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What The Fuck Happened Over The Weekend?

General Discussion
#213

Another democracy is now facing cyber attacks weeks before an election.

When the Australian Parliament and political parties are hacked, the Prime Minister makes a major speech to reassure the nation that their government is doing everything within its power to identify the country that attacked them and to shield their democracy from future assaults.

But when our democratic institutions come under cyber attack where is our leader? Not one word from him. In fact, he’s not just guilty of negligence; it’s worse than that. At every turn he is actively blocking the investigations and today he even spread a message calling for the lead investigator to be thrown in jail.

SYDNEY, Australia — Prime Minister Scott Morrison of Australia on Monday blamed a “sophisticated state actor” for the recent hacking of Parliament’s computer network, raising the specter of foreign interference in the country’s politics weeks before a national election.

The government has not identified the country behind the attack, but Mr. Morrison said that along with Parliament, the networks of the major political parties were also affected.

Mr. Morrison did not detail how the country’s security agencies had detected or dealt with the malicious activity, but he insisted that “there is no evidence of any electoral interference.”

Cybersecurity experts, he said, briefed the country’s electoral commissions and met with state and territory officials. “They have also worked with global antivirus companies to ensure Australia’s friends and allies have the capacity to detect this malicious activity,” he said.

Alastair MacGibbon, the national cybersecurity adviser, said on Monday that the government had not learned the identity of the hacker before it acted to block the activity…

A government cybersecurity expert said one difficulty in identifying the perpetrators was that the hackers used tools that had not previously been seen.

The nations most likely to carry out such an attack are China and Russia, security experts said, though Iran, Israel and North Korea also have sophisticated cyberwarfare capabilities.

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#214

A senior German official, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak on such matters, shrugged his shoulders and said: “No one any longer believes that Trump cares about the views or interests of the allies. It’s broken.”

—

Even the normally gloomy Russian foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, happily noted the strains, remarking that the Euro-Atlantic relationship had become increasingly “tense.”

“We see new cracks forming, and old cracks deepening,” Mr. Lavrov said.

The Europeans no longer believe that Washington will change, not when Mr. Trump sees traditional allies as economic rivals and leadership as diktat. His distaste for multilateralism and international cooperation is a challenge to the very heart of what Europe is and needs to be in order to have an impact in the world.

But beyond the Trump administration, an increasing number of Europeans say they believe that relations with the United States will never be the same again.

Karl Kaiser, a longtime analyst of German-American relations, said, “Two years of Mr. Trump, and a majority of French and Germans now trust Russia and China more than the United States.”

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#215

And the problem with that is, that those are from the alt-right, and the alt-left. The old political divides are fast disappearing as popularism and reactions to the increasing inequalities that have resulted from mega-corporate greed. This dissatisfaction is fostered by on-line dialogue generated from Russia and China, on social media sites.
Even as we “speak” the British Labour Party is splitting asunder, and the Tories are in not much better shape. France is beset with “green jackets” protests, Italians are are loggerheads with each other, the German alt-right is constantly demanding more and more attention.
Corporations have to wake up to the damage they are causing with their insatiable greed, as more and more of the worlds resources end up under their control. How to regulate social media is another matter. You have had your problems in 2016 and according to some experts you face a mega storm in 2020. The Australians are currently reporting interference from a foreign power in the lead up to their elections this year.
Trump is a significant factor, but there is much more to it than just him.

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#216

The FBI is dismantling a special unit that investigates international war crimes and hunts down war criminals—including suspected torturers and perpetrators of genocide, Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting has learned.

The unit, which was created a decade ago and has its roots in federal efforts to hunt down Nazis living in the United States after World War II, has had a hand in many high-profile prosecutions.

—

In a statement, the FBI confirmed the shuttering of the war crimes unit but argued its dissolution “in no way reflects a reduced commitment by the FBI” to enforce human rights law. The agents previously dedicated to human rights work will continue that work as members of the FBI’s civil rights program, the agency said.

