitted and filed with the FBI.
FBI supervisors like Strzok, however, are not supposed to rewrite other agents’ 302 forms. Nor are 302 forms supposed to be edited by FBI personnel who were not present at the interview, and both of these things happened in the Flynn case. “I've probably written in the close to the low thousands of 302s. I've probably supervised or overseen thousands upon thousands of more of those,” James Gagliano, retired 25-year veteran of the FBI and current CNN analyst, told RealClearInvestigations. “This is not how we do business as an FBI supervisor. I never, ever materially altered a 302.”
Former Special Agent Thomas J. Baker agreed: ”We never changed an agent's 302. An agent would fight a supervisor who wanted him to change the 302, because it's what that agent observed and heard and in his interview. So for us to read, what’s documented in this new material, that coming back from that interview with Flynn, which is a key event, that Peter Strzok said he virtually rewrote the whole thing – it damned them with their own words.”
Both former agents also expressed concern that Page, who was not present at the interview, was editing the 302 form against FBI protocol. “For [Strzok] to send that 302 to Lisa Page, a non-badge wearing, non-credential-having FBI agent, is unconscionable,” says Gagliano.
Baker said it was “not normal and suspicious” that it took three weeks for Pientka’s 302 form chronicling the Flynn interview to be filed. Gagliano also found the time delay concerning. “If the interview is on Monday, you better have that 302 uploaded on Friday. That's a requirement. Now if you go outside of that, does that mean that there's some skullduggery afoot? No, but you're going to explain that in court,” Gagliano said. “A defense attorney worth his or her salt will make hay with that. ‘Hey agent Gagliano, you know what the requirement is in the Bureau, right? Why was this thing typed up seven days after the interview?’ And then you sit there hemming and hawing and a dead-to-rights case gets blown open because you didn't follow a protocol.”
Even after the Flynn 302 was collectively written during the weeks-long delay in submission, the original wasn’t initially used in the case. Instead, Baker said, Mueller’s team submitted their own interview with Strzok “about his recollection of the interview with Flynn five or six months ago. Now that’s just bizarre.”
Eventually, the 302 was filed to the court in two versions, requiring a convoluted explanation about what had happened. In a cover letter to District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan dated December 17, 2018, Brandon Van Grack, a prosecutor on the Mueller probe, explained:
Since the documents were released last week, much attention has focused on a handwritten note by FBI counterintelligence head Bill Priestap in advance of the January 2017 interview with Flynn that would result in the retired lieutenant general being charged with lying to federal agents: “What is our goal?” Priestap asked, “Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?”
The new irregularities concern what happened after Flynn was interviewed by FBI agents Peter Strzok and Joe Pientka on January 24, 2017 – the interview in which Flynn was alleged to have lied about a December phone call with the Russian ambassador. FBI procedure is that one agent asks questions while another takes notes. Here, lead agent Strzok was the questioner and Pientka was responsible for memorializing the interview. After completing an interview, those notes are required to be organized and written up on an FD-302 form, which then becomes an official document used as evidence in an investigation.
FBI policy requires 302 forms to be submitted within five working days of an interview. The FBI took three weeks to deliberate on and compose Flynn’s 302 form, and it was mislabeled a “DRAFT DOCUMENT,” requiring a resubmission of the form three months later. A prosecutor working in the office of Special Counsel Robert Mueller, which eventually charged Flynn, was required to submit a separate document to a federal judge to explain that irregularity.
The new Flynn documents shed light on what happened during the unusual three weeks composing the 302. They include texts between Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who were communicating extensively during an extramarital affair in interchanges revealing anti-Trump bias and resulting in their later dismissal from Mueller’s investigation.
In one text, dated February 10, Strzok tells Page he is heavily editing Pientka’s 302 form to the point he’s “trying not to completely re-write” it. Other messages reveal that Page, who did not attend the interview, reviewed the 302 form and made editing suggestions. On February 14, Page texts Strzok, "Is Andy good with the 302?" – presumably referring to FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe. The next day, February 15, the Flynn 302 was officially submitted and filed with the FBI.
