WTF Community

Day 788

Updated 3/18/2019 12:33 PM PDT

1/ Trump attacked the late John McCain on Twitter for his involvement in sharing the dossier allegedly linking Trump to the Russian government. After the 2016 election, McCain turned the Steele dossier over to the FBI, Trump called "unfortunately a very dark stain against John McCain." Trump incorrectly claimed that McCain had "sent the Fake Dossier to the FBI and Media hoping to have it printed BEFORE the Election." He continued to complain about that longtime Republican lawmaker, who died last year, "had far worse 'stains'" than the dossier, "including thumbs down on repeal and replace after years of campaigning to repeal and replace!" Trump's statements about McCain were actually quotes from Ken Starr, who recently appeared on Fox News. (CNBC / Washington Post / New York Times)


This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://whatthefuckjusthappenedtoday.com/2019/03/18/day-788/
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These documents will land tomorrow. They will be redacted so it’s hard to know if we’ll learn anything new. But still… :popcorn:

A federal judge in Manhattan has ordered prosecutors to publicly release redacted copies of search warrants and other documents tied to last year’s FBI raid on former Trump attorney Michael Cohen’s properties.

U.S. District Judge William Pauley III filed an order Monday morning approving the government’s proposed redactions to the search warrant materials, including those to obscure Cohen’s email address, phone numbers, apartment number and safety deposit box. Pauley ordered prosecutors to publicly file the documents on Tuesday. …

The documents could shed further light on Cohen’s case, but they are unlikely to provide much new information about the campaign finance violations to which Cohen pleaded guilty that stem from payoffs he made to women who alleged they had affairs with President Trump prior to the 2016 election.

Pauley ordered the government to redact details about Cohen’s campaign finance violations that could jeopardize the ongoing investigation into the payoffs after federal prosecutors objected to the release of the documents, saying it would jeopardize an ongoing probe.

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Wow! That’s awesome news. I’ve been wondering when the Feds would get around to digging into Broidy’s nefarious deeds. Turns out, I was fretting over nothing since they unleashed the hounds way back in July.

For anyone who would like a quick “Elliott Broidy 101” course, here’s a summary of his prolific dubious achievements.

My favorite factoid is that just a few years before Broidy came on board as vice chairman for the Trump Victory Committee, he pled guilty to a felony charge of distributing $1 million in bribes. I guess Trump looked at that line in his résumé and said, “Put this guy in charge of fund raising! I like the way he handles money.”

Update: I just realized that since the “Elliott Broidy 101” summary referenced above was compiled in March of last year, it didn’t even include Broidy’s latest scandal which dropped in April: The payment of hush money via Michael Cohen to cover up an extra-marital affair.

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It seems clear that Rudy was forced off camera for all his beyond-expected off-the-cuff remarks. For such a colorful character, it seemed like the right choice. But I will let you to decide.

Rudy Giuliani has vanished from your television. The last time the president’s once-ubiquitous attack dog did a major TV appearance was on Sunday, Jan. 20, when he went on NBC’s “Meet the Press” and CNN’s “State of the Union.”

Between the lines: Sources familiar with Giuliani’s thinking say he views a major part of his job as trying to undermine public confidence in the Mueller probe and harden the support of Republican voters for Trump to protect him against impeachment. So for Giuliani to stay off TV for an extended stretch is odd.

  • White House officials had expected Giuliani’s Jan. 20 Sunday show appearances to be an easy “victory lap” after Mueller’s office took the rare step of publicly disputing a BuzzFeed story accusing Trump of committing a felony.

Instead, Giuliani tripped over himself , saying the Trump Tower Moscow talks may have lasted up until November 2016. The claim was both unhelpful and, in the White House’s view, incorrect.

  • Giuliani walked back the comments in a statement the next day: “My recent statements about discussions during the 2016 campaign between Michael Cohen and then-candidate Donald Trump about a potential Trump Moscow ‘project’ were hypothetical and not based on conversations I had with the president.”

