Category: Justice Department

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Crime Donald Trump Justice Department

Ex-Trump Lawyer Seems To Be ‘Waving A Red Flag’ Signaling He Wants To Help DOJ: Report

A former member of ex-president Donald Trump’s legal team appears ready to cooperate with the Justice Department’s investigation of classified documents that were improperly removed from the White House and taken to a Florida resort.

According to Joyce Vance, who worked as a U.S. Attorney in the Obama administration, comments made by Timothy Parlatore suggest a “turf war” is taking place among the failed former president’s legal team, and that could be big trouble for Trump.

“It’s almost as though there’s a turf war going on here among the lawyers,” Vance explained. “You know, often, when you see a lawyer leave a legal team that might signify that there’s a plea deal in the works or that there’s some legal reason behind the change. Here, it looks like a pure turf battle. But when Paraltore goes out and reveals this sort of information, it’s almost as though he’s pointing a finger at Boris Epshteyn and including him in the group of people involved in obstructing justice in this situation.”

“We don’t usually see lawyers come out and make statements like this after they leave a legal team,” she added. “You know, it’s CYA, it’s maybe waving a red flag at the Justice Department and saying he would like to come back and testify in a grand jury. I think that would make it the third time for him.”

Indeed, the New York Times reported over the weekend that there is major infighting on Trump’s legal team:

Parlatore described how … (Attorney Boris) Epshteyn had hindered him and other lawyers from getting information to Mr. Trump, leaving the former president’s legal team at a disadvantage in dealing with the Justice Department, which is scrutinizing Mr. Trump’s handling of classified documents after leaving office and his efforts to remain in office after losing the 2020 election.

Vance also explained that Trump’s attorneys aren’t about to go to jail just to protect him, no matter what promises the twice-impeached former president makes.

“You know, Trump’s lawyers don’t seem to believe that when people say ‘everything Trump touches dies,’ that it includes the lawyers,” she remarked. “But clearly, it does. Because they’ve put themselves at risk in a number of different ways.

“And so, we see lawyers leave and have to worry about whether they’re next. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a situation where so many lawyers, Boris Epshteyn, John Eastman, are all invoked as part of possible criminal activity.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tffU0wcqEc

If Trump thought things couldn’t possibly get worse, they most certainly will if one of his attorneys becomes a cooperating witness for the DOJ. Such a development would all but guarantee that the ex-president is headed to prison in the very near future.

 

Categories
Congress GOP Justice Department

WATCH: Jim Jordan’s ‘Weaponization’ Witness Gets Humiliated When Asked About His Revoked Security Clearance

This hasn’t been a very good day for Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.

Jordan’s committee held a hearing this morning regarding the so-called “weaponization” of the Justice Department against failed and indicted former president Donald Trump, and his first “whistleblower” was quickly discredited with a line of questioning about why he lost his security clearance when he worked for the FBI.

The witness/whistleblower, Steve Friend, who served as an agent in the Miami FBI office was asked by Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL), “You … claim that your top secret security clearance was improperly revoked. Yet an independent investigation concluded that you demonstrated a number of security concerns, which included that you refused to execute a court-ordered arrest warrant, and when you downloaded documents from intelligence systems to an unauthorized removable flash drive.”

Friend said nothing, so Wasserman Schultz continued:

“The cherry on top could be your unauthorized recording of executive management, which, as I’m sure you know, violates Florida law, along with your unsanctioned interviews with Sputnik News, established by the Russian government in 2014 and fully owned by the Kremlin and Putin’s cronies.”

The congresswoman concluded her remarks by noting, “I think it’s clear who is weaponizing government.”

Jordan’s other witness, FBI agent Marcus Allen, also lost his security clearance because he refused to share information with fellow agents regarding January 6 suspects who were under investigation.

It’d be tempting to call Jordan’s bogus hearings a dog and pony show, but that would be an insult to dogs, ponies, and shows.

 

Categories
Abuse of Power Justice Department Supreme Court

Clarence Thomas Is Now A Step Closer To Being Criminally Referred To The DOJ

Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas is a step closer to being criminally referred the U.S. Department of Justice for expensive trips and other perks he received from a top Republican donor, some of which were valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Last week, ProPublica revealed the connections between Thomas and billionaire megadonor Harlan Crow.

One of the trips Thomas took was to Indonesia.

IN LATE JUNE 2019, right after the U.S. Supreme Court released its final opinion of the term, Justice Clarence Thomas boarded a large private jet headed to Indonesia. He and his wife were going on vacation: nine days of island-hopping in a volcanic archipelago on a superyacht staffed by a coterie of attendants and a private chef.

If Thomas had chartered the plane and the 162-foot yacht himself, the total cost of the trip could have exceeded $500,000. Fortunately for him, that wasn’t necessary: He was on vacation with real estate magnate and Republican megadonor Harlan Crow, who owned the jet — and the yacht, too.

