Mega-Thread: Mueller investigation

[Skroe]

Er, Trump leaves office a billionaire and enjoys the rest of his life?

If he somehow leaves office at the end of his term, Individual-1 will be swooped down on by the Southern District of New York if nothing else.

Remember: he is an unidicted co-conspirator for the crime Michael Cohen is going to jail for.

And also he probably isn't a real billionaire either. He says he's worth $10 billion, which is a lie. Forbes had him in the $3.something billion range. Another reading of his wealth had him in the mid hundreds-of-millions. It depends, as always how you define 'wealth'.

[Stormspellz]

If he somehow leaves office at the end of his term, Individual-1 will be swooped down on by the Southern District of New York if nothing else.

Remember: he is an unidicted co-conspirator for the crime Michael Cohen is going to jail for.

And also he probably isn't a real billionaire either. He says he's worth $10 billion, which is a lie. Forbes had him in the $3.something billion range. Another reading of his wealth had him in the mid hundreds-of-millions. It depends, as always how you define 'wealth'.

a good portion of his "wealth" was the value of his brand, which like the man is bankrupt

[Xeones]

So at first I thought Trump went out of his way to look for criminals. But after the pedophile stuff with his labor secretary all over the news I'm thinking maybe only criminals are willing to work for Trump instead.

[mvaliz]

I'm going to make an edit here because when I wrote this, I misunderstood how Mueller sees his role (as investigative, not Prosecutorial). As we've seen since I wrote this especially, Mueller has been outsourcing prosecutions largely to standing parts of the DoJ, rather than doing it in house. This protects them from Trump, but it also means that, once the Mueller report is in, Trump can't fire Mueller because Mueller will be off the case and back in retirement anyway.

I also realized a few days ago it also means something else; when the report drops - it drops into the hands of ALL the prosecutors... meaning Dumbass Donnie Deplorable Dump can't fire them all if he goes on a ragebender.

- - - Updated - - -

Er, Trump leaves office a billionaire and enjoys the rest of his life?

1) What Skroe said

2) LOL@"billionare"... it's debatable if this guy is barely a Millionare at this point.

[Benggaul]

Er, Trump leaves office a billionaire and enjoys the rest of his life?

Given the slew of lawsuits waiting for him once he leaves the protection of office--from NYSD and the others out there from various other avenues--he's much more likely to die under a pile of paperwork than money. IF he doesn't end up in prison, which at this point is still a very real possibility.

[Dontrike]

Er, Trump leaves office a billionaire and enjoys the rest of his life?

It's easily possible Trump has about as much money as I do, and that isn't much.

[Ripster42]

So mueller was supposed to file a sentencing memo in manafort's second case last night. This is the case with witness tampering and foreign lobbying crimes, not the rather more simple bank fraud. Still has not been made public. I can't believe the entire thing would be redacted, but something is going on.

[Benggaul]

So mueller was supposed to file a sentencing memo in manafort's second case last night. This is the case with witness tampering and foreign lobbying crimes, not the rather more simple bank fraud. Still has not been made public. I can't believe the entire thing would be redacted, but something is going on.

I was wondering about this myself since the previous sentencing memos were made public pretty quickly afterwards. I'm sure there are a number of explanations for why it isn't now (it's the weekend, the shutdown put everything behind, etc. etc.) but who knows? More "wait and see".

[PosPosPos]

Which is what has happened, and Donald Trump's approval rating has fallen yet again. Thanks shutdown!

Sorry to disappoint, but you put too much stock in Trump supporters keeping grudges against their Fuhrer.

Didn't take long, but they have already pretty much forgotten how Trump fucked them over.

[Stormspark]

It's easily possible Trump has about as much money as I do, and that isn't much.

I don't think he has anything at all. I think he's negative, and depends on Russian money to survive at all.

[Ripster42]

I was wondering about this myself since the previous sentencing memos were made public pretty quickly afterwards. I'm sure there are a number of explanations for why it isn't now (it's the weekend, the shutdown put everything behind, etc. etc.) but who knows? More "wait and see".