FBI supervisors like Strzok, however, are not supposed to rewrite other agents’ 302 forms. Nor are 302 forms supposed to be edited by FBI personnel who were not present at the interview, and both of these things happened in the Flynn case. “I've probably written in the close to the low thousands of 302s. I've probably supervised or overseen thousands upon thousands of more of those,” James Gagliano, retired 25-year veteran of the FBI and current CNN analyst, told RealClearInvestigations. “This is not how we do business as an FBI supervisor. I never, ever materially altered a 302.”
Former Special Agent Thomas J. Baker agreed: ”We never changed an agent's 302. An agent would fight a supervisor who wanted him to change the 302, because it's what that agent observed and heard and in his interview. So for us to read, what’s documented in this new material, that coming back from that interview with Flynn, which is a key event, that Peter Strzok said he virtually rewrote the whole thing – it damned them with their own words.”
Both former agents also expressed concern that Page, who was not present at the interview, was editing the 302 form against FBI protocol. “For [Strzok] to send that 302 to Lisa Page, a non-badge wearing, non-credential-having FBI agent, is unconscionable,” says Gagliano.
Baker said it was “not normal and suspicious” that it took three weeks for Pientka’s 302 form chronicling the Flynn interview to be filed. Gagliano also found the time delay concerning. “If the interview is on Monday, you better have that 302 uploaded on Friday. That's a requirement. Now if you go outside of that, does that mean that there's some skullduggery afoot? No, but you're going to explain that in court,” Gagliano said. “A defense attorney worth his or her salt will make hay with that. ‘Hey agent Gagliano, you know what the requirement is in the Bureau, right? Why was this thing typed up seven days after the interview?’ And then you sit there hemming and hawing and a dead-to-rights case gets blown open because you didn't follow a protocol.”
Even after the Flynn 302 was collectively written during the weeks-long delay in submission, the original wasn’t initially used in the case. Instead, Baker said, Mueller’s team submitted their own interview with Strzok “about his recollection of the interview with Flynn five or six months ago. Now that’s just bizarre.”
Eventually, the 302 was filed to the court in two versions, requiring a convoluted explanation about what had happened. In a cover letter to District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan dated December 17, 2018, Brandon Van Grack, a prosecutor on the Mueller probe, explained:
Pursuant to the Court’s Minute Order dated today, the government hereby files two redacted versions of the FD-302 report summarizing the FBI’s interview of the defendant on January 24, 2017. See Attachment. The content of both versions of the report is identical, except that the first version, which was digitally signed and certified in February 2017, inadvertently contained a header labeled “DRAFT DOCUMENT/DELIBERATIVE MATERIAL.” Once that error was recognized, the header was removed and a corrected version, omitting only the header, was re- signed and re-certified in May 2017.
Sol Wisenberg, a former federal prosecutor who served as deputy independent counsel during the Whitewater and Lewinsky investigation, says that Van Grack’s letter is “very embarrassing as a prosecutor. Forget about the five day rule, if it's three weeks or a month, it's just like, ‘What took you so long?’”
On Thursday, shortly before news broke that the Justice Department was dropping the Flynn prosecution, Van Grack submitted a request to withdraw from the team of federal prosecutors on the Flynn case. Van Grack’s withdrawal request also came amid allegations he had withheld exculpatory information from Flynn’s attorneys that was contained in the document dump the previous week.
Hovering over all these questions about what happened with Flynn’s 302 is the silence of Joe Pientka, the other agent who was present for the Flynn interview. The FBI rebuffed congressional requests to make him available for questions. The Bureau argued that because Pientka was assigned to the Mueller probe, interviewing him would interfere with the special counsel’s investigation.
However, the Muller probe concluded last year, and the new revelations are shining a spotlight on Pientka’s absence. On May 4, Republican Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio and Mike Johnson of Louisiana sent a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray demanding, among other things, that he make Pientka available for a transcribed interview regarding Flynn.
And other key lawmakers are determined to hold the FBI accountable for what happened in the Flynn case. “The FBI set up General Flynn -- that is clear as day,” Rep. Devin Nunes, ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, tells RealClearInvestigations. “There is FBI leadership ordering the case kept open when agents wanted to close it for lack of evidence, the discussion of getting Flynn to lie or trying to get him fired, the ambush interview, the withholding of exculpatory evidence, and many other acts of blatant malfeasance. None of this is standard procedure. It’s a naked abuse of authority.”
