Stormy seas ahead for Trump's Lawyer

[SilverFang01]

Trump attorney Cohen is being investigated for possible bank fraud, campaign finance violations

Cohen Search Warrants Sought Info On Hush Money Pay-Offs, Taxi Medallions

What To Make Of The FBI’s ‘Extraordinary’ Raid Of Michael Cohen

[Labster]

So President Trump, sitting in a room full of his generals and admirals, gave a press conference calling the FBI disgraceful several times, attacking the Attorney General for recusing himself, and accusing Hillary Clinton for her 30000 missing emails.  The message is pretty clear -- don't trust the police, only trust the military.

Was that the message he was trying to send?  Possibly, but it's more likely that he was just so incensed about it that he turned a discussion about chemical warfare against civilians in Syria into a discussion about how disgraceful a legally executed warrant is.  (Dear Paul Ryan: "He's still learning" is no longer an excuse 15 months into the job.)

In related news, we finally found Donald Trump's Roy Cohn -- the only problem is that Michael Avenatti is working for Stormy Daniels instead.

Every time I hear about a relationship between Stormy and Trump, I keep thinking about the Ami/Mako fan manga, A Stormy Relationship by Shadowjack.  I assume it's just me.

[hazard]

Looks like the Stormy Daniels civil case might get stalled while the criminal case is handled, as that takes precedence.

[Labster]

One of the subtleties here is that Mueller (possibly at the insistence of Rosenstein, possibly not) referred the case to the federal prosecutor for the Southern District of New York.  Mueller's mandate is the Russia election investigation, after all.  The upshot of this is:

• If Trump fires the entire Special Counsel's office, it doesn't affect the other case
  
• Because the issue is related to Trump's campaign, Jeff Sessions is still recused from this investigation
  
• There are now three active investigations, if you include cooperation with the New York State government.
  

As for the civil case?  Well, if the FBI is getting involved enough to pierce attorney-client privilege, there's going to be a pot of cash at the end of that rainbow, even if it takes a couple years longer.

[robkelk]

Have they pierced attorney-client privilege, though? There are plenty of relevant documents that the police could remove with a warrant from a lawyer's office that don't fall under that privilege.

[Jinx999]

Have they pierced attorney-client privilege, though? There are plenty of relevant documents that the police could remove with a warrant from a lawyer's office that don't fall under that privilege.

A legal blog has commented on this. Basically, raiding a lawyers office is a big thing, and they wouldn't have done it, especially in such a high profile case, unless they had a very strong case (or were complete morons).

https://www.popehat.com/2018/04/09/the-s...mediately/

[Bob Schroeck]

And it requires so many hoops to be jumped through, and so many higher-ups to sign off on it, that they practically have to have complete proof of guilt already before it'll approved. That's the big takeaway from this, according to the opinion pieces from legal experts that I've read -- this wasn't a fishing expedition, this was reeling in something already on the line.

[Rajvik]

honestly my take on this is that they are fishing, Mueller is looking so hard for something, ANYTHING that he can throw at Trump and is coming up with nothing that he decided to either piss Trump off enough that Trump fires him or try and get him in a nickle an dime perjury trap

[robkelk]

Nobody gets a warrant to raid a lawyer's office just to go fishing - especially not the President's lawyer's office. (Mainly because if a judge gives that warrant to the fisher and the fisher finds nothing, both the fisher's and the judge's careers are toast.)

No, they had to already know that they would find evidence of what they wanted to prove before even asking for that warrant.

[hazard]

To add to Rob's point; raiding anyone's private records without a good reason is risky enough already, if the warrant was wrongly granted it can cause every scrap of evidence gathered due to the warrant to be removed from the case.

The judiciary does not appreciate shenanigans intruding on the privacy of the average citizen, and intruding on confidential matters like attorney-client privilege, doctor-patient confidentiality and religious confessions spoken to a priest in trust are not done lightly. Doing so with someone with influence and connections is more dangerous still. Doing it with the guy in charge of the executive branch of the government or his immediate supporting staff? Career suicide at best if you are wrong. That the FBI raided three different locations only tells us that they are certain Cohen had access to and/or kept the records somewhere, but that they did not necessarily know where.

