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Trump Russia Tag

Posted by Mary Chastain on November 08, 2017 8 Comments
A judge has issued a gag order in the case of former President Donald Trump chairman Paul Manafort and his protege Rick Gates. From Politico:
U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson's directive Wednesday doesn't ban such statements outright, but prohibits any remarks that "pose a substantial likelihood of material prejudice to this case."

Posted by William A. Jacobson on November 07, 2017 23 Comments
Remember the meeting Donald Trump, Jr. had with the Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya? The meeting that Veselnitskaya arranged on the promise of dirt on Hillary Clinton, but which appears to have been just a means of lobbying Trump on the Magnitsky Act. The leak about the meeting set off several news cycles of speculation. It turned out she had a connection to the firm, Fusion GPS, doing oppo research for the Clinton campaign. That put the meeting in an odd light, but it wasn't clear whether this was a Fusion GPS operation. When I covered it on July 13, 2017, I cautioned:

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on November 05, 2017 25 Comments
Earlier this week, Professor Jacobson noted that Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation is focused on process crimes and other things unrelated to the purpose of the Trump campaign-Russia collusion investigation. He wrote:
So I’ve had to watch several news cycles without being able to jump in. One of those cycles was the indictment of Paul Manafort and the guilty plea disclosure for George Papadopoulos. Certainly this is not the end of the Mueller investigation story, but so far, it’s proceeding as predicted: Rounding up the usual suspects close to Trump and process crimes.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on November 01, 2017 26 Comments
Sorry I've been mostly absent the past week. The Vassar meltdown threw me for a loop. I devoted much more time getting ready for the lecture due to the campus hysteria, and have had to devote more time than expected after the event starting the process of addressing the malicious lies spread about me by people who seem to care little for the truth.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on October 29, 2017 53 Comments
The Special Council investigation led by James Comey friend and ally and former FBI head Robert Mueller has been in search of a crime since its questionable inception.  In fact, so intent is he on digging up some kind of crime, any kind, that he's amassed a legal team that rivals in size the entire U. S. Attorneys Office for the state of Rhode Island.  Courtesy of your tax dollars. Reports suggest that he's bagging his first head on Monday.  Reports do not, however, state who will be arrested or on what charges.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on October 23, 2017 16 Comments
Former President Jimmy Carter sat down for an interview with Maureen Dowd for the New York Times and dropped some pretty interesting bombs.  Dowd focused her write-up on his answer to her question about acting as a go-between for the Trump White House and North Korea.  He said that he would go if asked, and that's certainly both important and within his wheelhouse.  In the interview, however, Carter also defends President Trump and offers surprising assessments of former-president Obama, failed presidential candidate Hillary, and the media. His comments in defense of Trump might be seen as an attempt to ingratiate himself in order to be called upon to assist with North Korea.  Maybe.  But that doesn't explain his apparent candor in unflattering critiques of Obama, Hillary, and the media.

Posted by Mary Chastain on October 23, 2017 15 Comments
Be careful for what you wish for because it may go your way, but it may also come back to bite you. The left has pressured for an investigation to find collusion between President Donald Trump and Russia, but now that investigation has brought in one of their own. Mueller's investigation now includes the Podesta Group, headed by Democratic lobbyist Tony Podesta...the brother of John Podesta, failed Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman. The inclusion came after Mueller looked into former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort's finances.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on October 21, 2017 26 Comments
It has been relatively quiet lately on the Russian-collusion Democrat-Media leak and rumor mill. "Relatively" is the key word. What once was a sustained campaign of leaks timed to hit every 2-3 days to create a permanent Russia-collusion news cycle, now barely makes a sound. Of course, some Russian collusion is more newsworthy to the media than others, with the Uranium One scandal receiving a tiny fraction of the coverage as completely speculative Trump campaign rumors did.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on September 26, 2017 19 Comments
Roger Stone, an ally of and unofficial campaign adviser of President Trump, testified Tuesday in a closed hearing of the House Intelligence Committee.  Though Stone requested an open hearing, it was at the Committee's insistence that the interview be closed. This is the latest in the efforts of Congress to root out alleged collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign and/or Trump associates. Stone was called to testify because he had a private Twitter conversation with infamous hacker Guccifer 2.0.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on September 20, 2017 34 Comments
WiretapGate keeps getting curiouser and curiouser. A couple of days ago there were reports that Team Mueller told Paul Manafort he likely would be indicted, and that Manafort was wiretapped before and after the 2016 election. Today brings a report from CBS News that those wiretaps took place during the campaign. The media reaction focuses heavily on Manafort having spoken with Russians, but there is no indication about what. What is lost in translation in the headlines is that, according to CBS, conversations between Manafort and Trump may have been scooped up in the surveillance:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on September 18, 2017 43 Comments
It has been a short while since we checked in on how the Prosecutors In Search of a Crime, aka Mueller Special Prosecutor, was doing. A 17th attorney was added, inching Team Mueller closer to the size of the entire U.S. Attorney's Office for the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. Tonight CNN dropped a bombshell. Of course, CNN bombshell's have been duds in the past, so take that into account.

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on September 14, 2017 29 Comments
Not even Hillary Clinton, acclaimed author of What Happened, went this far.  On Wednesday's Hardball, Dem Rep. Jackie Speier called Russian "hacking" of the presidential election an "act of war." Taking things a significant step further, Speier said:
"I'm not convinced that they didn't get into the [voting] machines."
That was too much even for Chris Matthews, who interjected, "we don't know that yet. We don't know that."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on August 28, 2017 20 Comments
On today's Morning Joe, Mika Brzezinski and Mike Barnicle fretted over the personal impact the investigations surrounding the Trump administration are having on aides to the president. Each wondered, "what do you tell your children?"

Posted by Mary Chastain on August 09, 2017 63 Comments
I woke up to numerous alerts on my phone about an FBI raid on Paul Manafort's home in connection to the investigation into possible Russian interference in our election. At first, it appeared that the raid happened this morning, but a deeper reading showed it occurred on July 26. An even deeper reading showed that authorities didn't make any huge discoveries. But the media can't help itself when it comes RUSSIA. From The Washington Post:
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