Anonymous ID: a76332 Oct. 10, 2018, 8:41 p.m. No.3433955   🗄️.is đź”—kun   >>3982 >>4005 >>4012 >>4183 >>4256

Former Top F.B.I. Lawyer Says Rosenstein Was Serious About Taping Trump

 

ASHINGTON — The F.B.I.’s former top lawyer told congressional officials in private testimony last week that he had taken seriously a suggestion by the deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein, to secretly tape conversations with President Trump but viewed it as too risky and unlikely to deliver meaningful information.

 

F.B.I. officials dismissed the idea within days, according to James A. Baker, then the bureau’s general counsel, but his testimony shows that F.B.I. leaders played out its potential ramifications before rejecting it.

 

Mr. Baker’s account contradicts Mr. Rosenstein’s denial of a New York Times article last month that said he suggested recording the president and discussed recruiting cabinet members to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Mr. Trump from office. It also undermines an assertion provided by the Justice Department from a law enforcement official present on one of the occasions when Mr. Rosenstein broached the idea of taping Mr. Trump and said he was being sarcastic.

 

Mr. Baker said that he learned of Mr. Rosenstein’s suggestion of wearing a wire into the Oval Office not long after he made it, either from Andrew G. McCabe, the acting F.B.I. director at the time, or a senior bureau lawyer, Lisa Page. Legal concerns aside, Mr. Baker testified, the approach made little practical sense to him and he never conducted a formal legal analysis.

 

Mr. Baker said he was also aware that Mr. Rosenstein discussed invoking the 25th Amendment. Three congressional officials described Mr. Baker’s testimony, requesting anonymity to discuss the private interview. People familiar with Mr. Baker’s actions in the chaotic days after Mr. Trump abruptly fired James B. Comey as F.B.I. director in May 2017 also corroborated his account.

A lawyer for Mr. Baker declined to comment, as did a spokeswoman for Mr. McCabe, who was fired from the F.B.I. in March. Asked for comment, a Justice Department spokesman referred back to Mr. Rosenstein’s statement from September. Fox News and The Washington Post first reported details of Mr. Baker’s testimony.

 

The House Judiciary and Oversight Committees jointly conducted the closed-door interview with Mr. Baker. Republicans who control the committees are investigating senior law enforcement officials’ handling of the F.B.I.’s investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email practices and the early stages of the inquiry into Mr. Trump’s campaign and Russia.

Mr. Comey’s firing in the spring of last year thrust the administration into turmoil. Senior law enforcement officials were confronting the prospect that they would have to investigate the president for possible obstruction of justice because of his dismissal of Mr. Comey, who was overseeing the Russia inquiry. On the job just two weeks, Mr. Rosenstein played his own part in Mr. Comey’s firing, writing a memo critical of his handling of the Clinton email investigation that the president used to justify the dismissal.

 

An atmosphere of mistrust had quickly taken hold at the top levels of law enforcement: Mr. McCabe believed that Mr. Rosenstein should recuse himself from any investigation into Mr. Comey’s firing because of his role in it, according to people familiar with Mr. McCabe’s thinking.

 

The House Republicans, cognizant that Democrats are favored to take control of the chamber after next month’s midterm elections, have lined up interviews in the coming weeks for their inquiry and are negotiating with other potential witnesses.

 

They include George Papadopoulos, a former Trump campaign adviser convicted of lying to the F.B.I. about his contacts with Russians; Glenn R. Simpson, the founder of the research firm Fusion GPS, which assembled a salacious, unverified dossier about the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia; and Nellie Ohr, the wife of a senior Justice Department official who did contract work for Fusion GPS and has been targeted by Republicans. They are also trying to secure an interview with Mr. Comey and are willing to subpoena him if necessary.

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/former-top-fbi-lawyer-says-rosenstein-was-serious-about-taping-trump/ar-BBOd8bE?ocid=spartanntp

Anonymous ID: a76332 Oct. 10, 2018, 8:51 p.m. No.3434081   🗄️.is đź”—kun

>>3433623

AMEN BROTHER.

never gotten more satisfaction and sense of worth out of next to no sleep and getting the verbal shit kickers ran all over us by every cia jewnigger from here to taiwan.

And we ain't even there yet.

What an amazing time INDEED.