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"Team Trump’s Blueprint for Fighting Back Against the Mueller Report
The special counsel is expected to release a report detailing his findings. There may be a court fight before it sees the light of day.
( By Betsy Woodruff )
Sure, there have been a few nasty tweets, and maybe an over-caffeinated interview or two. But ever since Special Counsel Robert Mueller began investigating the Kremlin’s interference in the U.S. election, Trump World has basically played nice.
... Now, Mueller’s team is writing a report detailing its findings, which will go to the attorney general, who will decide whether or not to give it to Congress.
At that point, the Trump administration’s conflict with Mueller could burst the bounds of Twitter and show up in court.
A person familiar with the president’s legal team’s thinking told The Daily Beast that Trump’s lawyers expect a complex, multi-faceted process to ensue after Mueller’s team drops its report—potentially involving a legal battle over executive privilege.
This depends on what’s in the report, of course. Rudy Giuliani, the face of Trump’s personal legal team, told The Daily Beast he couldn’t speculate about any potential fights until he sees the report.
“Maybe there will be no problem,” he said. “Maybe there will be selective problems.
Selective problems could cause huge fights.
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein named Mueller as Special Counsel on May 17, 2017. The appointment came just days after Trump fired FBI Director James Comey—a move Trump later said was informed by Comey’s supervision of an FBI counterintelligence investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential race.
In the 19 months since Mueller took over that probe as part of his work as Special Counsel, he has been examining whether Trump obstructed justice, including in his firing of Comey.
The White House was surprisingly cooperative with him in that pursuit.
Ty Cobb—then helming the White House’s response to Mueller’s team—decided to let senior White House staffers answer the Special Counsel team’s questions. Cobb and others argued that the president’s executive privilege remained intact despite this, as Mueller’s team is part of the government’s executive branch.
If the information White House staffers gave Mueller about their conversations with the president were to leave the executive branch, however, and be shared with Congress, it would violate the president’s executive privilege—
at least, that’s what Rudy Giuliani and a host of conservative lawyers have long argued.
This is where things could get messy.
Mueller’s report could discuss the question of whether Trump obstructed justice, according to a Washington Post report from April.
Any findings on that subject would likely involve testimony by White House officials who heard the president discuss his decision to fire Comey, as well as any efforts to pressure people close to the probe.
According to Giuliani, the president has the power to claim executive privilege and bar Mueller from sharing that testimony with anyone outside the executive branch.
After all, the regulations governing the Special Counsel only allow him to give his report to the attorney general. The attorney general can then decide whether or not to turn over the report to Congress.
And that’s the million-dollar question, one Trump’s lawyers are bracing for:
What happens if the report includes damaging statements from White House staffers about their conversations with the president?
Andrew McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor, told The Daily Beast he believes the Justice Department’s leaders will determine that such comments are subject to executive privilege—and, thus, not available to Congress.
He said he believes acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker and Bill Barr, who Trump plans to nominate to the post permanently, would withhold information from Congress that violates this understanding of executive privilege.
That could potentially mean redacting portions of Mueller’s report.
“I think it would be likely that the president’s counsel may not even have to tell them to do that,” said McCarthy, a writer for National Review and Fox News who is is deeply influential in conservative legal circles—including those around the president.
“The Justice Department sees as part of its mission the protection of executive privileges,” he continued. “If there’s any existing executive privilege to hold things back, they don’t need Rudy Giuliani to tell them that. They know it better than he does. Part of what the Office of Legal Counsel does is protect the executive branch from what would otherwise be a free-rein encroachment by Congress.”
A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment, and Barr did not respond to a request for comment.
To be clear, McCarthy’s is far from a consensus view.
Neil Eggleston, who served as White House Counsel during the Obama administration, told The Daily Beast he didn’t think this view of executive privilege holds water.
And he pointed to U.S.A. v. Nixon, when the Supreme Court forced the White House to turn over tape recordings of Nixon’s conversations to Watergate prosecutors, to support his claim.
“I assure you that nobody thought when they were turning materials and testimony over to Independent Counsel Ken Starr that they remained privileged because he was part of the executive branch,” he added...
And Bob Bauer, who also served as White House Counsel under Obama, said any litigation fight would be doomed for the White House.
“The privilege is qualified and can be overcome by a showing of the Congress’s or a grand jury’s legitimate needs,” he said.
“It can also be waived, and the president’s endless tweeting on these subjects, and even more, his lawyers’ memo to Mueller in January of 2018 setting out a presidential waiver, leaves in tatters any belated attempt to resuscitate this claim.”
David Rivkin, a Washington lawyer who held legal positions in the Reagan and George H. W. Bush administrations, disagreed.
“Nothing is entitled to a higher level of executive privilege claim than conversations between the president and his senior White House advisers,” he said. “Of course it’s entitled to executive privilege, and of course an executive privilege claim can and will be upheld, if Congress chooses to push for access to this information in a subpoena fight.”
