Posted originally on the conservative tree house on August 22, 2022 | Sundance
It simply makes sense. The legislative oversight group known as the “Gang of Eight” want to see the documents confiscated by the DOJ National Security Division from the FBI raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate. The reason and motives are simple.
If Donald Trump has evidence of the corruption in the Trump-Russia collusion fabrication and targeting effort, there would be evidence of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) participating in joint-effort with the DOJ and FBI. When the FBI launched their 2016 targeting operation against candidate Donald Trump, it was the SSCI who coordinated with them.
The group of congressional leaders charged with reviewing the most sensitive intelligence information has asked the Biden administration for access to the documents seized from former President Donald Trump’s private residence in Florida, according to two people with direct knowledge of the request.
The inquiry from the so-called “Gang of 8” comes as lawmakers from both parties seek to learn more about the unprecedented investigation into the former president. And it suggests that Congress is unwilling to be a bystander in the political and legal fallout following the FBI’s Aug. 8 search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Fla.
It follows a similar request from Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Vice Chair Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who asked the nation’s top intelligence official to draw up an assessment of possible national-security risks related to Trump’s handling of the sensitive documents.
The Gang of 8 includes the top two congressional leaders in each chamber — Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy — as well as the top Democrat and Republican on the House and Senate intelligence committees.
A spokesperson for the Senate Intelligence Committee declined to comment. A representative for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence also declined to comment. Meanwhile, a spokesperson for a Gang of 8 member indicated that a specific request hadn’t been signed onto by all eight lawmakers but acknowledged that congressional oversight is ongoing. (read more)
When the Trump targeting operation began in 2015/2016, Dianne Feinstein was the Vice Chair of the SSCI, and her lead staffer was Dan Jones. You might remember that Jones left the committee to coordinate anti-Trump efforts outside government and work as a liaison back to the committee. The Chair of the SSCI was Richar Burr.
After Trump’s surprising 2016 victory, Feinstein stepped down to allow Senator Mark Warner to become Vice-Chair, thereby putting Warner on the Gang-of-Eight in January of 2017.
Senator Warner was then responsible for: (a) continuing the attacks and investigation of Trump; (b) covering up the prior work done by the SSCI to target Trump; and (c) working to appoint a special counsel in order to mitigate the risk, while throwing a bag over the prior activity.
When the FBI came under scrutiny (ex. FISA warrant), the corrupt actors within the DOJ and FBI collaborated *ONLY* with the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI). The same DOJ and FBI stonewalled the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) which was then led by Chairman Devin Nunes.
The corrupt entities in the DOJ/FBI would only work with the SSCI not the HPSCI, because it was the SSCI who was working hand in glove with them on the targeting operation. That’s why the SSCI, Mark Warner Vice-Chair with Security Director James Wolfe, was given a copy of the Carter Page FISA application on March 17, 2017. At the exact same time the DOJ and FBI were blocking the House intelligence committee from seeing it.
Senator Mark Warner wanted the FISA application as a tool to leak to the media as part of the effort to help the DOJ get Andrew Weissmann and Robert Mueller installed as the special counsel. Weissmann/Mueller would be the cover-up and continued targeting group.
Mark Warner and James Wolfe received the FISA on March 17, 2017, from the FBI (carried by agent Brian Dugan). Shortly after 4:00pm on March 17th, Warner and Wolfe then leaked the FISA application to the media (Ali Watkins). Two days later FBI Director James Comey testified before the House committee (March 20) publicly admitting for the first time that President Trump was under investigation.
These days in March 2017 became the narrative opening for the leaked FISA to support the installation of a special counsel a few weeks later. All of it carefully coordinated.
The background collusion and assist motive was also why SSCI vice-chair Mark Warner was covertly in contact with Adam Waldman (2017), the lawyer for Chris Steele, while continuing to operate the parallel Trump targeting and DOJ/FBI cover-up operation from the SSCI. Warner’s skill at this process is why Feinstein abdicated her chair to him at the beginning of Trump’s term.
If the Gang of Eight is currently trying to see what documents President Trump held in Mar-a-Lago, what they are really trying to see is what evidence President Trump has against them.
Watch carefully now….
Watch how the DOJ-NSD and FBI respond to the Gang of Eight. If they follow the pattern, then Main Justice will likely support legislative oversight onlythrough the SSCI.
Please enjoy this weekly compilation of the best interviews from The Dan Bongino Show on Radio that you may have missed but are definitely worth your time. This week we present you: Kash Patel, The Daily Wire’s Michael Knowles, writers Julie Kelly and Darren Beattie
American schools are predominately liberal. I mentioned how the largest teachers’ unions in the country routinely donate millions of dollars to Democrats. They may not have money for school supplies, but they have the funds to support their favored candidate. It is not merely the public schools that are liberal, as this goes all the way up to the ivy league colleges.A Harvard poll recently found that 80% of the faculty identified as “liberal” or “very liberal.”Around 37% said they were “very liberal,” which marks an 8% increase from last year. On the contrary, only 1% identified as “conservative.” No one identified as “very conservative.”