Since that weekend, the president’s most prominent lawyer has kept his head down. He has only made one on-camera appearance: a March 8 hit on the streaming channel of the Washington newspaper The Hill, where he said Paul Manafort’s surprisingly short jail sentence was fair.

  • Two sources with direct knowledge told me that both Trump and the White House lawyer handling the Russia investigation, Emmet Flood, have privately griped about some of Giuliani’s TV appearances.
  • A third source said Trump thought it would be best if Giuliani stayed off TV for a while after his Jan. 20 hits.

Giuliani’s response: When I asked Giuliani about all of this, he texted that he has spent hours with Trump in the last month and hasn’t heard any complaints about his TV appearances from the president.

  • Giuliani then called me to elaborate. He said his decision to stay off TV since Jan. 20 had nothing to do with his performances on those shows.
  • “About a month to a month and a half ago we decided, because we thought the Mueller report was imminent in the next four or five days, that it would be better not to comment until the report was filed or made public,” Giuliani said.
  • “Obviously those days have now expanded way beyond four or five days.”

Giuliani said he decided to stay off TV so as "not to upset the apple cart , not to create unnecessary, additional, needless friction" with the Mueller team. I asked the president’s lawyer if he thought this brief cease-fire would have a meaningful effect on the Mueller report, given that Giuliani has attacked Mueller and his team relentlessly for the previous year.

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Four leading Democrats are demanding a new FBI investigation into a Florida woman’s apparent ties to Donald Trump, focusing on whether she illegally sought to leverage her relationship with the President by selling access to Chinese clients.

The Democrats – Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee and House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler – are calling on the FBI to conduct criminal and counterintelligence probes into allegations of human trafficking, foreign lobbying and potential campaign finance violations against Cindy Yang, the founder and former owner of a chain of Florida massage parlors.

The Democrats’ letter says Yang’s website used to offer clients “the opportunity to interact with the President” and other top political leaders, and they point to public reports saying she has been a frequent guest of Trump’s, including at his Mar-a-Lago estate.

“Although Ms. Yang’s activities may only be those of an unscrupulous actor allegedly selling access to politicians for profit, her activities also could permit adversary governments or their agents access to these same politicians to acquire potential material for blackmail or other even more nefarious purposes,” the lawmakers wrote. …

Here’s a copy of the letter.

Yes! How did the Secret Service vet a person with this background to associate with Trump? We want answers! :mag_right:

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Nunes is suing Twitter over mean tweets.

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Wow! When I read that I went wtf!!
And then I read this article on Vox

From the article:

But the poll question on which that headline rests is seriously flawed. The question reads as follows: “President Trump has called the Special Counsel’s investigation a ‘witch hunt’ and said he’s been subjected to more investigations than previous presidents because of politics. Do you agree?”

It’s true that 50.3 percent of the poll’s 1,000 respondents said “yes” to that question. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they believe the Mueller investigation is a “witch hunt.” The prompt packs two different questions into one — a poor strategy for a poll question. Respondents simply may have meant to agree that Trump has been “subjected to more investigations than previous presidents because of politics” — a controversial but defensible position — without intending to go further and indicate they think Trump is the victim of a “witch hunt.”


I think even I would have responded “Yes” to that loaded question.
Further to what the article says - it is true that Trump has called the investigation a “witch hunt” - he does it all the time. And it is true that he is subject to an inordinate number of investigations - because politicians must be seen to be not only law makers, but also compliant to the law. They are not above the law.
I don’t think one can come to any conclusion wrt what people think as a result of that question.
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WTF WTF WTF WTF WTF

Tactics that befit a child…Nunes is a mess.

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Breaking

CNN is reporting that WH lawyers want to have the first look at the Mueller Report, and prevent information from going to the public, by way of Executive Privilege for the President.

This could lead to a legal fight and tie it up on the courts…which would soften the impact of a truly transparent Mueller Report.

White House lawyers expect to have an opportunity to review whatever version of Robert Mueller’s report Attorney General Bill Barr submits to Congress before it reaches lawmakers and the public, multiple sources familiar with the matter said, setting up a potential political battle over the hotly anticipated document.