So to answer my own question, "no, we do not know for sure whether Flynn lied or not because we don't have the necessary legal proof that he did.
On Thursday, shortly before news broke that the Justice Department was dropping the Flynn prosecution, Van Grack submitted a request to withdraw from the team of federal prosecutors on the Flynn case. Van Grack’s withdrawal request also came amid allegations he had withheld exculpatory information from Flynn’s attorneys that was contained in the document dump the previous week.
Hovering over all these questions about what happened with Flynn’s 302 is the silence of Joe Pientka, the other agent who was present for the Flynn interview. The FBI rebuffed congressional requests to make him available for questions. The Bureau argued that because Pientka was assigned to the Mueller probe, interviewing him would interfere with the special counsel’s investigation.
However, the Muller probe concluded last year, and the new revelations are shining a spotlight on Pientka’s absence. On May 4, Republican Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio and Mike Johnson of Louisiana sent a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray demanding, among other things, that he make Pientka available for a transcribed interview regarding Flynn.
And other key lawmakers are determined to hold the FBI accountable for what happened in the Flynn case. “The FBI set up General Flynn -- that is clear as day,” Rep. Devin Nunes, ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, tells RealClearInvestigations. “There is FBI leadership ordering the case kept open when agents wanted to close it for lack of evidence, the discussion of getting Flynn to lie or trying to get him fired, the ambush interview, the withholding of exculpatory evidence, and many other acts of blatant malfeasance. None of this is standard procedure. It’s a naked abuse of authority.”
So to answer my own question, "no, we do not know for sure whether Flynn lied or not because we don't have the necessary legal proof that he did.
- Levianon17
- 05-10-2020, 02:08 PM
- HedonistForever
- 05-10-2020, 02:18 PM
https://justthenews.com/accountabili...s-case-against
Shortly after my colleague Sara Carter and I began reporting in 2017 on the possibility that the FBI was abusing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to spy on Americans during the Russia investigation, I received a call. It was an intermediary for someone high up in the intelligence community.
The story that source told me that day — initially I feared it may have been too spectacular to be true — was that FBI line agents had actually cleared former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn of any wrongdoing with Russia only to have the bureau's leadership hijack the process to build a case that he lied during a subsequent interview.
In fact, my notes show, the source used the words "concoct a 1001 false statements case" to describe the objections of career agents who did not believe Flynn had intended to deceive the FBI. A leak of a transcript of Flynn's call with the Russian ambassador was just part of a campaign, the source alleged.
The tip resulted in a two-and-a-half-year journey by myself and a small group of curious and determined journalists like Carter, Catherine Herridge, Greg Jarrett, Mollie Hemingway, Lee Smith, Byron York, and Kimberly Strassel to slowly peel back the onion.
The pursuit of the truth ended Thursday when the Justice Department formally asked a court to vacate Flynn's conviction and end the criminal case, acknowledging the former general had indeed been cleared by FBI agents and that the bureau did not have a lawful purpose when it interviewed him in January 2017.
Attorney General William Barr put it more bluntly in an interview Thursday: "They kept it open for the express purpose of trying to catch, to lay a perjury trap for General Flynn."
To understand just how dramatic a turnaround Thursday's action was, one has to go back to the headlines of 2017 fanned by the likes of The Washington Post, The New York Times, MSNBC, CNN and others and told by a host of former Obama administration officials and their Democratic allies in Congress.
Flynn was suspected of violating the Logan Act by talking with the Russian ambassador. He may have been compromised by a 2015 visit with Vladimir Putin at a Russia Today event. He lied to the FBI. He may have been an agent of Russia and involved in colluding to hijack the election. He betrayed his country.
All of that was alleged, it turns out, without proof. And then Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team pressured Flynn to plead guilty to falsely telling FBI agents that he did not discuss sanctions with Russia's ambassador. It turns out that wasn't true either.
A draft FBI report of the interview made public this week showed Flynn didn't deny it and instead suggested it was a possibility he did discuss sanctions and Russia's response to them.