Clearly, students are being presented with a left-leaning view of the world from elementary school to university. Last year, a North Korean defector by the name of Yeonmi Park compared her experience at Columbia University to her former life in perhaps one of the most censored nations in the world. Yeonmi Park stated that students in the US “choose to be brainwashed.” Yet, only one world perspective is pushed on American students beginning at the age of five. Tests and grades are based on students accepting their liberal teachers’ instructions as facts.
“They are dying to give their rights and power to government…they take it for granted. They don’t know how hard it is to be free,” Park stated. The teachers pass on their biased views to young children who grow up and often do not realize that they need to question everything they once believed was true. Now schools are pushing for Critical Race Theory (CRT), gender courses, and even going as far as to bring drag queens into elementary schools to read to the children.
The American school system is deliberately attempting to brainwash our children into believing that the woke ideology is factual. It is up to the parents to steer their children in the right direction. “The future of our country [the US] is as bleak as North Korea’s if we don’t rise up right now,” Park previously warned.
Posted originally on the conservative tree house on August 22, 2022 | sundance
Acceptance is the first step.
If we accept or acknowledge the RNC and DNC are private corporations, existing like all other corporations to the fulfilment of their for-profit charter, to make money; and
If we accept or acknowledge their business model is structured around people and businesses giving them money; and
If we accept or acknowledge that in the process of raising money their interests may or may not align with the goal of those contributing to the business; and
If we accept the history that Mitch McConnell and the RNC worked purposefully to remove the influence of the Tea Party; then
This factually accurate statement from Steve Deace takes on a new meaning:
[…] “the GOP (club) would rather lose to Democrats than lose control of the [club] to it’s base.” Electability boils down to the right kind of approved candidate.
That is an accurate context for this midterm election cycle. Factually, the income stream for the RNC improves if they have the ability to campaign against the opposition club. The larger the outrage, the more substantial the fundraising. The corporation makes more money in defeat, or in the minority, than it does when it wins or holds majorities.
As a result, there is a disconnect between the financial incentive of the corporation and the expressed intent of the corporation. When the RNC club wins, they have a more difficult time raising money, because people who previously contributed are now looking for results.
Combine that business model reality, with the accurate statement from Steve Deace about the club perspective of MAGA, and you begin to see the weird dynamic that surfaced in Georgia in the first week of January 2021. Did the club want to win the two senate races? Or was the club content to let deflated Trump voters see a lackluster club response to the 2020 election issues in Georgia, a frustration which led to wins by the opposition?
The same dynamic is established now. Senator Mitch McConnell and the GOP club corporate donors are not happy with the unapproved candidates winning many of the 2022 primary contests. They are not hiding their disdain, nor are they hiding their shift in midterm expectations as a result of their desire to see the unapproved republican candidates defeated.
However, there is a more looming scenario that we have been discussing.
As we have seen from their non-response to the FBI raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, the GOP club would not be disappointed to see the DOJ take down Donald Trump prior to the midterm elections.
In a national version of the Georgia result, there would likely be widespread voter anger and frustration, if the DOJ indict President Trump and the republican leadership pull the Ron DeSantis routine and stay hidden and silent.
The GOP gets rid of the issue of Donald Trump, and a 25% drop in MAGA voter turnout – the result of anger and disenfranchisement – leads to overwhelming victories for Democrats in the midterms. The result, both Donald Trump and MAGA are essentially removed from the RNC/GOP structure. Nothing would make that group happier than to return to the status quo of controlled and approved party candidates. [Insert Ron DeSantis here]
In the biggest of big pictures, the important issues for the club to control surround trade, finance and economic policy. There are trillions at stake. The multinationals and Wall Street in general would both benefit from the elimination of a political movement based on America-First national economic policy (ie. Main Street USA).
The common bond amid all of the diversity within the Trump coalition is the working-class economic connection. No other republican politician of significance has any national economic outlook unfavorable to the multinational corporations who finance the club priority. The only economic nationalist in the republican party is Donald Trump. Remove him and the America-First policy is removed with him.
Let us also not be naïve or intellectually dishonest with each other. The decision on whether to indict or not indict Donald Trump is going to be made by Democrats and Republicans alike. Personally, I worry that decision has already been made, sometime around early June when the DOJ first inspected the documents at Mar-a-Lago, as part of a larger collaborative midterm strategy, noted above.
The picture would essentially be, have the DOJ remove Donald Trump; have the republican leadership do nothing except express faux outrage at the outcome; and then watch as a blue wave midterm election benefits both Democrat and Republican clubs.
Democrats advance their radical agenda, republicans gnash their teeth and fundraise off the radical agenda, and the 2024 presidential candidates pull out the fainting couches, gasp in horror, bewilderment and outrage over the events, while reminding the republican base that supporting law enforcement, and following the constitution, means sitting quietly and voting harder…
QUESTION: The general view is that Trump has turned the Republican Party into his Party – Trumpism. You seem to support Trump. Would would respectfully explain why?
