As I posted here last week, Michael Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about conversations he had with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the presidential transition last December. Flynn is the fourth Trump associate to be charged in Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. As I also posted, Flynn promised “full cooperation” with Mueller’s investigation and was prepared to testify that Trump directed him to make contact with the Russians.
That second part was almost correct. Turns out, Brian Ross at ABC got it wrong:
.@ABC News statement on Michael Flynn report: https://t.co/sd9TeFiiLQ pic.twitter.com/UtHFHeuwcM
— ABC News (@ABC) December 2, 2017
Now, the only thing that Ross got wrong was the part that Flynn will testify that Trump directed him to make contact with the Russians. It doesn’t mean that Trump DIDN’T do that — just that the anonymous source is not good enough to confirm.
Trump seized on it, of course:
Congratulations to @ABC News for suspending Brian Ross for his horrendously inaccurate and dishonest report on the Russia, Russia, Russia Witch Hunt. More Networks and “papers” should do the same with their Fake News!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2017
Nnnnnno. It doesn’t make the Russia thing a “witch hunt”. Flynn DID plead guilty, after all.
But the other big news from the weekend was this tweet from Trump:
I had to fire General Flynn because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI. He has pled guilty to those lies. It is a shame because his actions during the transition were lawful. There was nothing to hide!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 2, 2017
Why was this significant? Because this was the first time that Trump has said that he knew Flynn lied to the FBI. Up until now, the White House position was that Flynn lied to Pence… period! The timeline here is critical:
- Flynn lied to the FBI on January 24 2017
- Acting Attorney General Sally Yates tells White House (through WH lawyer Don McGahn) that Flynn lied and may be subject to blackmail on January 26 2017
- Trump has lunch with FBI Director Comey — “I need loyalty” Trump says — on January 27 2017
- Photo of Trump with Flynn and others in Oval Office on January 29 2017
- Sally Yates fired on January 30 2017
Flynn isn’t fired until February 13 for lying to Pence (what we’re told at the time) and the next day, in another unusual Trump-Comey meeting alone in the Oval, Trump says to Comey that he hope he’ll “let Flynn go”.
The fact that Trump knew that Flynn lied to the FBI indicates that his subsequent actions could be characterized as “obstruction of justice”. Therefore, Trump’s tweet that he knew Flynn lied to the FBI is a HUGE and damning admission…. which Trump made AGAIN Saturday evening at 9:06 pm
So General Flynn lies to the FBI and his life is destroyed, while Crooked Hillary Clinton, on that now famous FBI holiday “interrogation” with no swearing in and no recording, lies many times…and nothing happens to her? Rigged system, or just a double standard?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2017
Meanwhile, the lawyers were doing damage control. This happened:
President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, John Dowd, told CNN on Sunday that he wrote a tweet for the @realDonaldTrump Twitter account about the firing of former White House national security adviser Michael Flynn.
“I had to fire General Flynn because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI,” the Saturday tweet reads. “He has pled guilty to those lies. It is a shame because his actions during the transition were lawful. There was nothing to hide!”
Dowd said he drafted the tweet and believes White House social media director Dan Scavino posted it online. He declined to answer additional questions about whether Trump reviewed the tweet before it was posted.
“Enough already,” he said in an email. “I don’t feed the haters.”
The Washington Post reported Saturday that Dowd drafted the tweet, citing two people familiar with the Twitter message. NBC News’ Chuck Todd also reported Sunday on “Meet the Press” that Dowd confirmed he authored the message.
Does Dowd have proof?
The president’s lawyer claims he drafted the president’s tweet, and then sent it to White House social media director to publish as the president.
When asked for the original email he sent to aide, the president’s lawyer claimed he dictated it orally. https://t.co/FA9Pu1UmoY
— NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt (@NBCNightlyNews) December 4, 2017
Although the mainstream media seems to accept Dowd’s assertion as true, I am not so sure. A criminal defense attorney tweeting on behalf of a client? I doubt that. And if he did this tweet, he should have been fired.
In any event, Dowd needs to repeat his assertion (that he authored the tweet) under oath, and Scavino needs to own up to it (under oath) as well. No, it is not attorney-client privileged.
But according to The Washington Post, Dowd is also saying that “Trump knew generally that Flynn’s account to the FBI and Pence (his claim to have never spoken with then-Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak about sanctions) were similar…”
Pardon me if I don’t see how this latest revelation helps Dowd’s client. Even with this new explanation, we are left with the impression that Trump assumed Flynn had committed a felony. That didn’t stop Trump from pressuring then-FBI director James Comey to go easy on him—or from firing Comey when he didn’t.
So Dowd’s saving tweet doesn’t change the ballgame, because legally, the distinction that Trump believed something as opposed to knowing it might not quell the allegations that he obstructed justice.
And now, this morning, we get this odd legal theory from Dowd, in an interview in Axios:
John Dowd, President Trump’s outside lawyer, outlined to me a new and highly controversial defense/theory in the Russia probe: A president cannot be guilty of obstruction of justice.
The “President cannot obstruct justice because he is the chief law enforcement officer under [the Constitution’s Article II] and has every right to express his view of any case,” Dowd claims.
Dowd says he drafted this weekend’s Trump tweet that many thought strengthened the case for obstruction: The tweet suggested Trump knew Flynn had lied to the FBI when he was fired, raising new questions about the later firing of FBI Director James Comey.
Dowd: “The tweet did not admit obstruction. That is an ignorant and arrogant assertion.”
Ooookay. The ever-increasingly bonkers Alan Dershowitz has been saying the same thing.
Let’s post this from the Brookings Institute (see pp 76-76)
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Open in new tab BREAKING — Well, this seems to settle it:
The White House’s chief lawyer told President Donald Trump in January he believed then-national security adviser Michael Flynn had misled the FBI and lied to Vice President Mike Pence and should be fired, a source familiar with the matter said Monday.
The description of the conversation raises new questions about what Trump knew about Flynn’s situation when he urged then-FBI Director James Comey to drop the investigation into Flynn and whether anyone in the White House, including the President himself, attempted to obstruct justice. Special counsel Robert Mueller is investigating whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russians, a probe led by Comey until Trump fired him.
White House counsel Donald McGahn told Trump that based on his conversation with then-acting Attorney General Sally Yates, he believed Flynn had not told the truth in his interview with the FBI or to Pence, the source said. McGahn did not tell the President that Flynn had violated the law in his FBI interview or was under criminal investigation, the source said.
Emphasis mine.
The more we learn, the more likely it seems that the incriminating tweet Trump sent out on Saturday was accurate, regardless of who wrote it. If Trump knew Flynn lied to the FBI, refused to fire Flynn until later when the news media found out, asked Comey to back off Flynn, then fired Comey after that failed, then the stunning admission in the tweet is true, regardless of who wrote it.