Here are the 12 revelations that unraveled the false narrative and Mueller's prosecution of a 33-year military veteran:
1. Flynn's RT visit with Putin wasn't nefarious. In fact, it was cleared by his former employer, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and he received a defensive briefing before he went to Russia and debriefed with U.S. intelligence after he returned. https://thehill.com/opinion/white-ho...el-kept-secret
2. Not a Russian agent. A Justice Department memo exonerated Flynn of Russia collusion on Jan. 30, 2017, nearly a year before he pled guilty. "The FBI did not believe Flynn was acting as an agent of Russia," a DOJ memo states. https://justthenews.com/accountability/political-ethics/fbis-russia-collusion-case-fell-apart-first-month-trump-presidency
3. Case closed memo. FBI agents wrote a memo to close the investigation of Flynn on Jan. 4, 2017, writing they found "no derogatory" evidence that Flynn committed a crime or posed a national security threat. FBI management then ordered the closure to be rescinded and pivoted toward trying lure Flynn into an interview. https://justthenews.com/accountabili...-flynn-planned
4. DOJ heartburn. Senior Justice officials expressed concern and alarm at the way the FBI was treating Flynn, including trying to interview him without the normally required notification to the Trump White House. Former acting Attorney General Sally Yates expressed significant concern that White House officials weren't being advised. “The interview was problematic from Yates’ perspective because, as a matter of protocol and courtesy, the White House Counsel’s Office should have been notified beforehand," a DOJ memo stated. https://justthenews.com/accountabili...fbis-treatment
5. Logan Act threat wasn't real. DOJ officials immediately did not believe Flynn could realistically be prosecuted under the Logan Act for his conversations with the Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Former Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe testified he was told such a prosecution was a "long shot," and former Assistant Attorney General Mary McCord "said that upon learning of Flynn’s phone calls with Ambassador Kislyak, a Logan Act prosecution seemed like a stretch to her,” DOJ memos say. https://justthenews.com/accountabili...fbis-treatment
6. Unequal treatment. James Comey bragged in a videotaped interview that he authorized the FBI to try to conduct a Flynn interview without the proper notifications and protocol, hoping to catch Flynn and the new Trump White House off guard. In other words, they didn't follow procedure or treat Flynn like others when it came to due process. Comey said the tactic was "something I probably wouldn't have done or maybe gotten away with in a more organized administration." https://www.foxnews.com/politics/com...s-not-standard
7. Disguising a required warning. FBI officials debated whether they could avoid, disguise or slip in the required FBI admonition against lying to agents at the start of Flynn's interview to keep him off guard. "It would be an easy way to just casually slip that in," FBI lawyer Lisa Page texted during the discussions. https://justthenews.com/accountabili...nn-lie-get-him.
8. "Playing games." Then-Assistant Director for Counterintelligence William Priestap wrote in handwritten notes that he feared the bureau was "playing games" with the Flynn interview in an effort to get the national security adviser to lie so "we can prosecute him or get him fired." https://justthenews.com/accountabili...nn-lie-get-him
9. No deception. The FBI agents who interviewed Flynn, including Peter Strzok, did not believe Flynn intended to lie or be deceptive in his interview. "Strzok provided his view that Flynn appeared truthful during the interview," a memo from Mueller's team stated. https://justthenews.com/accountabili...fbis-treatment
10. No actual denial. The FBI agents who interviewed Flynn indicated in a draft report that Flynn did not directly deny talking to Kislyak about sanctions, as he was accused by Mueller. Instead they noted he couldn't remember, wasn't sure and even conceded it was possible. Here's a direct quote from the draft interview memo. "FLYNN stated it was possible that he talked to KISLYAK on the issue, but if he did, he did not remember doing so." That's a far cry from a direct denial. https://int.nyt.com/data/documenthel...mized/full.pdf
11.) Interview Reports Edited. According to evidence DOJ disclosed this month, FBI officials subsequently edited the original Flynn interview report. After Strzok and fellow special agent Joe Pientka interviewed the Trump adviser, Pientka wrote the original interview report, known as a 302, then Strzok heavily edited it, so much so that he worried he was “trying not to completely re-write” the memo. Then FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who neither attended the interview nor is an agent, edited it again, according to the DOJ evidence. And then that version of the 302 was never given to the court. Instead, a substitute summary of the interview written months later was presented as official evidence, an act current and former FBI officials told me was extraordinarily unusual. https://www.wsj.com/articles/rewrite...rm-11588541993
12.) Evidence withheld. The biggest, and perhaps most troubling discovery, according to DOJ officials and Flynn's lawyers, was the majority of the above evidence was withheld from the courts and Flynn's legal team for years despite repeated orders that all exculpatory Brady materials, i.e. evidence of innocence, be produced.