DH
ANSWER: This is a very clever tactic by the Democrats to try to turn Republicans against the Republican Party and to vote for the Democrats while never explaining why they have become so WOKE, dividing the country and setting it up for its destruction. Adolf Hitler used the same tactic of demonizing any opposition as fascists or communists. The German False flag used by Hitler was known as the Reichstag Fire. Hitler had a problem. He won less than 35% of the vote. The Reichstag Fire was an arson attack on the German parliament in Berlin on February 27th, 1933 to polarize the nation. To this very day, the Ukrainian Nazis hate Russians because of that very propaganda that they were all evil communists. The Roman Emperor Nero blamed the Christians for the Great Fire of Rome and began the Christian persecutions. That is why they had often called Nero the anti-Christ.
Vilification of political opponents has become standard practice yet it degrades the public discourse and undermines any hope of democracy. There will be people who have just been brainwashed and refuse to open their minds to the fact that both sides engage in propaganda. The most important factor here is seeking the truth for the demonization of Trump, a single man, which is then used to justify the hatred of all Republicans that is the necessary step to win an election or even support a cry to unleash the dogs of war.
Leaders who think they must now paint the opposition as evil to get people to vote or even die on a battlefield believing it is for some just cause. In Islam, they call it a Jihad or holy war in the name of God to move the people to sacrifice their lives for the interpretation of a leader. Politicians are polarized between Marxism and freedom and this Wokeness has divided the people far worse ensuring that as long as the people argue among themselves, then they need to government to stand guard.
We must be mindful of how leaders create war in politics or in the physical world by the vilification of someone like Trump or even Putin that is then used to hate all Republicans or Russians for example. This is a basic strategy in leadership 101. Politicians have known this for centuries. I know of nobody in the geopolitical or domestic political arena who does not know this strategy is a winning one near term, but they do not look at the cost long-term and how it divides a nation ensuring its fall. That does not say very much for the mental capacity of the common human race. But this has been a strategy since ancient times.
The strategy of vilifying the enemy has always led to hatred unleashing a vicious cycle of violence throughout history. The vilification or demonization of the enemy renders all diplomatic solutions impossible – you cannot sit down with a devil to negotiate. It historically becomes a battle to the death and the total destruction of the political state. Just look at Ukraine. Zelensky is even releasing criminals to fight for territory that has historically been part of the Russian Empire long before the USSR that is why there are Russians there in the Donbas. This is all about hatred and Zelensky has been using it well.
There can be no hope for peace now and it becomes a bitter war consumed by hatred. There are no peacemakers only warmongers so peace cannot now be negotiated only because the hatred will never vanish. True peace now necessitates total annihilation. This is the end result of depicting the enemy as particularly evil that inspires feelings of deep hatred and in the case of the United States, it has now ENSURED the division precisely as we see in Ukraine – a civil war of hatred that fills the air.
The portrayal of one’s enemy as demonic has typically been to attack the leader and then paint the entire population as evil. What unfolded in the aftermath of defeating Hitler was the theory that the German people were somehow different and could kill Jews without a feeling of remorse. That led to the experiments of Stanley Milgram to see if Germans were somehow different. His studies showed that people off the streets anywhere, even in NYC, would torture a fellow human being when told that this was necessary by a higher authority. Stanley then wrote his book – Obedience to Authority. This is what develops as the result of the vilification of an opponent. The very process reduces an opponent’s more complex motives to the simple promotion of pure evil. Calling anyone a “Trump supporter” is invoking that very process.
Even if we look at the Chinese revolutionary theorist Mao Zedong who was very smart and understood strategy historically, we find the same understanding. Mao delivered his comments on this vilification or demonization of an enemy. He always painted his opponent as “[o]ur enemies are all those in league with imperialism” which was invoking the hatred of the British. Yet speaking about this very tactic, he commented that it was a very good thing to drive an enemy to such insanity to demonize you. He explained:
I hold that it is bad as far as we are concerned if a person, a political party, an army or a school is not attacked by the enemy, for in that case it would definitely mean that we have sunk to the level of the enemy. It is good if we are attacked by the enemy, since it proves that we have drawn a clear line of demarcation between the enemy and ourselves. It is still better if the enemy attacks us wildly and paints us as utterly black and without a single virtue; it demonstrates that we have not only drawn a clear line of demarcation between the enemy and ourselves but achieved a great deal in our work.
To Be Attacked by the Enemy Is Not a Bad Thing but a Good Thing (May 26, 1939)
I have explained, that when Trump was elected, there were many career Republican politicians who hated him – McConnel was one. Why? Trump was naive in saying he would drain the swamp to cheers because Trump channeled the fury of average Americans against Washington. But the swamp was on both sides. CNN gave him so much press and actually made Trump president because they thought he would lose so they gave all the news to Trump against the 17 Republican opponents assuming Hillary would win.