There's kinda a saying about mueller. "Mueller drops bombs on fridays." It's not the weekend, or the shutdown (mueller's group didn't stop working). It likely has to do with all the redactions in the filing, which have to be approved by the judge. Unless the entire thing is under seal (which, would be crazy), we should see them when jackson finishes her review, but large amounts of redactions bodes very poorly for trump's cohort, as it means they still have to protect sources/investigatory techniques from trump's cohort.

[Dontrike]

Sorry to disappoint, but you put too much stock in Trump supporters keeping grudges against their Fuhrer.

Didn't take long, but they have already pretty much forgotten how Trump fucked them over.

And somehow went higher than his usual, as to why, I don't know.

[Deja Thoris]

This is almost like that god botherer who predicts the rapeture happening every few years. And is wrong.

rapeture?

Wow, thats an awesome spelling mistake.

[PosPosPos]

And somehow went higher than his usual, as to why, I don't know.

It's rose-tinted glasses, they look back on the experience and found it character-building. Maybe.

Possibly with a tinge of Stockholm Syndrome too, empathize with the guy who held their salaries ransom.

[Jakexe]

But what did I supposedly lie about? All I did was discuss a CNN article and say exactly what was reported. Seems the only liar here is you.

Says the banned POS.

[cubby]

It is not surprising the new AG is shutting this down. I am curious how much gets released if anything from the report but I suspect if they try to bury it the house dems wind up subpeoning a lot of people and a good deal of the info is going to get out one way or the other. Also if we wind up with a dem president in a couple years they could just release the whole report easy enough.

The only current saving grace for this country right now is the Dem controlled House. Pelosi and her Committee Chair's have sweeping subpoena authority, regardless of classification or judicial seal. Because of this if the Mueller Report isn't released to the public in a timely fashion, the House will subpoena it in it's entirety. If the DoJ refuses, the House can subpoena it directly from Mueller. And Mueller will comply, because he is above all else a man who follows the rules.

The report will be released to the public.

The fun part will be the timing of it. When it's eventually released (and we should start ignoring "rumors" of imminent release - they seem to be disinformation campaigns by the Trump administration) we'll have a lot of things to discuss and decide. And the 2020 campaign is figuratively right around the corner. And Trump is not allowing any GOP member to attempt to primary him. So barring an early resignation, Trump will be the GOP nominee.

- - - Updated - - -

AP has an amazing summary of the Trump/Russia collusion to date and more importantly how far back it began. Taken from court filings and other unimpeachable sources. Way too long to post.

Full Story.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Donald Trump was in full deflection mode.

The Democrats had blamed Russia for the hacking and release of damaging material on his presidential opponent, Hillary Clinton. Trump wasn’t buying it. But on July 27, 2016, midway through a news conference in Florida, Trump decided to entertain the thought for a moment.

“Russia, if you’re listening,” said Trump, looking directly into a television camera, “I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing” — messages Clinton was reported to have deleted from her private email server.

Actually, Russia was doing more than listening: It had been trying to help Republican Trump for months. That very day, hackers working with Russia’s military intelligence tried to break into email accounts associated with Clinton’s personal office.

It was just one small part of a sophisticated election interference operation carried out by the Kremlin — and meticulously chronicled by special counsel Robert Mueller.

We know this, though Mueller has made not a single public comment since his appointment in May 2017. We know this, though the full, final report on the investigation, believed to be in its final stages, may never be made public. It’s up to Attorney General William Barr.

We know this because Mueller has spoken loudly, if indirectly, in court — indictment by indictment, guilty plea by guilty plea. In doing so, he tracked an elaborate Russian operation that injected chaos into a U.S. presidential election and tried to help Trump win the White House. He followed a GOP campaign that embraced the Kremlin’s help and championed stolen material to hurt a political foe. And ultimately, he revealed layers of lies, deception, self-enrichment and hubris that followed.

[Breccia]

Redacted sentencing memo for Manafort.

Well let's just take a quick look --

Based on his relevant sentencing conduct, Manafort presents many aggravating sentencing factors and no warranted mitigating factors.