The attorneys want the White House to have an opportunity to claim executive privilege over information drawn from documents and interviews with White House officials, the sources said.

The White House’s review of executive privilege claims are within its legal purview, but could set up a political battle over the perception President Donald Trump is trying to shield certain information from the public about an investigation that has swirled around him since the first day of his presidency.

Justice Department lawyers could advise him against certain assertions if they don’t feel it’s legally defensible. If Trump does assert executive privilege, the decision could be litigated in court if it’s challenged, which Democrats would almost certainly do.

White Houses under Republican and Democratic presidents have asserted executive privilege to prevent certain information from being disclosed to Congress, and attorneys representing the White House and Trump have personally indicated they could assert that privilege over information that would be disclosed to Congress and the public.

During his confirmation hearing last year, Barr said while he did not “have a clue as to what would be in the report,” he said “someone might raise a claim of executive privilege” if there is "material to which an executive privilege claim could be made."

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Broidy probably left a trail of his illegal deeds as he does not seem to be a ‘detail’ person…another dirt bag that should got to Federal prison. That is what it will take to clean-up the GOP as a politcal party if it is even possible.

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I was watching a documentary on Scientology and couldn’t help but notice how the leader of the organization operated in a similar way to how Trump operates… both seem to more a cult than what they publically claim to be that is for sure.

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Good grief! Who does Nunes think he is - that he has been “damaged” to the extent of of $250 million - because some people have called him nasty names?

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He’ll be dragged until he leaves Twitter due to the Streisand effect

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T had very close ties with Deutsch Bank and all T had to do would be show some inflated asset numbers, and money comes pouring in. It was a certain few bankers, Ms. Rosemary Vrablic, Mike Offitz and Justice Kennedy’s son, Justin who did a great job in facilitating the loans.

Rosemary is widely recognized as one of the top private bankers to the U.S. ultra high-net-worth community,” Mr. Bowers said in a September 2006 news release. Deutsche Bank took out an ad in The Times to celebrate the arrival of her and a few colleagues.

In early 2014, Mr. Trump and his personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, approached Ms. Vrablic about more potential loans.

The owner of the Buffalo Bills had died, and the N.F.L. franchise was up for sale. Mr. Trump was interested, and he needed to show the league he had the financial wherewithal to pull off a transaction that could top $1 billion.

Mr. Trump asked Ms. Vrablic if the bank would be willing to make a loan and handed over bare-bones financial statements that estimated his net worth at $8.7 billion.

Mr. Cohen testified to Congress last month that the documents exaggerated Mr. Trump’s wealth. Deutsche Bank executives had reached a similar conclusion. They nonetheless agreed to vouch for Mr. Trump’s bid, according to an executive involved.

Mr. Trump’s bid did not win, but another lending opportunity soon arose.

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I’ve always been suspicious (well since early 2016) of this side of the Trump “empire” where it was reported that no banks in America would touch his business with a barge pole due to his (not infrequent) use of bankruptcy to avoid his debtors. Just where the funding was coming from, to underwrite these massive loans, means that some people outside of America had/have to be involved, and the fingers pointed to Russian oligarchs desperate to launder money out of their country. I guess eventually the truth will find the light of day.

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The Mercers’ tentacles reach 'round the world – now they’re back in the UK where they’re fixing a bankruptcy case to hide possible criminal activity. This article does a great job of breaking down a somewhat complex case. Follow along and you will be appalled at the flagrant felonious behavior of the Mercers. In my opinion, they should be arrested for engineering this cover up, but these days, who knows if they’ll ever be held accountable. A lot depends on the judge who will render his decision in a few days.

BTW, you’ve got to admire Professor David Carroll. He is a lone U.S. citizen who is in a David & Goliath battle with the Mercer family and their corrupt global empire. This would make a riveting movie scenario along the lines of “Erin Brockovich.” Let’s hope Carroll triumphs in the end like Brockovich! We shall see.