All the truth has surfaced about how Hillary created RussiaGate all on fake news to win. Had Hillary won, things would have been far worse than anyone would have imagined! She was conspiring with the Oligarchs to take control of Russia back in 2000. All the bankers were only donating to Hillary. Goldman Sachsorder their staff to vote for Hillary.
Bidenomics will now take hold with the Inflation Reduction Act that goes beyond 87,000 armed IRS agents who will now harass small business. They will especially attack every small business that is operating as an LLC. They will storm their homes and offices, if they are still open after COVID. They will hone in on every expense and attribute business expenses to really personal and seize bank accounts and impose property liens. That will be just the beginning.
The Government will get much bigger now but it will ONLY benefit Big Business supporters of the Democrats. The benefits for the environment and consumers are far fiction. Anyone who believed that the Inflation Reduction Act’s massive swelling of ‘investment’ in climate action will actually succeed as advertised is a total fool. We have pension funds asking if we could design a “green” portfolio that does not lose money. Bidenomics has completely ignored the long record of nothing but the failure of government subsidies of green energy. CALPERS, the California pension system for state employees, was directed to invest in “green” projects for political reasons and lost. They have been trying to cover-up their politically correct investment decisions.
The big Democratic supporters will get a windfall of money and they will fill their pockets at the expense of the economy and the people. The lobbyists held champaign parties in Washington to celebrate Bidenomics. This has been nothing more than a payoff masquerading as an energy and climate bill. Trust me, all the investment companies are already falling all over themselves to figure out who will be the biggest windfall from the spend and grab.
Bidenomics no include subsidies for rich people to buy new electric cars and the auto manufacturers are raising prices to compensate for the tex credits. Meanwhile, the lower classes can’t afford electric cars and a friend who had a Prius in St Petersburg could not even drive to our conference in Orlando. I laughed and said if there was a major hurricane coming, you could not get out of its way.
Bidenomics offers $1.5 billion to oil and gas companies for meeting its goals of cleaning up their acts. The significant beneficiaries of the climate-related provisions of this massive tax and spending bill will be those who will contribute nothing to GDP but accelerate its decline. The very subsidies in this bill are a Santa Claus wish-list of power-industry companies who will be rolling in dollars at the expense of our living standards. All the renewable project developers like NextEra Energy and AES and the wind turbine manufacturers, such as TP Composites, and the parts suppliers like Borg Warner and Aptiv for electric cars will get their windfalls. Indeed, Borg Warner had hired the lobbying firm that was that of former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. That’s why they take these positions only so they can feed at the trough.
Even the Mining companies for lithium and nickel will be looking to expand now big time because there is actually not enough battery power to create all the cars Bidenomics thinks will be there. There is ZERO consideration that all an adversary needs to do is target the power grid and they can defeat a country. In Switzerland, the only voice of reason, Fredy Fassler, the head of the Security and Justice Department in the canton of St. Gallen, told the daily Blick that a blackout would have “far-reaching consequences.”
“Imagine, you can no longer withdraw money at the ATM, you can no longer pay with the card in the store or refuel your tank at the gas station. Heating stops working. It’s cold. Streets go dark. It is conceivable that the population would rebel or that there would be looting,” he said, adding that the country’s authorities should take measures to prepare for such extreme scenarios.
Trump had to be removed to get this agenda through. They needed to demonize him and then they turned to Putin and they are turn on Xi Jinping. This is all about creating a one-world government which is the dream of George Soros and Klaus Schwab.
The need this strategy to get people to hate Trump, which in turn polarizes the nation and will ensure we end up in civil war. My support for Trump was not about him, it was because I knew the agendas and the goals. The very filmmaker who did the Forecaster on me also did the Forum on Schwab. I am not making up stuff out of the blue. I do not engage in conspiracy theories. If I cannot verify something I remain silent. Schwab will fail and we will see civil wars because these elitists are unrealistic. There are all climate zealots who want to destroy the entire world because they think the warming from the bottom of the Mini-Ice Age during the 1600s was cause by the Industrial Revolution and fossil fuels. There is no talking to them because this is their religion.
They will indict Trump. The Democrats have brought numerous actions against him and the documents seized from his residence were predominantly on RussiaGate according to sources. It was pulled off by the very same FBI agents who were in charge of RussiaGate and were under investigation by Durma. The Florida office of the FBI had nothing to do with it. This is all about (1) demonizing all republicans for the November election to try to get the Democrats to vote for them and not overturn the Hill which would stop their agenda so they need you to hate everyone who is a Republican. (2) They are desperate to prevent Trump from running in 2024. They need to get him in prison and there are a lot of Republicans who do not want him to run.
This is how the United States will end. They have created such hatred between left and right, there is no coming back. Once the Democrats took this path, they sealed the fate of the nation. Sorry. It is over! Those who are in Blue states that disagree with the politics had beet move to a Red state. The nation will divide along the same lines historically where there were tensions. We should expect it to be the South against the North and those mid-West states that are Red will be joining the South and the Pacific state will separate into their own little fiefdom. For example, those who are Republicans in California will be hunted down like the Jews in Germany – they will be painted with the same brush as they have used on Trump.