[robkelk]

Reuters: Trump believes he can fire Mueller, White House says

[SilverFang01]

That only happens if he can withstand the political fallout, which considering how deferential the GOP Congress has been to him is a possibility.

[Bob Schroeck]

There are a lot of GOP congresspeople telling him not to try it, because it'll be a disaster for him and the party. It'll be the Saturday Night Massacre all over again and a tacit admission of guilt. After all, as so many on that side of the aisle are fond of saying in different circumstances, if he's got nothing to hide why is he so worked up? And no matter what comes of it, the GOP's reputation as the party of "law and order" is destroyed; it's just the degree of destruction that's uncertain. After all, it's hard not to read this, no matter the spin, as "the FBI has no right to investigate rich white folks for any kind of crime; they're supposed to go after Democrats and poor non-white folks."

And as I understand it, the way Mueller's appointment was set up, only Rosenstein can actually fire him. Trump can try to shut him down by fiat, but Mueller can actually ignore it and then it'll go to the courts. And the judiciary doesn't relish getting in the middle of that potential mess. Trump can also try to fire everyone between himself and Mueller, and then appoint people who'll jump when he says to, but that'll still be too long for Trump's delicate sensibilities.

On top of that, according to CBS radio news this morning, there's a bipartisan bill just submitted in Congress to protect Mueller from Trump. I've been looking for a news story online about that and can't find one, though, so I'm wondering what's actually going on.

Edit: Found one.

[Dartz]

That only happens if he can withstand the political fallout, which considering how deferential the GOP Congress has been to him is a possibility.

Political fallout only matters when you care about political fallout.

[robkelk]

That only happens if he can withstand the political fallout, which considering how deferential the GOP Congress has been to him is a possibility.

Political fallout only matters when you care about political fallout.

I suspect the Republican senators and house members up for re-election this year care a great deal about political fallout.

[hazard]

If Trump fires Mueller the only thing that will save the GOP from at best becoming the minority party for the next 2 or 3 decades (if it doesn't shatter) is if the House promptly impeaches Trump for it.

Also, Bob?

I'm not sure if the Republican party wants the FBI to not investigate rich white folk/men, or if they want the FBI to investigate everyone else. Including rich non-white people and poor white people.

An interesting question though would be how many Republican Senators that are intending to retire are supporting the bill, and how many that intend to run for reelection are.

[Dartz]

You're assuming they're beholden to the people.

Or that the majority of their base aren't suckling on the fox-news tit, divorced from the reality of the universe. The President must defend himself against biased investigators undermining the republican presidency, after all.

[Labster]

honestly my take on this is that they are fishing, Mueller is looking so hard for something, ANYTHING that he can throw at Trump and is coming up with nothing that he decided to either piss Trump off enough that Trump fires him or try and get him in a nickle an dime perjury trap

Wait what really?  So Robert Mueller, a registered Republican who George W. Bush appointed to lead the FBI after the 9/11 attacks, is working so hard to throw anything at Trump that he got other people to agree to do this?  Those other people are Geoffrey Berman, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, who was appointed to lead by Jeff Sessions and is a former partner at Rudy Guiliani's law firm.  And the warrant had to be approved by Rod Rosenstein, another Republican and Trump appointee.  And finally, a federal judge had to decide that it was not a fishing expedition, and the standard had been met to investigate the President's personal lawyer.

I guess under your theory Republicans really really hate Trump.  Perhaps you should consider voting Democratic in the next election, so Trump gets a fairer deal.

[SilverFang01]

Trump’s allies worry that federal investigators may have seized recordings made by his attorney

“We heard he had some proclivity to make tapes,” said one Trump adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation. “Now we are wondering, who did he tape? Did he store those someplace where they were actually seized? . . . Did they find his recordings?”

[robkelk]

Trump’s allies worry that federal investigators may have seized recordings made by his attorney

“We heard he had some proclivity to make tapes,” said one Trump adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation. “Now we are wondering, who did he tape? Did he store those someplace where they were actually seized? . . . Did they find his recordings?”