But the move could run afoul of Congress, which mandated the unit’s establishment and funds its work every year as part of the FBI’s budget. Sources tell Reveal that most of the agents previously dedicated to human rights likely will now be assigned to other jobs and worry that perpetrators of torture and genocide will be free to act with impunity.

In addition to finding international war criminals living in the United States, the FBI’s human rights unit also has investigated and apprehended perpetrators of war crimes against Americans abroad, along with Americans who commit war crimes themselves—such as military contractors accused of killing civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan or U.S. citizens who fight alongside the Islamic State. All those efforts now could fall through the cracks.

Human rights advocates, who have become increasingly concerned with President Donald Trump’s embrace of ruthless autocrats such as Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, worry that the move could be political.

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#217

Here’s more of a clarification of what was revealed in McCabe’s CBS interview…from our :boom: friend, Benjamin Wittes at Lawfare

While I will never parse through details like a lawyer, the details re-stated here gives more credence to the NY Times reporting of the need for a counterintelligence resource, which McCabe meeting with the President about starting right after he met w/ T.

Less clear is what Rosenstein is admitting or revealing, which never actually refutes the question that the 25th Amendment was discussed, just not acted on.

Should any of this change one’s fundamental understanding of any of the individuals or events in question? Probably not. But as the picture comes into tighter focus, the image that emerges is of a chaotic period, one in which everyone was under intense stress and Rosenstein in particular was handling the stress badly and making erratic judgments. McCabe’s account doesn’t change the fundamentals of the story, but it puts a lot of flesh on the bones. And it makes clear that at least one former senior official will put his name behind a series of stories that until now had been sourced anonymously in the New York Times.

NYT’s article referenced above.

And Benjamin’s conclusion after speaking the FBI’s fired lawyer, Jim Baker, that “Obstruction was the Collusion” theory

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#218

Ohhhhh Roger Stone is beyond words…provocateur who’s actions are going to bring him down faster, messing with the Judge presiding over his case.
I mean common man…

UPDATED 4:15 PST Roger has apologized…legally. :exploding_head:

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#219

@dragonfly9 I think McCabe was wrongfully terminated, he had already retired when the IG report came out, they didn’t have to fire him. That IG report was harsh but didn’t find bias in the work of any of the investigators.

Worth rereading the Rosenstein Memo justifying the firing of Director Comey over the FBI handling of Clinton email case.

I just think it’s too convenient to fire the man that opened the investigation to find out if the President is a Russian asset and then over the next year clean house at the FBI. Wittes is placing too much emphasis on the IG report, it’s a false equivalency compared to the mountains of lies we’ve heard from this administration.

As emptywheel points out, it’s up to the courts to decide and so far they all agree with the FBI.

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#220

So true. And let’s not forget that the person employing these Mafia-style tactics has been a close confidant of our President for many years.

Here’s WaPo’s reporting:

Days after a federal judge imposed a limited gag order on him, Roger Stone posted a photograph of that judge to his Instagram page that included her name, a close-up of her face and what appeared to be the crosshairs of a gun sight near her head.

Stone, a longtime confidant of President Trump, deleted the picture soon afterward, then reposted it without the crosshairs before deleting that second post as well.

U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson is presiding over Stone’s criminal trial, in which he has pleaded not guilty to charges of lying about his efforts to gather information about hacked 2016 Democratic Party emails that were published by WikiLeaks. …

To me, what he writes below the photo is nearly as disturbing as the photo itself (which can be seen in the WaPo article):

Through legal trickery Deep State hitman Robert Mueller has guaranteed that my upcoming show trial is before Judge Amy Berman Jackson , an Obama appointed Judge who dismissed the Benghazi charges again [sic] Hillary Clinton and incarcerated Paul Manafort prior to his conviction for any crime. #fixisin Help me fight for my life at @StoneDefenseFund.com,”

BTW, there was no “legal trickery” involved. Prosecutors presented evidence that Stone’s case is related to the case of the indicted Russian hackers (a case which she is adjudicating) because he was communicating with them. Thus, the two cases are interwoven. In these circumstances, the same judge is almost invariably put in charge of both trials. It just makes sense – it’s not a “conspiracy” – it’s a result of the sound and fair manner in which our judicial system operates.