The demonization of Trump, the attack on Mar-a-Largo, and his coming indictment will only backfire. It may secure the Democrats and fuel their hatred of republicans even more, but Trump channeled the fury of average Americans against Washington back in 2016 and that will become the battle cry. I am getting emails from overseas and they view the raid on Trump as politically motivated and as such, the respect of the United States has begun to crash and burn. This is how the West will collapse and, like it or not, our computer is not political. It shows that Russia and China will win.
Posted originally on the conservative tree house on August 21, 2022 | sundance
The all too familiar David Laufman says it out loud, but few will pay attention. “That’s what this is. It- just because [the DOJ-NSD justification for the raid on Trump] implicates classified information to me, doesn’t seem to give a platform for the House Intelligence Committee to intrude at this time,” Laufman says.
In the aftermath of 9-11 the U.S. government created the Dept of Homeland Security (DHS) to conduct surveillance of “domestic threats,” the American people. When Barack Obama and Eric Holder stepped in a few years later, they created the DOJ National Security Division (DOJ-NSD). This division specializes in weaponizing surveillance against their political enemies. The DOJ-NSD had no inspector general oversight and operates within Main Justice, but above the law. Essentially, they use the justification of ‘national security‘ to defend the Fourth Branch of Government, the permanent surveillance state. {Go Deep}
David Laufman was the former head of the DOJ-NSD and he specialized in the targeting process. Laufman was a primary player in the defense of Hillary Clinton against accusations of ‘national security violations’ as a result of her classified personal email use. Laufman sat in on, guided and shaped the FBI interview Hillary Clinton. Additionally, David Laufman is one of Christine Blasey-Ford’s Rehoboth “beach friends,” as outlined in the Judge Brett Kavanaugh confirmation hearings.
When Blasey-Ford said she wrote the letter to Senator Dianne Feinstein accusing Brett Kavanaugh of college rape, she was with a bunch of “beach friends” including former FBI public information officer Monica McLean who actually wrote the letter. When investigators began digging into the background of the letter construct, McLean came under legal scrutiny. McLean hired beach friend David Laufman to shield her from legal trouble and represent her legal interests. David Laufman then worked together with another former DOJ lawyer, Michael Bromwich, who represented Christine Blasey-Ford. That’s the network.
Fast forward to 2022. All network indications reflect that David Laufman, similar in effort to former DOJ-NSD head Mary McCord (Schiff congressional impeachment team), is one of the primary Lawfare agents currently guiding, mapping and counseling the use of the DOJ-NSD to continue the targeting of Donald Trump. Laufman provides the legal strategies for the people within the current DOJ-NSD to follow. In addition to being a familiar face on MSNBC, we should consider David Laufman the outside agent providing guidance to Main Justice intent.
In this CBS interview, David Laufman is questioned about the role of congressional oversight in the DOJ/FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago. Pay close attention to what David Laufman says, because he essentially admits the quiet part. There’s no role for any oversight, any check and balance in the system, because the DOJ-NSD operates above the law. [Transcript] – WATCH:
ED O’KEEFE: Now for a more detailed look at all of the legal problems swirling around former President Donald Trump. We’re joined by Rikki Klieman, criminal defense lawyer and a CBS News legal analyst. And here in Washington, David Laufman, former chief of the Justice Department’s counterintelligence and export control section. Great to have both of you with us. David, I want to begin with you. You’re the former head of the division of the Justice Department that’s now led by a guy named Jay Bratt who argued in court this week regarding the potential release of this affidavit, that it may quote, “chill future cooperation by witnesses whose assistance may be sought as this investigation progresses, as well as in other high profile investigations.” You agree with his assessment?
FORMER CHIEF OF COUNTERINTELLIGENCE DAVID LAUFMAN: Based on my experience with the Department of Justice, that’s absolutely correct. Especially in the early stages of an investigation, the Justice Department and the FBI want to do everything they can to protect the integrity and confidential law enforcement actions that are being taken.
ED O’KEEFE: Do you have any sense then, do you expect he’s going to release at least part of this or a redacted version?
LAUFMAN: I think the Justice Department knows it has to come back to the court with a reasonable proposal. The judge signaled pretty clearly that he wants to release some facets of this affidavit. And I think the Department and the FBI are now trying to come to grips with what they can live with- with regard to public disclosures. And there are some portions of the affidavit that I think they’ll be willing to make public.
ED O’KEEFE: You just heard Congressman Turner of Ohio talking about the possibility of the Intelligence Committee getting read into the details of this at some point. There is bipartisan agreement that they’ve got to hear something from the Justice Department. It’s just a question of when and what exactly and how much. But in your view, is there a requirement for the Justice Department and FBI to do that at all?
LAUFMAN: I mean, there’s no requirement. Look, I mean, there’s- this- there are sometimes classic collisions between two coordinate branches of government; does seem to be premature for Congress to be sticking its nose into an ongoing criminal investigation. That’s what this is. It- just because it implicates classified information to me, doesn’t seem to give a platform for the House Intelligence Committee to intrude at this time.