Wow. Second fucking paragraph. I think I can stop here.

[Bullettime]

Rohrabacher being mentioned in the sentencing is super juicy.

[Breccia]

Rohrabacher being mentioned in the sentencing is super juicy.

It is. For those who don't remember, Manafort met with Rohrabacher and, according to Manafort, did not disclose he worked for Russia -- sorry, Putin-backed pro-Russian members of the pro-Russian government figures in Ukraine. Manafort would later give substantial donations to Rohrabacher's campaign, and Rohrabacher, when it was discovered that these donations came from Russia -- sorry, Putin-backed pro-Russian members of the pro-Russian government figures in Ukraine -- gave the donations to charity.

You might also remember Rohrabacher from such lines as "There’s not a person in this town who would not take a meeting to get material like that" to defend the Trump Tower meeting, and "She was at the other end of table of 30 people and now they say I ‘dined’ with her" when discussing the dinner he had with Butina.

For more information on Dana Rohrabacher, consult this WaPo article titled "A not-so-fond farewell to Dana Rohrabacher, Putin’s best friend in Congress". There's a picture of him with Steven Seagal. The article is dated Nov 2018, so, you can guess how his re-election went.

[Bullettime]

It is. For those who don't remember, Manafort met with Rohrabacher and, according to Manafort, did not disclose he worked for Russia -- sorry, Putin-backed pro-Russian members of the pro-Russian government figures in Ukraine. Manafort would later give substantial donations to Rohrabacher's campaign, and Rohrabacher, when it was discovered that these donations came from Russia -- sorry, Putin-backed pro-Russian members of the pro-Russian government figures in Ukraine -- gave the donations to charity.

You might also remember Rohrabacher from such lines as "There’s not a person in this town who would not take a meeting to get material like that" to defend the Trump Tower meeting, and "She was at the other end of table of 30 people and now they say I ‘dined’ with her" when discussing the dinner he had with Butina.

For more information on Dana Rohrabacher, consult this WaPo article titled "A not-so-fond farewell to Dana Rohrabacher, Putin’s best friend in Congress". There's a picture of him with Steven Seagal. The article is dated Nov 2018, so, you can guess how his re-election went.

Rohrabacher's name was likely meant to be redacted given it was redacted elsewhere in the document. His name would be the fit in another mention in the sentencing.

In addition, with the assistance of __________ Manafort personally lobbied in the United States. He drafted and edited numerous ghostwritten op-eds for publication in United States newspapers. He also personally met with a member of congress who was on a a subcommittee that had Ukraine within its purview in March 2013 in Washington,D.C. 46

46 March 19, 2013, "Dinner/Manafort, __________ / reservation under __________ Capitol Hill Club

Rohrabacher is the redacted name there and we know that because Gates was accused by the special counsel of lying about a meeting on that date between Rohrabacher and representative Vin Veber and Paul Manafort at the Rehlberg Capitol Hill Club.

So we're at the point where, based on court filings, the GOP is now linked to the operation. GOP names are trickling out.

- - - Updated - - -

Another note of importance from another report I saw from back in June given the Hapsburg group was brought up again.

A new filing from the special counsel Robert Mueller unsealed on Wednesday identifies two former journalists and the content of messages former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and a Russian associate sent them in February, just two days after a superseding indictment against Manafort.

The 21-page document also names members of the so-called “Hapsburg group” – described by Mueller in the February superseding indictment of Manafort as "a group of former senior European politicians to take positions favorable to Ukraine, including by lobbying in the United States.”

According to the document, some of the key participants of the Hapsburg group are former Austrian Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer, former Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, Belgian Judge Jean-Paul Moerman, head of the German Federal Chancellory Bodo Hombach and former Spanish NATO head Javier Solana.

The exhibit containing the names of Alan Friedman, Eckart Sager, Konstantin Kliminck, and Hapsburg group members, was filed by the clerk in an unredacted form on Wednesday afternoon but was re-filed a short time later in a redacted form with those names hidden.

How this is relevant is the pieces are starting to come together and unveil that this was actually a true bona fide conspiracy that is trailing straight back to Russia.