Also, the reason Manafort was confined before his trial was that he was caught witness tampering (until then he was free to live at home). And he was not placed in “solitary confinement” (which is meant to sound draconian). Instead, he was kept apart from other prisoners for his own safety – a logical precaution that is taken for many high-profile prisoners. At first he was allowed the use of a VIP cell with his own private shower, TV, phone, electronic tablet, etc. But then he even abused those privileges and so was housed in a more conventional manner.

In other words, it’s ridiculous for Stone and the alt-right to portray Manafort as a victim of prejudicial treatment by Judge Jackson. She afforded him every opportunity to stay at home in comfort awaiting his trial until he blew it in multiple ways. The biggest proof of this is that his cohort Rick Gates, who was arrested along with Manafort and who has been cooperative and has not participated in witness tampering, is still enjoying life outside jail as he awaits sentencing.

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#221

@anon95374541 - thanks for posting the more encompassing legal strategies that JABJ may be considering, along with the other judges when it comes to revealing what kinds of defenses that the various T indictees - Papadopoulis, Manafort, Flynn, Cohen had been hoping to create.

I agree with Marcie’s EmptyWheel’s assessments…and while deep in legal fact and going on what’s been redacted, it makes sense what the Mueller group is preventing from being seen, and the kinds of defenses that these guys had wanted to present.

Thx for Rosenstein memo…and it is also clarifying to note it focused solely on the Clinton email handling by Comey. That was ‘safe’ ground that Rosenstein could create a reason to terminate him for T.

But one tiny point, I think McCabe was fired before he was at the end of his term, or the day before he could legally retire. McCabe’s defense is to say he was wrongfully terminated though, unfairly etc. Clearly, the intent was to stick it to McCabe…

I could be creating more circles of information…but suffice it to say, am tracking with you on a lot of points! :grin:

After Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Friday carried through on an FBI recommendation to fire former bureau Deputy Director Andrew McCabe on the eve of his planned retirement, a massive legal imbroglio seems inevitable.

However, lawyers say McCabe’s legal options are few because most FBI employees have little legal recourse over attempts to punish them over alleged misconduct.

“I don’t see an obvious path for recourse,” said Katherine Atkinson, a Washington lawyer who represents federal workers. “FBI employees generally do not have those rights.”

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#222

@dragonfly9

Good because I want to go back to this DAG statement from earlier this week.

“directed that Mr. McCabe be removed from any participation in that investigation.”

Is this new information? Was it ever reported that McCabe was removed from the Investigation he began before he retired? I don’t recall and I’m not finding this referenced anywhere else.

I just always understood his departure from the case as being due to his retirement. I guess I didn’t know he was removed from the case prior to retirement by the DAG. I’m very interested in the chain of events that precisely lead to the creation of the Special Counsel.

This story is extremely nuanced. This matters because the Republicans believe the whole investigation is illegal.

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#223

Ok…am with you…re-reading these passages, listening to Wittes/Doran debate the merits of the origins/legality/scope of the Mueller probe…and

I do not think this is new information, but we are just seeing it explicitly written. At the point the Mueller term started Special Counsel Investigation May 17, 2017, it was decided by Rosenstein to off-load everything to Mueller.

Up through the election, Comey/McCabe/Chris Wray/Lisa Page/Strzok/ and a variety of FBI agents were working on checking into the Russian activity and through first week of May 2017, FBI had tabs on the transition team making calls to Kislyak, and knew that Manafort was double dealing w/ Ukraine. The FBI was on full alert and getting FISA warrants on people…one had already been started on Carter Page.

So the timeline is confusing, because just after the election, and Sessions was set up to be AG, all that knowledge of conversations w/ Kislyak and Sanctions/Flynn became known within the FBI and so when Rosenstein became DAG, he had those 8 days to consider wearing a wire, talking with cabinet members re: 25th Amendment.

After inauguration, T was briefed by FBI/Intel heads that Russia was working against us in the election and that they were worried about this.

DAG, Sally Yates had warned WH to be aware of Flynn’s activity just after the inauguration.