ED O’KEEFE: Because it could unspool in a way where the information you share with them is leaked. And then, the investigation’s compromised. Its ability to have a fair trial will be compromised.
LAUFMAN: I think they’re trying to create a kind of a carnival atmosphere under the patina of the exercise of Congress’s constitutional authority to conduct investigations.
ED O’KEEFE: Rikki, to you. Allen Weisselberg, the former longtime chief financial officer of the Trump Organization, this past week pleaded guilty to 15 counts of fraud and tax evasion as part of the scheme to receive more than $1.7 million in off-the-books perks and compensation from the Trump Organization. Important to point out the former president hasn’t been charged as part of this civil case. But based on what you know about this case, what we’ve seen so far, is there any legal risk at this point to a member of the Trump family?
CBS NEWS LEGAL ANALYST RIKKI KLIEMAN: There is hardly any legal risk because of the fact that the plea of Alan Weisselberg is against the Trump Organization, which really means the Trump Corporation and the Trump Payroll Corporation. It had to do with the fact that he received perks to, as you say, $1.7 million over a period of years. The plea bargain seems abundantly clear. He is testifying against entities, not people.
ED O’KEEFE: And there’s been so much focus in the past two weeks on the Mar-a-Lago operation, this Weisselberg guilty plea this past week, but I know you believe that it’s what’s going down in Georgia that is potentially most legally risky for the former president. Correct?
KLIEMAN: There is no doubt in my mind that the most risk to the former president is in fact the Georgia investigation. And one of the reasons I say that is because it has intensified in terms of the number of witnesses that the district attorney is calling before this special, investigative grand jury. But also the fact that should not be overlooked is that Donald Trump has hired one of the best criminal defense lawyers in the country in the person of Drew Findling. Drew Findling was a past president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. He is based in Atlanta. He knows how to work within the system ethically and properly and he’s fierce. So when we look at this particular situation, Rudy Giuliani called to testify last week. We have no idea nor should we have any idea in a secret proceeding what he said or if he took the Fifth Amendment at any point in time. This week, Lindsey Graham is set to testify on Tuesday, unless the 11th circuit issues a stay and buys into his argument that his phone calls involving this election in 2020 and the results when he wanted, allegedly, to say that they should look into the mail in ballots, and perhaps there were many of the mailing ballots that had faulty signatures and his communications with Donald Trump would be the focus of this particular special grand jury. And that he wants to say, well, no, that was within my duties within the Speech and Debate Clause. We’re going to see what the 11th circuit has to say about that. But I expect Lindsey Graham is going to have to testify. This grand jury is investigative only. They can issue a report that would tell the district attorney at a later point in time, whether or not she does have reason to indict probable cause to indict any of the players, including Donald Trump.
ED O’KEEFE: And, David Laufman, in terms of the operation of Mar-a-Lago at this point, how concerned should any current or former staff of the former president there be concerned about legal exposure?
LAUFMAN: Well, I think any- any individuals who were involved in removing classified information from the White House in the waning moments of the Trump administration, taking them to Mar-a-Lago, knowingly keeping them there to play certain unauthorized to be, has potential criminal jeopardy depending on all the facts and circumstances that investigation uncovers. One of the statutes referenced in the search warrant is the Espionage Act and at issue in principle is a provision that makes it a crime to willfully retain National Defense Information. And the fact that these were highly classified documents as high as top secret code word makes it pretty clear to me the president has potential jeopardy here, compounded by what appeared to be deliberate misrepresentations by the president or his team, to the government about whether classified information remained at Mar-a-Lago and hence, the obstruction statute reference in the search warrant.
ED O’KEEFE: Ricky, you’ve been at this for a long time tracking legal cases of all sorts all across the country. Have you ever seen anyone facing more than a dozen legal, civil, congressional investigations at one time? And what is it like being an attorney for someone like that, when they have competing, compounding legal concerns and interests?
KLIEMAN: I have never seen this many investigations happening all at the same time. Some in greater stages, some in lesser stages. But if you are an attorney for Donald Trump, you are well advised to separate each one and decide where you’re going to devote your energies. Donald Trump, it appears, has been hiring lawyers from different places. So one lawyer does not have all of the responsibility. But this is not a good time for Donald Trump, at least if he thinks that everything is coming in upon him. However, we also know that Donald Trump enjoys the chaos and we will see what happens in terms of his decision if he is going to run or not in 2024.
ED O’KEEFE: We sure will. Rikki Kleiman, CBS News legal analyst, David Laufman, former Justice Department official, thank you both for being here. And we’ll be right back. (link)
From the corrupt Clinton investigation; to the corrupt us of the FISA application against Donald Trump’s campaign; to the corrupt Brett Kavanaugh confirmation hearings; to the corrupt J6 targeting and political midterm election effort; all the way to the ongoing targeting of Donald Trump, David Laufman is the one constant in an ever-evolving DOJ-NSD narrative.