U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan must still decide whether to accept the Justice Department's request to dismiss the charges. And then the judge must decide whether the prosecutors and agents in the case should face punishment.
In the meantime, Flynn lost three years of his life, his job, and his home and endured crushing legal bills and public shame. That what makes this dirty dozen list so egregious to critics of this investigation.
9500, if you are reading this, instead of telling me you don't read right wing conspiracy theories, how about you read it and tell me what isn't true and you can prove it.
The story that source told me that day — initially I feared it may have been too spectacular to be true — was that FBI line agents had actually cleared former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn of any wrongdoing with Russia only to have the bureau's leadership hijack the process to build a case that he lied during a subsequent interview.
In fact, my notes show, the source used the words "concoct a 1001 false statements case" to describe the objections of career agents who did not believe Flynn had intended to deceive the FBI. A leak of a transcript of Flynn's call with the Russian ambassador was just part of a campaign, the source alleged.
The tip resulted in a two-and-a-half-year journey by myself and a small group of curious and determined journalists like Carter, Catherine Herridge, Greg Jarrett, Mollie Hemingway, Lee Smith, Byron York, and Kimberly Strassel to slowly peel back the onion.
The pursuit of the truth ended Thursday when the Justice Department formally asked a court to vacate Flynn's conviction and end the criminal case, acknowledging the former general had indeed been cleared by FBI agents and that the bureau did not have a lawful purpose when it interviewed him in January 2017.
Attorney General William Barr put it more bluntly in an interview Thursday: "They kept it open for the express purpose of trying to catch, to lay a perjury trap for General Flynn."
To understand just how dramatic a turnaround Thursday's action was, one has to go back to the headlines of 2017 fanned by the likes of The Washington Post, The New York Times, MSNBC, CNN and others and told by a host of former Obama administration officials and their Democratic allies in Congress.
Flynn was suspected of violating the Logan Act by talking with the Russian ambassador. He may have been compromised by a 2015 visit with Vladimir Putin at a Russia Today event. He lied to the FBI. He may have been an agent of Russia and involved in colluding to hijack the election. He betrayed his country.
All of that was alleged, it turns out, without proof. And then Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team pressured Flynn to plead guilty to falsely telling FBI agents that he did not discuss sanctions with Russia's ambassador. It turns out that wasn't true either.
A draft FBI report of the interview made public this week showed Flynn didn't deny it and instead suggested it was a possibility he did discuss sanctions and Russia's response to them.
Here are the 12 revelations that unraveled the false narrative and Mueller's prosecution of a 33-year military veteran:
1. Flynn's RT visit with Putin wasn't nefarious. In fact, it was cleared by his former employer, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and he received a defensive briefing before he went to Russia and debriefed with U.S. intelligence after he returned. https://thehill.com/opinion/white-ho...el-kept-secret
2. Not a Russian agent. A Justice Department memo exonerated Flynn of Russia collusion on Jan. 30, 2017, nearly a year before he pled guilty. "The FBI did not believe Flynn was acting as an agent of Russia," a DOJ memo states. https://justthenews.com/accountability/political-ethics/fbis-russia-collusion-case-fell-apart-first-month-trump-presidency
3. Case closed memo. FBI agents wrote a memo to close the investigation of Flynn on Jan. 4, 2017, writing they found "no derogatory" evidence that Flynn committed a crime or posed a national security threat. FBI management then ordered the closure to be rescinded and pivoted toward trying lure Flynn into an interview. https://justthenews.com/accountabili...-flynn-planned
4. DOJ heartburn. Senior Justice officials expressed concern and alarm at the way the FBI was treating Flynn, including trying to interview him without the normally required notification to the Trump White House. Former acting Attorney General Sally Yates expressed significant concern that White House officials weren't being advised. “The interview was problematic from Yates’ perspective because, as a matter of protocol and courtesy, the White House Counsel’s Office should have been notified beforehand," a DOJ memo stated. https://justthenews.com/accountabili...fbis-treatment
5. Logan Act threat wasn't real. DOJ officials immediately did not believe Flynn could realistically be prosecuted under the Logan Act for his conversations with the Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Former Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe testified he was told such a prosecution was a "long shot," and former Assistant Attorney General Mary McCord "said that upon learning of Flynn’s phone calls with Ambassador Kislyak, a Logan Act prosecution seemed like a stretch to her,” DOJ memos say. https://justthenews.com/accountabili...fbis-treatment
6. Unequal treatment. James Comey bragged in a videotaped interview that he authorized the FBI to try to conduct a Flynn interview without the proper notifications and protocol, hoping to catch Flynn and the new Trump White House off guard. In other words, they didn't follow procedure or treat Flynn like others when it came to due process. Comey said the tactic was "something I probably wouldn't have done or maybe gotten away with in a more organized administration." https://www.foxnews.com/politics/com...s-not-standard
7. Disguising a required warning. FBI officials debated whether they could avoid, disguise or slip in the required FBI admonition against lying to agents at the start of Flynn's interview to keep him off guard. "It would be an easy way to just casually slip that in," FBI lawyer Lisa Page texted during the discussions. https://justthenews.com/accountabili...nn-lie-get-him.