Post May 17, 2017 Mueller hired some of the same FBI folks who had been working on the investigation = see Strzok and Page.

McCabe was acting head of FBI…he did not have the same mandate any more afterwards I believe.

As far as knowing the nuances of the timeline…and what may happen with the Republican argument that this whole Mueller investigation is a sham, and what Doran said vs. Wittes. (and what may become William Barr’s position)

Lawfare Podcast - Benjamin Wittes/Mike Doran

From the Republican and perhaps Barr’s viewpoint…

  • Investigation should have not been started because

  • That the whole investigation started as a counterintelligence operation and assumed the Russians were colluding with T and his campaign. Doran argues that there was no probable cause to start investigation ( Rosenstein’s memo for SCI is redacted, so we don’t know)

  • They believe that George P’s discussions with Mifsud and the Australian ambassador was a big nothing…it never warranted a FISA.

  • They believe that the use of the Dossier was too loosely configured, and was never a good starting point for any investigation. Steele was funded by Dems, Steele leaked to press, and Simpson was too close to press as well. The FBI and DOJ subsequently validated this information by talking to TheHill

*They believe that Carter Page never merited a FISA agreement…it should never have happened. They like that Nunes released the circumstances from the redacted FISA?

So Republican lawmakers feel that the Mueller investigation should never have started, that FBI/DOJ are deep state and want to oust the President. They feel that the FBI/DOJ is ramming this ‘story’ down the American public’s mouth, via the press and a lot of leaking.

What what of the 35 + indictments and discussions that we know Roger Stone and his goons, Guccifer 2.0 had with Assange, the DNC hacking, and all of the rest of it?

I think the T administration is a fraud and T should be impeached or run out of town, and definitely tried in court. I think Mueller has a lock on what’s been illegal and has it all buttoned up.

So, what will happen now that there are rumblings again about Mueller’s possible removal…

See

Well, we gird against more cr#p coming our way…and #persist. :statue_of_liberty:

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#224

And what do we think about this…? @anon95374541

She does a great job of parsing out a lot of details…(but have done my WTF time for today) :sleeping:

Trump wanted Rod Rosenstein to include Russia in the reasons he should fire Comey

The order to Rosenstein was one of the predications for the investigation into Trump

McCabe describes the genesis of the obstruction and the counterintelligence investigation

About the Two Investigations into Donald Trump | emptywheel

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#225

@dragonfly Great article!

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#226

Adding William Happer to the Climate Change panel is bonkers. He is a denier…:see_no_evil:

Despite evidence from its own intelligence community and the Pentagon that climate change poses a threat to national security, the White House has created a panel to examine that very question, and is set to put a climate change skeptic at its helm.

According to a document obtained by The Washington Post, the Trump administration intends to use an executive order to create a panel tasked with assessing the potential harm of climate change.

Citing a memo dated February 14, The New York Times reported the committee, called the the Presidential Committee on Climate Security, will consist of 12 individuals, including William Happer, who is slated to head the team. Appointed to the National Security Council as the senior director for emerging technologies, the Princeton physicist is a known climate change denier, who once compared the “demonization of carbon dioxide” to the "demonization of poor Jews under Hitler."

In 2015, Happer made news after undercover members of the environmental campaign group Greenpeace posed as oil company representatives and persuaded him to write a scientific paper, The New York Times reported. He assured them it would be an unpaid “labor of love.”

Happer told the Greenpeace members, whom he believed were from an unnamed oil company: “More CO2 will benefit the world. The only way to limit CO2 would be to stop using fossil fuels, which I think would be a profoundly immoral and irrational policy.”

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#227

Surprise! Surprise! /sarc

What would have been a surprise would be if he picked someone who actually takes Climate Change seriously, and not just their past academic pride.

The world can go to hell in a hand basket for all DT cares. So long as his pockets are full, he is happy.

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#228

Kushner Cos. Seeks Federal Loan in Biggest Deal in Decade

Bloomberg - February 22, 2019
by Lily Katz, David Kocieniewski, and Caleb Melby

Due to the ongoing blizzard of scandals swirling around this administration, it looks like the President’s son-in-law has a shot at sneaking through an approval for this massive (and massively corrupt) government loan.

