President Trump started his day on Twitter @ 7:30 a.m. eastern time on Tuesday. His first three tweets once again focused on the Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into whether or not President Trump’s campaign members including the President himself, colluded aka conspired against the United States with Russia to interfere with the 2016 Presidential Election.
@ 7:30
Twelve Minutes Later…
Twenty-Five Minutes Later…
According to Trump Twitter Archive the first time President Trump tweeted Witch Hunt, was over the investigation into whether or not Mike Flynn his national security adviser lied about his conversations with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, that was in January 2017, before President Trump was sworn in as the 45th President of the United States. Since January 2017, President Trump has tweeted about the “Witch Hunt,” 139 times. For what it’s worth Flynn plead guilty to lying to FBI investigators about his conversations with the Russian Ambassador on December 1st, 2017.
On Monday prosecutor for the Special Counsel’s office, Andrew Weissmann filed a three page joint status report in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia that alleges former campaign manager for President Trump, Paul Manafort, lied to both FBI investigators and the Special Counsel’s office, on a “variety of subjects,” breaching the terms of the plea arrangement Manafort entered into back in September 2018.
Weissmann explains that “the government,” in advance of sentencing will file “a detailed sentencing submission to,” both the Probation Department and the Court. According to Weissmann this submission will set forth, “the nature of the defendant’s crimes and lies, including those after signing the plea agreement.”
Manafort’s attorney, Kevin Downing disagreed with Weissman saying in the same court filing that, “Manafort has provided information to the government in an effort to live up to his cooperation obligations.”
Despite the conflict between Downing and Weismann, Downing agrees that “there is no reason to delay sentencing.”
As a reminder Manafort stood trial in Virginia where a jury found him guilty on eight counts of bank and tax fraud.
On Tuesday The Guardian reported that according to their sources, Paul Manafort and Julian Assagne, the founder of WikiLeaks, held secret talks “nside the Ecuadorian embassy in London, and visited around the time he joined Trump’s campaign.”
Assange who according to a U.S. court filing is said to be under “seal indicted,” though his crimes were not listed, and Manafort it’s alleged in the article, met three times, first in 2013, again in 2015 and in the spring of 2016.
The Guardian explains that according to an internal document that they reviewed that was “written by Ecuador’s Senain intelligence agency it lists, “Paul Manaford [sic]” as one of several well-known guests. It also mentions “Russians.”
In light of The Guardian article, Democrat Ranking Member of the Foreign Relations Committee, Senator Robert Menendez (NJ) issued a statement asking Ecuador’s current government to “publicly and swiftly confirm whether former Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa and his administration allowed these meetings to take place.”
A list of those that have entered guilty pleas via The New York Times as of September 2018:
- George Papadopoulos who was sentenced to fourteen days in prison for, “Lying to the F.B.I. about conversations with people he believed were working on behalf of Russians.” He was a foreign Trump camapign advisor. (Of note Papadopoulos reported to prison on Monday where he will serve 14 days.)
- Sam Patten a lobbyist with ties to former Trump campaign Paul Manafort plead guilty to failing to register as a foreign agent.
- Paul Manafort who was found guilty by a jury for finicial crimes entered into a plea deal with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Office instead of facing another trial.
- Michael Cohen the one-time lawyer and self proclaimed “Fixer” for President Trump entered a plea deal on campaign finance violations, and other financial crimes.
- Alex van der Zwaan who worked for both Paul Manafort and Rick Gates plead guilty and served thirty days in prison for lying to investigators.
- Rick Gates business partner of Paul Manafort, who also worked as the number two on the Trump Campaign. He testified against Manafort during his trial in Virigina. On Wednesday a judge granted the Special Counsels Office request to delay sentencing until January as Courthouse News reported the request came as Gates is said to still be needed for the continued investigation.
- Richard Pinedo has no ties to the Trump campaign. He plead guilty to selling stolen U.S. Identities to the Russian’s during the 2016 presidential election cycle.
- Michael Flynn who worked for both the campaign of President Trump and was National Security Adviser to President Trump. He plead guilty to lying to investigators about his conversations with the Russian Ambassador.
- Konstantin V. Kilimnik who has been charged with Obstruction of Justice was an associate of Paul Manafort.
- 13 Russian Nationalists and three companies they are connected to charged with, “Conspiracy to defraud the U.S., conspiracy to commit bank fraud, identity theft.”
- 12 Russian Intelligence Officers who have been indicted on, “Conspiracy to commit an offense against the United States, identity theft, conspiracy to launder money.”
Bonus Tweet:
President Trump on Monday held two MAGA rallies in support of Cindy Hyde-Smith as the News Blender reported Hyde-Smith faces Mike Espy (D) in a run-off election being held Tuesday in Mississippi.
Bonus Tweets
shortly after publication of this article, President Trump tweeted two more times. In his latest Tweets he took on General Motors.
As was reported @ the News Blender on Monday, General Motors announced a “transformation,” of how they will be manufacturing cars going forward. This transformation according to the company statement requires the plant closures of three U.S. based assembly plants and two U.S. based propulsion plants. It also requires the plant closure of a assembly plant in Canada and two unnamed plants outside of North America.
OPINION:
The President of the United States just threatened via Twitter a private company. It should be noted that while GM did in fact benefit from the bailout that started under President Bush and signed by President Obama, that does not entitle the President, whether he be a democrat or a republican the ability to abuse the power of the Presidency by threatening a company with being denied tax benefits that are legally allowed to benefit from…
We are after all still a Free Country. It means, while the decision to close their facilities is troubling not only for what it means to the global economy, but more important what it means to the employees of those plants that are closing, the decision is still GM’s to make, not a President, not an American Government. It is a private business, therefore, President Trump should mind his own damn business.
For an in depth look into the Russian investigation @ the News Blender.
3 Trackbacks / Pingbacks
Comments are closed.