A decision by the Attorney General to withhold all or part of Mueller’s report will almost certainly mean a legal battle. The most likely party seeking access to the materials would be the House of Representatives, which Democrats will control—and, in particular, the House Judiciary Committee, which Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY) is set to chair. Nadler told ABC News last month he would be open to subpoenaing the report if the Attorney General won’t turn it over.
“The committee certainly could subpoena any report Bob Mueller gives to the Attorney General or Deputy Attorney General,” a committee aide told The Daily Beast. “We could also just ask the Special Counsel to come before our committee to share his findings.”
And if the Justice Department defies that subpoena, Nadler’s committee could sue, asking a federal judge to enforce it. That’s where legal fight could turn from ugly to uglier.
“I think Congress would have the upper hand, ultimately,” said Jonathan Turley, a George Washington University law professor who provided expert witness testimony in the Clinton impeachment hearings, and whose writings and cable news commentary draw the attention of Trump’s legal advisers.
“But this is not an exercise of legal authority alone; Congress will have to not only watch the existing precedent but the expiring calendar in planning its efforts.”
In other words, embroiling the Democratic House in a lengthy legal battle could also help the administration run down the clock on any potential impeachment proceedings.
But the president’s own prolific social media use could make it slightly easier for Democrats to argue against a potential executive privilege claim.
“These tweets bite him in the ass eight days a week,” said McCarthy. ... "
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"Why Trump Reigns as King Cyrus
The Christian right doesn’t like the president only for his judges. They like his style.
(By Katherine Stewart
Ms. Stewart writes regularly about the political activities of evangelicals and other religious groups.)
The month before the 2018 midterms, a thousand theaters screened “The Trump Prophecy,” a film that tells the story of Mark Taylor, a former firefighter who claims that God told him in 2011 that Donald Trump would be elected president.
At a critical moment in the film, just after the actor representing Mr. Taylor collapses in the flashing light of an epiphany, he picks up a Bible and turns to the 45th chapter of the book of Isaiah, which describes the anointment of King Cyrus by God.
In the next scene, we hear Mr. Trump being interviewed on “The 700 Club,” a popular Christian television show.
As Lance Wallnau, an evangelical author and speaker who appears in the film, once said,
“I believe the 45th president is meant to be an Isaiah 45 Cyrus,” who will “restore the crumbling walls that separate us from cultural collapse.”
Cyrus, in case you’ve forgotten, was born in the sixth century B.C.E. and became the first emperor of Persia.
Isaiah 45 celebrates Cyrus for freeing a population of Jews who were held captive in Babylon.
Cyrus is the model for a nonbeliever appointed by God as a vessel for the purposes of the faithful.
The identification of the 45th president with an ancient Middle Eastern potentate isn’t a fringe thing.
“The Trump Prophecy” was produced with the help of professors and students at Liberty University, whose president, Jerry Falwell Jr., has been instrumental in rallying evangelical support for Mr. Trump.
Jeanine Pirro of Fox News has picked up on the meme, as has Ron Dermer, the Israeli ambassador to the United States, among many others.
As the Trump presidency falls under siege on multiple fronts, it has become increasingly clear that the so-called values voters will be among the last to leave the citadel.
A lot of attention has been paid to the supposed paradox of evangelicals backing such an imperfect man,
We still buy the line that the hard core of the Christian right is just an interest group working to protect its values. But what we don’t get is that Mr. Trump’s supposedly anti-Christian attributes and anti-democratic attributes are a vital part of his attraction.
Today’s Christian nationalists talk a good game about respecting the Constitution and America’s founders, but at bottom they sound as if they prefer autocrats to democrats.
In fact, what they really want is a king. “It is God that raises up a king,” according to Paula White, a prosperity gospel preacher who has advised Mr. Trump.
Ralph Drollinger, who has led weekly Bible study groups in the White House attended by Vice President Mike Pence and many other cabinet members, likes the word “king” so much that he frequently turns it into a verb.
“Get ready to king in our future lives,” he tells his followers.
“Christian believers will — soon, I hope — become the consummate, perfect governing authorities!”
The great thing about kings like Cyrus, as far as today’s Christian nationalists are concerned,
is that they don’t have to follow rules. They are the law.
This makes them ideal leaders in paranoid times.
“When are they going to start rolling out the boxcars to start hauling off Christians?” Tony Perkins, the president of the Family Research Council, asked in 2016.
If you’re hearing those boxcars pulling up in the distance, as it were, you don’t merely overlook the antisocial qualities of a prospective leader, you embrace them as virtues.
Mr. Trump himself well understands this longing for the hard hand of the despot.
... Of course, there are those on the Christian right who have made a show of holding their noses while supporting Mr. Trump to advance their aims of stacking the Supreme Court or ending abortion. But we are kidding ourselves if we think their continuing support for him is purely transactional.