And here I was wondering how closely this would match the last time a Republican President faced the possibility of impeachment. All we need now is a missing 18½ minutes of tape.

[Bob Schroeck]

Wait what really?  So Robert Mueller, a registered Republican who George W. Bush appointed to lead the FBI after the 9/11 attacks, is working so hard to throw anything at Trump that he got other people to agree to do this?  Those other people are Geoffrey Berman, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, who was appointed to lead by Jeff Sessions and is a former partner at Rudy Guiliani's law firm.  And the warrant had to be approved by Rod Rosenstein, another Republican and Trump appointee.  And finally, a federal judge had to decide that it was not a fishing expedition, and the standard had been met to investigate the President's personal lawyer.

I guess under your theory Republicans really really hate Trump.  Perhaps you should consider voting Democratic in the next election, so Trump gets a fairer deal.

No, you don't understand.  If they don't support Trump they're not true Scotsmen real Republicans -- just frothing liberals like both Bushes and Reagan before them

[hazard]

You're assuming they're beholden to the people.

Or that the majority of their base aren't suckling on the fox-news tit, divorced from the reality of the universe. The President must defend himself against biased investigators undermining the republican presidency, after all.

It's not that the GOP can't keep a chunk of the population in their pocket. I'm expecting that, the breaking of the Republican Party seems to me to be the least likely.

But the sheer outrage of the public with the GOP is likely to create a long term pro-Democrat sentiment, and in a time and place where sentiments and technology are starting to effectively grind away at attempts to rig the voting system in favour of one party. It doesn't help that the political system has found a structural preference among the voting public for the Democratic party, while the way the voting system is constructed has structurally favoured the Republican party. A redesign that would favour the way the public votes would inherently thus favour the Democrats.

[SilverFang01]

This storm seems to be strengthening into a Cat. 3


Trump lawyer negotiated $1.6 million settlement for GOP donor with Playboy model

I wonder if Cohen wrote the same kind of sloppy NDA for the unnamed model that he wrote for Daniels.

[Rajvik]

honestly my take on this is that they are fishing, Mueller is looking so hard for something, ANYTHING that he can throw at Trump and is coming up with nothing that he decided to either piss Trump off enough that Trump fires him or try and get him in a nickle an dime perjury trap

Wait what really?  So Robert Mueller, a registered Republican who George W. Bush appointed to lead the FBI after the 9/11 attacks, is working so hard to throw anything at Trump that he got other people to agree to do this?  Those other people are Geoffrey Berman, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, who was appointed to lead by Jeff Sessions and is a former partner at Rudy Guiliani's law firm.  And the warrant had to be approved by Rod Rosenstein, another Republican and Trump appointee.  And finally, a federal judge had to decide that it was not a fishing expedition, and the standard had been met to investigate the President's personal lawyer.

I guess under your theory Republicans really really hate Trump.  Perhaps you should consider voting Democratic in the next election, so Trump gets a fairer deal.

not to sound like a smartass, but there are Republicans who hate Trump, thus the name, "Never Trumpers" they are the ones who wanted the same milkwater canidate to go against Hilary in the General election and got pissy when Trump, and not Jeb Bush got the nomination. Now, also you have to take into consideration the Good Ole Boy network that is seeming to come to light the longer this investigation goes on. Mueller's "attack dog prosecuter" who had a 9-0 overturn in the Supreme Court, who is known to have suppressed exculpatory evidence, and was a party to the Whitey Bulger/mafia framing that caused 2 innocent people to die in prison, all of Mueller's people along with Comey came through that same district of New York and have friends there, which i'm sure includes a few judges. 

In short when you show me actual proof and not innuendo of supposition, then i might believe the accusations, until then i'm taking the mainstream media who have been against this president and his team since before day one with a whole truckload of salt

[robkelk]

...
In short when you show me actual proof and not innuendo of supposition, then i might believe the accusations, until then i'm taking the mainstream media who have been against this president and his team since before day one with a whole truckload of salt

As long as you apply the same level of skepticism to the special-interest media on both sides of the mainstream, I have no problem with that.