Posted originally on the conservative tree house on August 21, 2022 | sundance
Giddy up… In the next series of posts CTH is going to outline the 2022 midterm election roadmap for both wings of the DC political club. Unfortunately, once you see the strings on the UniParty club marionettes, you can never return to that moment in time when you did not see them.
Long before President Trump’s home in Mar-a-Lago was raided, both political clubs in DC appear to have developed a map to stop the voters from interfering in the DC business model. Always remember, the color of the flag atop the dome matters not, the provided indulgences underneath the dome do not change. Destroying the populist movement known currently as the MAGA base, formerly the Tea Party, is as much a goal for the red club as it is the blue club.
Shortly before August 8, 2022, club agreements were made, prior strategies within the DNC and RNC wings were triggered, and events began unfolding according to the script. In the aftermath of the raid the club’s narrative engineers now begin to finish setting the stage. “Democracy is at risk” because of this populist uprising. WATCH:
… But it’s not the polling per se’ that people should be paying attention to. Instead, it’s the overarching national midterm election narrative being created. There’s a vulgarian hoard out there creating all of this angst and trepidation you are feeling. Voters are going to have to decide if they want instability (an election outcome against the interests of Washington DC), or stability (an election outcome congruent with the interest of Washington DC).
This is how the abuser system works. If you leave, you have no idea what might happen next; however, if you stay, you have the benefit of familiarity. Even though the abuse is painful (‘we’re on the wrong track), at least it is consistent and predictable. Skilled abusers leverage psychological resignation.
You might scoff at the metaphor, but on a larger national dynamic that’s our reality. The club knows how to leverage this anxiety, and the club narrative engineers in media know exactly how to support it. In the red wing of the club, CTH calls it ‘battered conservative syndrome.’ In the blue wing of the club, it’s ‘group think‘ by peer pressure. The intents of both approaches are the same, keep the abused voter from exiting the cycle.
Posted originally on the conservative tree house on August 21, 2022 | sundance
Mike Turner replaced congressman Devin Nunes as the ranking member on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI). During this interview with CBS and Ed O’Keefe, Turner discusses his perspective on the DOJ/FBI raid on President Trump’s home in Mar-a-Lago and the issue of publicly releasing the DOJ affidavit used to gain a search warrant. [Transcript Here]
Ed O’Keefe carries the baton of narrative engineering on behalf of the regime, using leading questions in an effort to indict President Trump in the court of public opinion, while Mike Turner plays the customary role of a high-minded republican who is aghast, shocked and horrified by the unprofessional conduct of the former president and the institutions targeting him based on political motive.
Toward the end of the interview, O’Keefe does the familiar partisan shift in asking what Turner would do as Chairman of the HPSCI if republicans take the House. Here Turner pledges to reverse the current committee use by Adam Schiff, vows not weaponize the committee for political purposes, and return the HPSCI back to the more important business of investigating Chinese espionage etc. WATCH:
[Transcript] – ED O’KEEFE: Welcome back to FACE THE NATION. I’m Ed O’Keefe in this morning for Margaret Brennan. We turn now to the FBI search at former President Trump’s Florida resort. Ohio Congressman Mike Turner is the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee and he joins us this morning from Dayton, Ohio. Congressman, great to have you with us.
ED O’KEEFE: This past week, a Florida federal judge asked the Justice Department to prepare a redacted version of the aff- of the affidavit that set off the FBI operation at the former president’s home, signaling he may be willing to release it as early as this coming week. But affidavits aren’t usually made public during an investigation so as to not impede the investigation. I’m curious what level of disclosure would satisfy the demand for the release of the affidavit, in your view?
REP. MIKE TURNER: Well, this is very revealing because the court has already made a ruling that they believe, and remember, the court knows what’s in the affidavit. The portions of the affidavit can be released to the public. Now, what’s important about this affidavit is it will give us the information to understand how did the FBI justify a raiding Mar-a-Lago and spending 9 hours in the president’s house when we know the former president’s home, they had other options besides just raiding the house. They could have gone in and asked for the subpoena to be enforced. And the mystery sort of here deepens, because we know Attorney General Garland himself has taken responsibility, said he approved it. And the American public want the attorney general focused on issues like human and drug smuggling at the border. They- Chinese espionage, out of control crime in our cities. But if it’s- if you’re going to turn to this, if you’re going to turn to the former president and Mar-a-Lago, they want to make certain that this is to the highest level, there’s an imminent national security threat. And this affidavit will tell us, did they even allege so? Because in their document, trying to keep the affidavit sealed, they didn’t even allege that there was a national security threat.
ED O’KEEFE: We should point out there’s a poll out this morning at another news organization that finds almost six in ten Americans actually support continuing this investigation. So while there may be other big issues, there’s certainly wide public interest in this one. You’re an attorney, though. Why would releasing any information in this affidavit make sense and assure the former president not only a fair investigation by the Justice Department, but potentially, if it gets to that, a fair trial?