LONDON — British political consultants that worked for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign liked to boast that they could deploy dirty tricks and twist democracies all over the world without the risk of detection.

The High Court in London heard on Monday that Cambridge Analytica was up to its old tricks from beyond the grave—by surreptitiously trying to halt investigations that could expose allegedly nefarious tactics before the company was shut down for good.

The company filed for the British equivalent of chapter 11 bankruptcy last year after secret recordings of its boss, Alexander Nix, emerged in which he claimed that Trump’s data gurus had carried out illicit election campaigns all over the world. The company was also accused of using up to 87 million clandestinely harvested Facebook profiles to create a state of the art voter database that helped Trump win election in 2016.

In Britain, court-appointed administrators are supposed to work independently on behalf of all creditors to take over running of the company, similar to chapter 11 bankruptcy in the U.S. But the legal team of David Carroll, an associate professor at Parsons School in New York who is fighting for access to the data compiled on him, claimed that the administrators of Cambridge Analytica has succumbed to undue influence. Emerdata appointed the administrator and subsequently committed to pay them up to $1 million in fees.

The administrators, Vincent Green and Mark Newman of Crowe U.K. LLP, were accused of trying to liquidate the company before a full investigation into the company could be held.

It is extremely unusual, in my submission, to have the fees of an administrator underwritten effectively by the people who may themselves be the principal focus of any subsequent investigation,” said Andreas Gledhill Q.C., the lawyer representing Carroll in court.

Rebekah and Jennifer Mercer, daughters of billionaire Trump donor Robert Mercer, are listed as directors of Emerdata. As is former Cambridge Analytica chairman Julian Wheatland, who is named on the list of people close to President Trump being probed by the House Judiciary Committee, alongside Nix, who resigned as a director of Emerdata on the same day that he was called back for further questioning by a committee in Britain’s House of Commons. Nix remains a shareholder.

So, you see where this is going – the Mercers have fixed it so that Emerdata, a company they control and which is closely linked to Cambridge Analytica, has appointed (and is paying) the officials arbitrating Cambridge Analytica’s bankruptcy proceedings. Thus, the Mercers are ensuring that the proceedings will hush up any wrongdoing by Cambridge Analytica. It is the classic “fix” where an entity is allowed to investigate itself and, surprise, surprise, finds it did nothing wrong.

It’s hard to summarize all the details here, so if you’re interested in this case, I’ll leave it to you to peruse the rest of the article – it’s a real eye-opener.

Here’s Professor Carroll’s Twitter feed where he describes his one-man crusade to find the truth about Cambridge Analytica. He is fighting to prevent the company from destroying its records as it rushes through a rigged bankruptcy proceeding.

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Rosenstein was going to leave by mid-March, and now indicating that he’s going to stay a bit longer. We had known that he had wanted to stay until the Mueller Report came in…wondering if he’s got some skin in the game there when it does come in?

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It’s come to this (well…everyday it is like this), which feels more like the battle for a World Wrestling Event WWE match, or some kind of reality TV showdown.

T is now condemning George Conway for all his negative tweets…
T’s bottom line - keep my name in the news, at ALL times, and make it good.

T v. George Conway.

(But this works in KellyAnne’s favor, because I believe she was the NYT Opinion leaker, and gets to be duplicitous in sort of condemning her husband, and probably agreeing with him Who is mystery NY Times Op Ed Author)

And then there was a time when T supported George Conway. OH MY

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This is a follow up to my post above about how, on the sly, the Mercers set up what is basically a new version of Cambridge Analytica. It’s called Emerdata and performs many of the same operations as Cambridge Analytica – with the additional task of covering up its predecessor’s crimes.

Here’s an excellent infographic that lays out Emerdata’s structure and how it relates to Cambridge Analytica. It also illustrates ties to Erik Prince and a state owned Chinese company. This is the work of Wendy Siegelman who publishes in The Guardian and BuzzFeed and is an infographic wizard. Her twitter feed is an invaluable resource.

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