But there were many other jaunts around the globe for Justice Thomas and his wife, Ginni, who worked to try and overturn the results of the 2020 election so that Donald Trump could remain in office despite having lost in a landslide to President Joe Biden.

The Campaign Legal Center (CLC) has written a committee of federal judges who oversee matters related to members of the judiciary and is requesting a formal criminal referral of Thomas to the Justice Department, noting:

Campaign Legal Center respectfully requests that the Judicial Conference exercise its authority pursuant to 5 U.S.C. § 13106(b) and refer Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to the U.S. Attorney General because there is “reasonable cause to believe” that he “willfully failed to file information required to be reported” under the Ethics in GovernmentAct (“EIGA”).

Specifically, Justice Thomas’ public statement on April 7, 2023, and recent news reporting, confirm that for over twenty years he did not file required gift disclosures of private plane and yacht travel from one individual. There is reasonable cause to believe that the omissions were willful because Justice Thomas (1) previously reported private plane travel from the same individual in compliance with the law, but stopped the disclosures after negative media attention; and (2) has a history of omitting significant information from his financial disclosure reports.

Thomas has served on the Supreme Court since 1991.

 

Categories
Crime Donald Trump Espionage Justice Department

New Evidence Suggests Trump Obstructed Justice – Moved Classified Docs To Hide Them From FBI

New evidence in the form of text messages from a former aide to disgraced ex-president Donald Trump may be exactly what Special Counsel Jack Smith needs to prove that the twice-impeached former president did indeed actively engage in obstruction of justice by moving classified documents in order to hide them from FBI agents who searched his Mar-a-Lago resort in August of last year.

According to The Washington Post:

Justice Department and FBI investigators have amassed fresh evidence pointing to possible obstruction by former president Donald Trump in the investigation into top-secret documents found at his Mar-a-Lago home, according to people familiar with the matter.

The additional evidence comes as investigators have used emails and text messages from a former Trump aide to help understand key moments last year, said the people, who like others interviewed for this article spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing criminal investigation.

The new details highlight the degree to which special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the potential mishandling of hundreds of classified national security papers at Trump’s Florida home and private club has come to focus on the obstruction elements of the case —whether the former president took or directed actions to impede government efforts to collect all the sensitive records.

Federal investigators, using “witness statements, security camera footage, and other documentary evidence,” believe that boxes which contained classified materials were moved from a storage area at Mar-a-Lago after a subpoena was served and that Trump “personally examined” some of the boxes in question.

“While Trump’s team returned some documents with classified markings in response to the subpoena, a later FBI search found more than 100 additional classified items that had not been turned over,” The Post adds.

These latest details come from court documents requesting a search of Mar-a-Lago for the purpose of proving that “evidence of obstruction will be found at the premises.”

The statute cited in the documents is 18 USC 1519, which makes it a felony to alter, destroy, mutilate or conceal a document “with the intent to impede, obstruct, or influence the investigation or proper administration of any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or agency.”

Trump will be in Manhattan next Tuesday to be fingerprinted and photographed in connection with crimes he allegedly committed when he paid off adult film actress Stormy Daniels to conceal an affair he had with her so it wouldn’t become public during his 2016 run for the White House.

The failed, one-term former president could also face felony charges in the state of Georgia for allegedly attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

 

Categories
GOP Justice Department U.S. Senate

Cory Booker Expertly Debunks Republican Lies About The DOJ At Wednesday Hearing: VIDEO

Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) used a Wednesday appearance by Attorney General Merrick Garland before the Senate Judiciary Committee to debunk one lie after another that Republicans are fond of using when it comes to the Justice Department.

It was a master class in debate and logic by Booker, who followed Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) in questioning AG Garland.

First up was the lie Republicans have been repeating all over Fox News that the DOJ had allowed the classification of the drug fentanyl to expire. All drugs are considered for classification from time to time, but the one for fentanyl doesn’t expire until 2024. Garland also confirmed that fentanyl will undoubtedly be classified as a dangerous drug when 2024 arrives.

Booker then moved on to the issue of policing:

“On policing. It took really important steps to ensure that the thought enforcement agencies are engaging in the best practices to make themselves and the public safer. Some of these policies the department has adopted in his making great progress on, including limitations on chokeholds, guidelines for no-knock warrants, which is extraordinarily dangerous for police officers themselves.

“And a cleaner standard for the use of deadly force. Even in the Trump EO included the need for us to have a database that is, I guess, called an accountability database, to serve as a repository for officer misconduct records within the next eight months. Now this past January. Trump’s executive order which was issued in June of 2020 also directed the attorney general to create such a database to collect this information.”

The New Jersey Democrat also mentioned that the Biden administration had worked with Congress on grant programs that fund efforts to help local cops with training and ways to help reduce police violence.

In less than 5 minutes time, Booker effectively swatted down the bullshit that flows from members of the GOP anytime they open their mouths about the Justice Department.