Billionaire George Soros, 92, announced that he is stepping down and passing the reins of power to his 37-year-old son, Alex. The Open Society Foundations founder is worth $6.7 billion but he funneled $18 billion into his foundation in 2017. Soros’ version of philanthropy is instilling his views upon society as a whole and funding far-left politicians across the world. Alex Soros recently told the Wall Street Journal that he is “more political” than his father.
One of his first courses of action was to meet with Kamala Harris. Harris did not add her meeting with the younger Soros to her public calendar. Alex also met with US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. All are proponents of the World Economic Forum and receive massive funding from the Open Society. The Soros family is highly linked to the Biden Administration, and Alex told the WSJ that one of his main goals is ensuring Donald Trump never returns to the White House. “As much as I would love to get money out of politics, as long as the other side is doing it, we will have to do it, too,” he said in regards to funding the upcoming 2024 Presidential Election on behalf of the Democrats.
Everyone thought George’s son Jonathan would take over for his father, but they had notable differences and was dismissed in 2015 when his father began to enter politics heavily. “We think alike,” George told the Wall Street Journal of his son Alex. The Soros super PAC, Democracy PAC, has created chaos globally. In the US, over 90% of Soros-backed candidates have won their elections. Soros-backed cities are overrun with crime as they have a policy of failing to prosecute dangerous criminals. As of November 2022, Soros subsidized district attorneys were in control of one-fifth of the entire country. Why is Soros funding the most radical prosecutors in America? I suggest you read my article on the Cloward-Piven strategyfor political control.
It was once a conspiracy theory that George Soros was the financial powerhouse behind the success of the far-left. His son Alex has confirmed that the Open Society will become more political under his rule. There is no comparable conservative billionaire backing politics in this manner. Soros was the top donor of the midterms and has pushed an additional $125 million into his super PAC. Soros also created the Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET) which aims to create a new global economy.
I warned that 2015.75 was the peak in confidence in government, which has sharply declined ever since. That same date also marked George Soros’ aggressive initiative to infiltrate politics in a more significant way. The only politicians he supported outside of the left were neocons like John McCain. Alex Soros is not hiding his political agenda by any means. The models indicate that the likes of Soros and Schwab will fail to usher in a new world order, but that does not mean they will not create absolute pandemonium in their attempts.
Posted originally on the CTH on June 13, 2023 | Sundance
Attorney Robert Barnes appeared on a podcast yesterday to give his analysis of the political indictment of President Trump. It’s a long deconstruction of the Lawfare effort, and contains numerous defenses therein; however, it is a very good encapsulation of the ridiculous issues created by the Biden administration’s efforts to target their political opposition on behalf of the Deep State. WATCH:
Posted originally on the CTH on June 13, 2023 | Sundance
Things are certainly getting interesting on the Biden bribery story. Apparently, in the unclassified interview with the Confidential Human Source, the FBI redacted the source alleging he has audio recordings of himself speaking to Joe Biden.
Senator Chuck Grassley revealed this little bit of information today from the security of the Senate floor. WATCH:
[Grassley] […] Let me assist for purposes of transparency.
The 1023 produced to that House Committee redacted reference that the foreign national who allegedly bribed Joe and Hunter Biden allegedly has audio recordings of his conversations with them. Seventeen total recordings.
According to the 1023, the foreign national possesses fifteen audio recordings of phone calls between him and Hunter Biden. According to the 1023, the foreign national possesses two audio recordings of phone calls between him and then-Vice President Joe Biden. These recordings were allegedly kept as a sort of insurance policy for the foreign national in case he got into a tight spot. The 1023 also indicates that then-Vice President Joe Biden may have been involved in Burisma employing Hunter Biden. (read full transcript)
[Transcript] – Last week, I came to the Senate Floor to give a speech about the Biden Justice Department and FBI playing games with the American people by hiding the FBI-generated 1023 document from Congress.
Director Wray was going to be held in contempt for refusing to produce the 1023 that I told Chairman Comer about. Then, instead of contempt, the FBI committed to showing the 1023 and related documents to Congress.
So, the FBI showed but didn’t provide possession of that 1023 to the House Oversight Committee last week.
As the public knows that 1023 involves an alleged bribery scheme between then-Vice President Biden, Hunter Biden and a foreign national. The same allegations that Chairman Comer and I made public on May 3 of this year.
And on the same day that the FBI provided a redacted version of the 1023 to the House Oversight Committee, the Justice Department announced that former President Trump had been indicted and charged with 37 crimes relating to his alleged mishandling of classified records.
Attorney General Garland signed off on prosecuting Trump for conduct similar to what Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton engaged in. Two standards of justice in this country will turn our constitutional Republic upside down. Thanks to the political infection within the Biden Justice Department and FBI, we’re well along the road for that to happen.
This senator will do all that he can to fight that political infection. And you fight it by bringing transparency to what the government does. The public’s business ought to be public. Transparency brings accountability.
With respect to the 1023 shown to that House Committee, from what I’ve been told by folks who’ve reviewed it, it’s filled with redactions. So, Director Wray placed redactions on a document that’s already unclassified.
