Michael Cohen just hurt Trump's FBI narrative

President Trump's lawyer, Michael Cohen, just hurt his client's narrative that the ongoing special counsel investigation of Trump's 2016 presidential campaign is a…

WITCH HUNT!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 23, 2018

The BBC's Paul Wood reported today that Cohen arranged a June 2017 meeting between Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and Trump at the White House. And Wood's reporting suggests that the Poroshenko-Trump meeting was arranged after Cohen was paid between $400,000 and $600,000 by Ukrainian intermediaries linked to Poroshenko.

Cohen was not, as would be required by federal law, listed as a foreign agent for Ukraine.

Wood points out that there is no evidence Trump was aware of the payments. But Cohen's conduct here may lead to serious criminal charges for the lawyer who is already under federal investigation.

Even if Trump has done nothing wrong himself, this incident lends credibility to the argument that the president's affairs and those around him at least deserve the scrutiny they are now receiving. If nothing else, it strongly suggests that Trump's argument of a "witch hunt" isn't exactly the whole story here.

If Cohen is charged in relation to this meeting, it raises the question as to whether he will cooperate with federal investigators in return for a lighter sentence. And if he does, how will that affect Trump in terms of what the president has said he knew about payments to Stormy Daniels? What will it mean for other considerations of the president's business affairs as known to Cohen?

One final point from Wood's story. The highly respected BBC journalist (Wood is no hack or biased reporter) also notes that Ukraine's anti-corruption investigation into former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort came to an end shortly after Trump met with Poroshenko. You can bet that special counsel Robert Mueller will look into whether that was just a coincidence.

https:// www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/michael-cohen-just-hurt-trumps-fbi-narrative

Devin Nunes shuts down Dem on FBI informant briefing attendance: 'I’m not going to play that game'

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., shut down a Democratic member of his panel on the House floor Wednesday when asked if Democrats could attend a planned briefing Thursday with Republicans on an FBI informant that made contact with members of President Trump's campaign.

“I’m not going to play that game," Nunes responded to Rep. Joaquin Castro, according to the Texas Democrat speaking to CNN.

The White House announced Tuesday that it only planned to brief two Republican lawmakers because only they have been asking the Justice Department to see documents related to how the special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation began.

Castro wasn't the only Democrat who has spoken out about members of his party attending the meeting.

“This meeting is completely improper in its proposed form and would set a damaging precedent for your institutions and the rule of law,” wrote Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to the the Justice Department and FBI on Thursday.

Like Schumer and Pelosi, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, D-Calif., demanded that the meeting be opened up to the so-called Gang of Eight, which is comprised of the top four bipartisan leaders of the House and Senate as well as the chair and ranking members of both the House and Senate Intelligence panels.

https:// www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/devin-nunes-shuts-down-dem-on-fbi-informant-briefing-attendance-im-not-going-to-play-that-game

Jim Mattis: US not ratcheting up China tensions with RIMPAC decision

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. - The decision to disinvite China from a massive multinational naval exercise in the Pacific is an acknowledgment of its destabilizing activity in the South China Sea, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said Wednesday.

The Pentagon announced the move earlier in the day citing evidence that Beijing has moved anti-ship missiles, surface-to-air missile systems, and electronic jammers into the Spratly Islands. A spokesman said Wednesday the Chinese navy is no longer welcome this year at the biennial Rim of the Pacific exercise, which is billed as the largest maritime exercise in the world. 27 nations are slated to take part in the exercise.

Mattis denied the disinvite will escalate tensions with China but said it must be confronted over the activity. Beijing has been creating artificial islands in the South China Sea for years that the U.S. and allies worry could be used to project military force and dominate busy international sea lanes.

“We are not ratcheting up anything. In fact, we believe firmly in a stable Pacific,” Mattis told the Washington Examiner, which is traveling with him in Colorado. “What we are doing is we are cooperating with China wherever we can, and we are going to have to also confront them when we believe that the rule of law or that matters that can destabilize the region are being pursued.”

China has claimed the artificial islands are for benign purposes, including bases for search and rescue operations and fisheries protection, but the placement of the weapons is “only for military use,” according to the statement today by Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Christopher Logan.

“Our military operations are transparent out there, but so long as China continues to militarize features in the South China Sea and what is traditionally, historically international waters and militarizing them with weapons that just a few years ago they said they would not be putting there, then we have to acknowledge that reality,” Mattis said.

https:// www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/defense-national-security/jim-mattis-us-not-ratcheting-up-china-tensions-with-rimpac-decision

>>1521696

Any possibility they make an example out of him, that's the direction, I was headed. Just like the Manafort situation.