REP. TURNER: Well, I think- and you’re- you’re citing polls and there are lots of polls out there, by the way. The polls also indicate that people want to make certain that- that if this is an imminent national security threat, that it’s pursued. But also, they want to make certain that you don’t have abuse of discretion here. And what our concern is from our committee is there’s an- an allegation of classified documents that falls within our jurisdiction. And show us what you found, because the affidavit is going to have them tell publicly now what they told the court they were going to go find. Show us what you found. It certainly won’t affect the investigation. We deal with classified documents and information all the time. Show us what it is that you went into the president’s residence, spent 9 hours at former President Trump’s residence. What is it that was at an imminent national security threat that you didn’t just go to court and ask the court to- to order that the documents be delivered to them? Why did they spend- I just think of the resources of 30 agents that spent 9 hours in the preparation for that when we have real imminent national security threats like Chinese espionage, the border, issues that- things that are going on in Ukraine. To take these resources and apply them here, certainly the American public wants to make certain this is not an abuse of discretion.
ED O’KEEFE: Well, I’m- I’m curious, since you’re a member of the Intelligence Committee, what use could a former president have for classified or top secret information once he’s left office? Why- why bring it home with him to Florida?
REP. TURNER: Well, I don’t know. I mean, you have to ask him. But certainly, we all know that every former president has access to their documents. It’s how they write their memoirs. They don’t have, you know, great recall of everything that’s occurred in their administration. And we don’t know that they were classified. We know, according to the FBI documents, that they were- they were identified as marked classified. You have, of course, the former president saying that he declassified them himself. But I think what’s important here about this abuse of discretion, we have evidence of the FBI abusing that discretion and of misconduct on behalf of the FBI. The FBI, you know, we had an attorney for the FBI that actually was convicted of doctoring an email to obtain a warrant against- against Trump. There’s Trump’s organization- you have the- the FBI using the Russia dossier, which has been proven to be debunked as evidence under a warrant that they submitted. Both- all of which CBS has reported, and I have them up on my website, your own stories of these abuses of discretion. And the other question that we have is- is just recently there was a raid on Project Veritas, which is a news organization, to supposedly retrieve President Biden’s daughter’s diary. Now, that’s not certainly an imminent national security threat. It might be embarrassing to the president, but it’s not something you’d see them do for an ordinary citizens. There are real questions as to what is the FBI doing here? It’s the- it’s you know, the rank and file FBI agents, everybody agrees, you know, we support them. We have great faith in them. But the leadership of the FBI, when they undertake a raid against the current president’s political rival, you have to ask these questions.
ED O’KEEFE: Real quick, are you aware of any standing order from President Trump that he might have had, a standing order, to declassify documents he took from the Oval Office to the White House residence while he was in office?
REP. TURNER: I have never served in the White House. I would never have any knowledge of anything that occurred.
ED O’KEEFE: Okay. So the Intelligence Committee wouldn’t know whether the president had a standing order?
REP. TURNER: Whether Biden does, whether anybody does- what is there to declassify. In fact, we weren’t even notified when President Biden declassified all the information concerning the hunt for Zawahiri. And I was very surprised the detail that they made public there. Very concerning as to how it might inform al Qaeda and the future people that we’re trying to target.
ED O’KEEFE: Two quick—
REP. TURNER: I had no, no advance knowledge or notice when they did that.
ED O’KEEFE: Okay, two quick questions for you on the future. You want to be the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee next year?
REP. TURNER: Well, I think that certainly my work on the Intelligence Committee is about national security and focusing on national security, and that’s going to continue to be my focus.
ED O’KEEFE: Give us a sense, then, of what you would investigate if you were head of the Intelligence Committee and Republicans take control of the House.
REP. TURNER: Well, you know, as I said from the beginning, is what I think we want Attorney General Garland to be focusing on instead of Mar-a-Lago, is Chinese espionage certainly furthering? How do we assist Ukraine in fighting Russia aggression? Looking at ways that we look at what’s going on at the border with human and drug smuggling and how it’s affecting our families. And, of course, there’s always the issue of the spiraling crime that’s occurring in- in our cities. And how can we impact that? How can we ensure that we have the right tools and information about any foreign influence that might be impacting that?
ED O’KEEFE: And as a Republican in Ohio, what does J.D. Vance, who in some polls is trailing right now, have to do to win that Senate race and hold the seat for Republicans?
REP. TURNER: Yeah, he has to make the case and I think he’s doing that. He’s campaigning very hard. And, you know, you- you should have him on.
ED O’KEEFE: We’d love to. In fact, we’ve asked and so far we haven’t heard back. But if he’s listening, J.D. Vance, we’d love to have you. Mike Turner, we loved having you. We’ll see you soon here in Washington. And we’ll be back in a moment. [LINK]
“Corporatism” is when power (government), money (corporations), and propaganda (media) merge together to repeatedly rip-off the people at large. The antithesis to this “system” is severely limited government, sound money and free markets. But as long as the people at large resist their freedom, the rip-off machine will happily continue on to the next “latest thing.”
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