Kushner Cos., the real estate firm owned by the family of President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, has sought financing from federally-owned lenders for its biggest purchase in a decade.

The company has been in talks with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac about a loan for a $1.15 billion purchase of apartments in Maryland and Virginia, according to two people familiar with the discussions…

Peter Mirijanian, a spokesperson for Jared Kushner’s attorney Abbe Lowell, said that Kushner has no involvement in the company’s management. “As part of an ethics agreement he has and has followed, Mr. Kushner has had no role in the Kushner Companies or its activities since joining the government over two years ago,” Mirijanian said.

Who is monitoring this “ethics agreement”? How do we know it’s being enforced? Can Kushner simply pick up the phone and talk to Kushner Co. executives with no one outside the company being any the wiser? The only assurance we have that Kushner is following the agreement comes from Kushner himself (via a spokesperson for his lawyer). Of course Kushner is going to say “I’m following the agreement – I’ve investigated myself and found that I’m not doing anything wrong.” /sarc

The only true assurance that Kushner is not privy to Kushner Co. business and profiting from it would be if he took these two steps (which he should have done before entering his father-in-law’s administration):

  1. Sell his holdings to independent third-parties (right now he has just handed off some of them to close family members, undoubtedly with an understanding that they will hand them back later) AND

  2. Place the proceeds from those sales in a blind trust.

Since he has not taken these steps, Kushner can profit from decisions he makes at the highest levels of our government – a clear and unequivocal conflict of interest. And in this loan, we are watching this corruption play out in plain sight. I’m a little disappointed in Bloomberg’s reporting because, although, they describe the basis of the conflict of interest, they don’t actually spell it out. Here’s the relevant paragraph:

President Trump appointed Joseph Otting to oversee the Federal Housing Finance Agency, which regulates Fannie and Freddie. Otting previously served as CEO of OneWest Bank, founded by now-Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, an ally of Kushner’s in the West Wing.

Let’s dissect these two sentences which are each evidence of a conflict of interest:

  1. Kushner’s father-in-law (Trump) appointed the person (Joseph Otting) who heads the agency that oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (responsible for approving the loans). This alone is a flagrant conflict of interest. But there’s more… as revealed in the next sentence.

  2. That same person (Otting) was also CEO of a bank founded by a powerful White House ally of Kushner (Treasury Secretary Mnuchin).

Therefore, two people at the highest levels of our government (the President and the Treasury Secretary), who are also very close to Kushner, are in a position to apply pressure down the chain of command to the people approving Kushner’s loans. They don’t even have to actively apply that pressure – the favors they are owed do not need to be spelled out to the person who owes those favors.

[This deal] is the latest sign that Kushner Cos. is returning to its roots as an owner of suburban properties. It sold almost $2 billion of apartments in 2007 to help finance the purchase of 666 Fifth Ave. The company set a record with the $1.8 billion purchase of the 41-story Manhattan office tower, which was then plagued by outsized debt payments for more than a decade.

Kushner Cos. reached a deal to sell a 99-year lease on 666 Fifth to Brookfield Asset Management Inc. last year…

The article doesn’t mention that the Qataris hold a significant stake in Brookfield. So what really stinks is that the shady Qatari money that helped bail out Kushner from the disastrous 666 deal put him in a position to make this equally shady new deal.

The Kushner-Brookfield-Qatari connection has been covered in WTFJHT here and here.

And how the Kushner-Qatari bail out is also connected to the administration’s secretive efforts to sell nuclear technology to the Middle East has been covered here.

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#229

Here’s another democratic government being attacked by the Kremlin. When will Trump speak up? :interrobang:

This is a long article that reads like a spy novel. :female_detective:

The accusations of how the dirty campaign money would be laundered from Russia to Italy are surprisingly detailed and gave me a feeling of déjà vu in the way these events parallel our U.S. experience being targeted by the Russians. And the Kremlin’s end goals in Italy are similar to what they are here: 1) Sow division, fear, and doubt; divide and conquer; in this case, they’re trying to tear apart the European Union and 2) Install politicians who will lift European sanctions on Russia.