I have attended dozens of Christian nationalist conferences and events over the past two years
...the gist of the proceedings almost always comes down to the belief that he is a miracle sent straight from heaven to bring the nation back to the Lord.
I have also learned that resistance to Mr. Trump is tantamount to resistance to God.
This isn’t the religious right we thought we knew.
The Christian nationalist movement today is authoritarian, paranoid and patriarchal at its core. They aren’t fighting a culture war.
They’re making a direct attack on democracy itself.
They want it all.
(Emphasis is mine.)
And in Mr. Trump, they have found a man who does not merely serve their cause, but also satisfies their craving for a certain kind of political leadership.
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( My updated ebook, "How to Influence Media in Real Time," will be ready after the 1st of the year. It will include updated examples of the conversations I have with some of my “media friends” and some updated indications that media can hear us! Any donor who leaves a name and an email on my GoFundMe Page will get one as soon as it is ready to go! Thanking you in advance for your interest. I hope you will join me in helping media be the best they can be -- in being a media influencer. )
→ Direct sources & resources for Democrats:
* ( Personal favored and most informative follows are also shared here, below, with the understanding that readers will always apply their own critical thinking to any information provided anywhere by anyone. #StrongerTogether does not share sources of information lightly but -- no one is perfect! -- so always #DistrustAndVerify -- even if it's me. I am using a "star" rating that is strictly based on my situational experience with the work of the media personality specifically in relation to issues of interest to me. )
Democratic Party Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi
There is no better way to get your information than to #Go2TheSource
The Democratic Party Website
Also, NOT exactly a Democratic Party specific source under a GOP majority but a good place for to hear and to watch speeches & hearings directly C-SPAN
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A new podcast introducing you to the staffers and strategists that silently shape our politics from behind the scenes" here
You can email your two Senators and your Representative in Congress in one email here
"Postcards to Voters are friendly, handwritten reminders from volunteers to targeted voters giving Democrats a winning edge in close, key races coast to coast.
What started on March 11, 2017 with sharing 5 addresses apiece to 5 volunteers on Facebook...
Now, we consist of over 20,000+ volunteers in every state (including Alaska and Hawaii) who have written close to 3 million postcards to voters in over 100+ key, close elections."
You can find Postcards to Voters here
→ Some of my favorite, most active organizations -- some existing & some developing to elect Democrats:
"Born from conversations between Governor Howard Dean and Secretary Hillary Clinton in the aftermath of the 2016 election, Onward Together was established to lend support to leaders — particularly young leaders — kicking off projects and founding new organizations to fight for our shared progressive values." here
" Since #StandOnEveryCorner has grown, it’s become a stand by all of us to protect our democracy from corruption and treason...A stand not at your State Capitol, but in your own backyard. Not once every few months, but as often as you can here "
→ Fact checking organizations courtesy of the Society of Professional Journalists
in alphabetical order...
→ Some of my favorite, most informative
follows on Twitter include:
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ US Intelligence | Author | Navy Senior Chief | NBC/MSNBC
⭐⭐⭐ Federal Government Operations | Vanity Fair | Newsweek | MSNBC Contributor | Author
⭐⭐⭐⭐ Voting Rights/Voter Suppression | Author | Mother Jones
→ Some of my favorite, highly credible media -- at the moment:
📰📰📰 Mother Jones
📰📰📰📰 The Washington Post
→ Some of my favorite Talking Heads -- at the moment -- and their Twitter handles:
→ Some of my favorite media/panelists -- at the moment -- and their Twitter handles:
✅✅✅✅ Joan Walsh national affairs correspondent for The Nation; CNN political contributor
✅✅✅ Heidi Przybyla USA TODAY Senior Political Reporter
✅✅✅✅ Jennifer Rubin Conservative blogger at @ WashingtonPost's Right Turn,MSNBC contributor
✅✅✅ Natasha Bertrand Staff writer @ The Atlantic covering national security & the
intel community. @ NBCNews/@ MSNBC contributor
→ Some of my favorite Democrat Party Leaders to follow on Twitter, not in elected office but proving knowledge & experience are positives & not negatives are:
Former First Lady Michelle Obama
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
Former Labor Secretary/Today's DNC Chair Tom Perez
Note: I rarely get involved in primary races -- outside of those in my own area and unless there is a glaring reason that can not be ignored, I support Democratic Party nominees in general elections. I don't support bashing Democrats.
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(Linked) "...is our 2016 platform...a declaration of how we plan to move America forward. Democrats believe that cooperation is better than conflict, unity is better than division, empowerment is better than resentment, and bridges are better than walls.
It’s a simple but powerful idea: We are stronger together."
Owned, Created and Curated by Gail Mountain, this blog is often gently edited and/or excerpted for quick reading, with occasional personal commentary in the form of the written word and/or in the form of emphasis noted. Network For #StrongerTogether ! is not affiliated with The Democratic Party in any capacity. This is an independent blog and the hope is you will, at a glance, learn more about the Party and you will, with a click or two, also take action on its behalf as it is provided!
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