8. "Playing games." Then-Assistant Director for Counterintelligence William Priestap wrote in handwritten notes that he feared the bureau was "playing games" with the Flynn interview in an effort to get the national security adviser to lie so "we can prosecute him or get him fired." https://justthenews.com/accountabili...nn-lie-get-him
9. No deception. The FBI agents who interviewed Flynn, including Peter Strzok, did not believe Flynn intended to lie or be deceptive in his interview. "Strzok provided his view that Flynn appeared truthful during the interview," a memo from Mueller's team stated. https://justthenews.com/accountabili...fbis-treatment
10. No actual denial. The FBI agents who interviewed Flynn indicated in a draft report that Flynn did not directly deny talking to Kislyak about sanctions, as he was accused by Mueller. Instead they noted he couldn't remember, wasn't sure and even conceded it was possible. Here's a direct quote from the draft interview memo. "FLYNN stated it was possible that he talked to KISLYAK on the issue, but if he did, he did not remember doing so." That's a far cry from a direct denial. https://int.nyt.com/data/documenthel...mized/full.pdf
11.) Interview Reports Edited. According to evidence DOJ disclosed this month, FBI officials subsequently edited the original Flynn interview report. After Strzok and fellow special agent Joe Pientka interviewed the Trump adviser, Pientka wrote the original interview report, known as a 302, then Strzok heavily edited it, so much so that he worried he was “trying not to completely re-write” the memo. Then FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who neither attended the interview nor is an agent, edited it again, according to the DOJ evidence. And then that version of the 302 was never given to the court. Instead, a substitute summary of the interview written months later was presented as official evidence, an act current and former FBI officials told me was extraordinarily unusual. https://www.wsj.com/articles/rewrite...rm-11588541993
12.) Evidence withheld. The biggest, and perhaps most troubling discovery, according to DOJ officials and Flynn's lawyers, was the majority of the above evidence was withheld from the courts and Flynn's legal team for years despite repeated orders that all exculpatory Brady materials, i.e. evidence of innocence, be produced.
U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan must still decide whether to accept the Justice Department's request to dismiss the charges. And then the judge must decide whether the prosecutors and agents in the case should face punishment.
In the meantime, Flynn lost three years of his life, his job, and his home and endured crushing legal bills and public shame. That what makes this dirty dozen list so egregious to critics of this investigation.
9500, if you are reading this, instead of telling me you don't read right wing conspiracy theories, how about you read it and tell me what isn't true and you can prove it.
- bambino
- 05-10-2020, 02:22 PM
Trump should bring him back just to fuck with Obama and his Cronies. It would be the ultimate fuck you.
- Jacuzzme
- 05-10-2020, 03:16 PM
- HedonistForever
- 05-10-2020, 07:05 PM
Trump should bring him back just to fuck with Obama and his Cronies. It would be the ultimate fuck you. Originally Posted by bambino
I agree and now that Pence is on board, BRING BACK FLYNN!
Still waiting to hear anybody ask Biden or Obama if the FBI should ever wonder if finding the truth is the goal.
- Chung Tran
- 05-10-2020, 07:13 PM
- The_Waco_Kid
- 05-10-2020, 07:32 PM