Here are a few excerpts, but I’ll leave the detailed narrative to your perusal – a good Sunday read?

ROME — Italy’s interior minister and vice premier, Matteo Salvini, went off the grid for 12 hours during an official state visit to Moscow last October. Tales of Russian prostitutes seemed to explain the time lapse for the single statesman. But a new exposé by the Italian newsmagazine L’Espresso suggests that his time may have been spent doing something far more sinister: he may have been making backroom deals with Russian operatives ahead of European Parliamentary elections.

The investigation, which the magazine says was conducted over several months, comes to the conclusion that Russian president Vladimir Putin is selling 3 million tons of diesel fuel via a Russian company to an Italian state company, Eni, that Salvini as interior minister can help manage…

The Russian profits, according to L’Espresso, would then be funneled back to Italy to fund Salvini’s Lega [League] party to help it engage in the dark art of manipulative online persuasion ahead of European elections in May.

The elections are key for Salvini… His hope is that if he and other like-minded political parties across Europe can infiltrate the European Union structure and control it from the inside, they can do any number of things, including lifting Russian sanctions…

The main event [during Salvini’s trip to Moscow] was a 5:00 p.m. conference organized at the Lotte Hotel. Savoini [Salvini’s close associate] was sitting front row center. After the conference, Salvini and Savoini apparently disappeared through a side door and were not heard from until the next morning. The Italian press traveling with him were baffled until it was leaked that the single Salvini had plans of an intimate nature.

But L’Espresso says those rumors came from the Salvini camp, and instead the interior minister was meeting “in secret with a prominent character of the Kremlin: Deputy Premier Dmitry Kozak, delegate for energy affairs, a man in the close circle of Putin.”

The next morning, Salvini was back and Savoini was photographed by L’Espresso reporters at a meeting with Russian oil executives at Moscow’s posh Metropol Hotel where he was overheard promising Salvini’s commitment to the diesel deal. “The new Europe must be close to Russia. We no longer have to depend on enlightened decisions in Brussels or the U.S.,” L’Espresso says Savoini told the Russians through a translator.

“We want to change Europe together with our allies like Heinz-Christian Strache in Austria, Alternative für Deutschland in Germany, Mrs. Le Pen in France, Orbán in Hungary, Sverigedemokraterna in Sweden.”

All of these leaders happen to be part of Steve Bannon’s new ‘Movement‘ coalition of right-wing leaders hoping to take Europe by storm in elections in May.

At the hotel meeting, L’Espresso journalists, who snapped and published photos of the meeting, say the four talked about the Russian oil company Rosneft…

“The Russians propose three million tons of diesel to be delivered in six months or a year,” Savoini allegedly told the group, according to L’Espresso. “The Italian lawyer says that there is no problem: he ensures that Eni has the ability to buy even more if necessary.”

Savoini reportedly then told the Russians, “The plan made by our political guys is simple. Given the four percent discount, they pay €250,000 a month, for a year. So they can support a campaign,” he says…

L’Espresso reports that the rest of the meeting dealt with the type of diesel order, whether it could also include airplane fuel, where and how it would be delivered. “The Russians suggested Banca Intesa Russia and the Italians reassured them it was a good choice because in the board of directors there is already ‘one of our men, Mascetti,’” referring to Andrea Mascetti, a League member who sits on that bank’s board…

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#230

This statement by Senator Sasse, who has been a relentless crusader seeking justice for Jeffrey Epstein’s victims, contains a real bombshell at the very end. :boom:

…On page 26 of the opinion, the court notes that it has previously held that “the [Crime Victims’ Rights Act] authorizes the rescission or ‘reopening’ of a prosecutorial agreement, including a non-prosecution agreement, reached in violation of a prosecutor’s conferral obligations under the statute,” citing previous case law.

