4061

Given how many people associated with his campaign had contact with the Russians, I would say it was systemic.

Given that the contact continued all through the Spring and summer, through the election and up til inauguration, I would say it was sustained.

Given that they have lied at every turn about those contacts, only admitting to them after evidence comes to light, I would say it was furtive.

Your move Kelly Anne.

4062

Making plans to meet up & have sex with a 12-yr-old girl in a hotel room, then bringing condoms and a teddy bear to the meet up but finding out the girl is actually Chris Hansen is STILL a crime. I’m not sure why Trump Jr. isn’t taking a seat over there.

4063

… and, to repeat for the ten thousandth time, it’s still a crime even if you don’t know it is. Ignorance of the law does not make you not guilty.

4064

Look, tbf, I had real trouble with that when I was 10.

4065

Well, hopefully Chris Hansen wasn’t too hard on you, Adam.

4066

Poor choice of words.

4067

…not if he got to keep the teddy.

4068

Ken White (Mr. Popehat to you and I) the author of that tweetstorm was an Assistant US Attorney in California. He knows whereof he speaks.

4069

Why has the truth emerged now? A careful parsing of the events of the last few days points to the importance of the federal criminal investigation overseen by a stalwart special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III. His behind-the-scenes work already has changed the rules of the game for the White House and contributed to a more accurate public accounting.

The New York Times, which broke the story, reports that it was Kushner’s legal team that recently discovered the now-infamous email chain in which Trump Jr. was told that a senior Russian government official had documents that “would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father,” to which Trump Jr. quickly replied, “If it’s what you say I love it.”

And here is where Mueller’s investigation has rewritten the rule book for senior White House officials. To receive a security clearance, Kushner had to complete a form — the SF-86 — detailing, under penalty of perjury, every contact he had with foreign government officials in the last seven years. (I dealt with SF-86s as a deputy assistant attorney general at the Department of Justice.)

Prosecutions for lying on an SF-86 are rare, but they happen, and Kushner already has one strike against him: He first signed and submitted his SF-86 without listing more than 100 applicable contacts with foreign leaders or officials. His lawyer said the questionnaire was submitted prematurely; it took two tries to fully supplement it. The Trump Jr. emails reportedly surfaced when Kushner was going through his records as part of that process.

In a pre-Mueller world, Kushner might have approached the matter casually and, if anyone asked, pleaded ignorance and a busy schedule. That approach, however, is no longer feasible. In the midst of a wide-ranging criminal investigation, with multiple targets, the threat of a perjury prosecution is the sort of offense zealous and sophisticated federal prosecutors — and there is no doubt that Mueller’s team fits that description — could bring to bear.

4070

An article in Salon makes the point well: that every excuse and reply from the WH makes their actions even worse than it would be on its own:

4071

Preemptive pardon?

4072

It’s been done. A pardon can be issued for a crime that was already committed, even if there aren’t charges (see Gerald Ford’s pardon of Nixon). Wouldn’t surprise me at all. The title is misleading, btw. Heck pointed it out as a possibility, there was no suggestion it happened.

4073

So, why is it allowed for the campaign to be paying the legal bills of a businessman who holds no government position and is not an employee of the campaign? Typical of the way they run the Foundation, just as a slush fund for any family needs.
https://twitter.com/lachlan/status/886286641215795200

4074

WSJ is fake news?

4075

Can it be done secretly? I’d have thought a pardon would have to be on the record.

4076

That’s what Heck said in the article, wherein he hoped someone in the media would ask the president if he had done so.

4077

He asserted it, but I didn’t see any evidence. What use is a pardon if law enforcement or the courts don’t know about it?

4078

I presume it would be made public at that time? Then again, the only reason he’d do that is if he thought he wouldn’t be in office later, which doesn’t seem like Trump.

4079

So Jay Sekulow today is using the defense of “Why didn’t the Secret Service stop the meeting if it was wrong?”, but the only person who had a Secret Service detail at that point was Sr. So the question now is whether Trump was in the meeting as well. Wouldn’t have been the SS detail’s job to stop the meeting anyways, but I wonder if Sekulow slipped.

4080

Trump is willing to go to war with anyone and everyone, apparently. I can’t imagine the Secret Service loves being thrown under the bus on this one. I’m pretty sure they are not responsible for managing the legal/political ramifications of meetings their charges attend.