In other words, since Alex Acosta, who headed the Epstein prosecution team and is now Secretary of Labor, did not fulfill his “conferral obligations” vis-à-vis the victims (as evidenced by a recent court ruling), the DOJ or the courts can re-open the case! This would not only justly expose Epstein to further legal jeopardy, it would also mean that his long list of sex crimes against minors would come back under investigation – and Acosta’s role in hushing the whole thing up would also come under scrutiny.

And this isn’t just Sasse’s opinion, I’ve heard it mentioned in several panel discussions, the best example being Friday’s Morning Joe where MSNBC legal analyst Danny Cevallos drew the same conclusion. He also adds that it’s possible Epstein could be charged in other jurisdictions such as in the U.S. Virgin Islands where Epstein owns an island.

This panel does a great job of explaining many of the issues surrounding the Epstein case and Acosta’s involvement, but if you want to skip to the part about re-opening the non-prosecution agreement, go to 4:40.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=386&v=t6AvhnX-EiE

BTW, the first panelist is the Miami Herald’s Julie K. Brown. In recognition for her tireless and incisive reporting on this case, she was recently presented with a prestigious George Polk Award in Journalism. :trophy:

Here’s the in-depth report for which she was recognized:

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/article220097825.html

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#231

Yang wasn’t just running rub and tug massage parlors and trading in human trafficking, she was also selling access to the White House.

Yang, who goes by Cindy, and her husband, Zubin Gong, started GY US Investments LLC in 2017. The company describes itself on its website, which is mostly in Chinese, as an “international business consulting firm that provides public relations services to assist businesses in America to establish and expand their brand image in the modern Chinese marketplace.” But the firm notes that its services also address clients looking to make high-level connections in the United States. On a page displaying a photo of Mar-a-Lago, Yang’s company says its “activities for clients” have included providing them “the opportunity to interact with the president, the [American] Minister of Commerce and other political figures.” The company boasts it has “arranged taking photos with the President” and suggests it can set up a “White House and Capitol Hill Dinner.” (The same day the Herald story about Yang broke, the website stopped functioning.)

The short bio of Yang on the website, identifying her as the founder and CEO of GY US Investments, shows her in a photo with Trump bearing his signature. It says she has been “settled in the United States for more than 20 years” and is a member of the “Presidential Fundraising Committee.” According to the Herald , Yang is a registered Republican, and since 2017 she and her relatives have donated more than $42,000 to a Trump political action committee and more than $16,000 to Trump’s campaign. Her Facebook page, which was taken offline on Friday, was loaded with photos of her posing with GOP notables: Donald Trump Jr., Rep. Matt Gaetz or Florida, Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel, Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, among others.

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#232

The parallels between what happened to Yulia Tymoshenko and Hilary Clinton continue…

American Oversight has uncovered the signed directive from former Attorney General Jeff Sessions instructing a federal prosecutor to carry out President Trump’s authoritarian demand to investigate Hillary Clinton.

The document, obtained through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) litigation by American Oversight, is a formal, November 2017 letter from Sessions to U.S. Attorney for Utah John Huber and has never before been released to the public. In a sworn declaration filed in November 2018 in response to American Oversight’s lawsuit, the Justice Department had insisted that no written directive existed and that all guidance to Huber had been delivered verbally.

(…)

On November 13, 2017, Assistant Attorney General Stephen Boyd wrote to former House Judiciary Committee Chair Robert Goodlatte informing him that Sessions had directed “senior federal prosecutors” to evaluate issues the congressman had raised in previous letters. Goodlatte had written to Sessions calling for the appointment of a second special counsel to investigate Clinton, the Uranium One sale, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s handling of the inquiry into Clinton’s use of a private email server.

(…)

“It strains credulity to believe that the Justice Department didn’t know about this letter when they swore under penalty of perjury that it didn’t exist — you don’t exactly forget about a formal directive to investigate Hillary Clinton signed by Jeff Sessions,” said Evers. “The fact that they only ‘found’ it the same week Matthew Whitaker was heading for the exit makes it hard to see DOJ’s previous denial as anything but a deliberate attempt to conceal the extent to which President Trump’s authoritarian demands were being put into action.”

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