More than that, the FBI made Congress review a redacted unclassified document in a classified facility. That goes to show you the disrespect the FBI has for Congress. On a previous time on the Senate Floor, I asked my fellow senators what’s so unusual about an unclassified document being given to the public, when on May 18 of this year, there was leaked to the New York Times a classified document and even the name of a confidential human source. So, we’re kind of in a strange situation here. A classified document can be leaked to the New York Times, but an unclassified document can’t be made public to 300 million Americans.
Accordingly, Congress still lacks a full and complete picture with respect to what that document really says. That’s why it’s important that the document be made public without unnecessary redactions for the American people to see.
Let me assist for purposes of transparency.
The 1023 produced to that House Committee redacted reference that the foreign national who allegedly bribed Joe and Hunter Biden allegedly has audio recordings of his conversations with them. Seventeen total recordings.
According to the 1023, the foreign national possesses fifteen audio recordings of phone calls between him and Hunter Biden. According to the 1023, the foreign national possesses two audio recordings of phone calls between him and then-Vice President Joe Biden. These recordings were allegedly kept as a sort of insurance policy for the foreign national in case he got into a tight spot. The 1023 also indicates that then-Vice President Joe Biden may have been involved in Burisma employing Hunter Biden.
So, as I’ve repeatedly asked since going public with the existence of the 1023, what, if anything, has the Justice Department and FBI done to investigate?
The Justice Department and FBI must show their work. They no longer deserve the benefit of the doubt. It’s clear that the Justice Department and FBI will use every resource to investigate candidate Trump, President Trump and former President Trump.
Based on the facts known to Congress and the public, it’s clear that the Justice Department and FBI will use every resource to investigate candidate Trump, President Trump and former President Trump. Based on the facts known to Congress and the public, it’s clear that the Justice Department and FBI haven’t nearly had the same laser focus on the Biden family.
Special Counsel Jack Smith has used a recording against former President Trump. Well, what’s U.S. Attorney Weiss doing with respect to these alleged Joe and Hunter Biden recordings that are apparently relevant to a high-stakes bribery scheme?
Getting a full and complete 1023 is critical for the American people to know and understand the true nature of the document and to hold the Justice Department and FBI accountable.
It’s also important for asserting constitutional congressional oversight powers against an out-of-control Executive Branch drunk with political infection. Remember, Congress has received 1023’s in the past and they’ve been made public. So asking for this 1023 to be turned over to the American people to read is not unusual.
Congress owes it to the American people and the brave and heroic whistleblowers to continue to fight for transparency in this matter and make this document public without unnecessary redactions.
I want everyone to remember, that I have readthe unredacted version. [Transcript Link]
Additionally, as more information is coming out from the FD-1023 and associated articles, the deep weeds walkers and research teams are zeroing in on the potential identity of the Confidential Human Source who gave the interview to the FBI.
Also keep in mind, this testimony was made to the FBI in July of 2020. We are now past several elections of sequential coverup operations by the FBI in order to protect Joe Biden and manipulate election outcomes.
Posted originally on the CTH on June 12, 2023 | Sundance
Devin Nunes was previously the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. In that very specific role, Nunes was a member of the Gang of Eight who are briefed on all intelligence issues at the same level as the President, the chief executive. The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman, is the #2 ranking intelligence oversight member within the national security oversight apparatus, exceeded in rank amid the Gang of Eight group only by the House Speaker.
As the HPSCI chairman, Nunes has a very granular understanding of intelligence language and the way the intelligence apparatus uses words within national security documents. When Nunes talks about national security documents, he is a subject matter expert on the administration side of the process. Why is that important right now? Because Nunes knows how to contrast the wording in the Jack Smith indictment against wording used to describe national security documents.
Pay very close attention to this interview, prompted to 05:06, for the Nunes part. You have to get past the paid to obfuscate Mrs. Hannity interruptus, as she tries to shut down Nunes from bringing sunlight on the indictment. However, what Nunes introduces in his comments is the origin of what I am going to explain after the interview.
This is a game-changing context for the Jack Smith indictment. Again, pay close attention. WATCH:
.
What almost everyone in professional narrative engineering/punditry is missing, many of them because they are paid to pretend not to know, is that the national archivists gave sworn testimony to Congress about the Trump documents on May 17, 2023 {citation}. What I am going to outline below will explain the fraud that Jack Smith and his Lawfare crew are purposefully generating.
Some baselines are needed for you to understand what is happening.
First, the National Archives and the DOJ did not demand a return of Classified Documents. They requested a return of documents containing classification markings. These are two entirely different things.
Most documents containing classification markings are not classified documents; yet, most classified documents contain classification markings. Additionally, one of the documents used by Jack Smith in his indictment [COUNT #11] contained no markings at all.
Second, it is critically important to remember that throughout the legal issues in the aftermath of the Mar-a-Lago raid, the DOJ has viciously denied any responsibility to describe the classified documents they claim to have retrieved. In fact, the DOJ has fought against any entity, including the court appointed “special master”, from being able to look at the documents the DOJ *previously* claimed were either classified, or, vital to national security.
Because there is a very specific type of Lawfare game playing with words taking place, it is critical to see the value in what Devin Nunes understands about the way the language is being deployed. Now we return to the testimony of the national archivist office, and here is where it gets really interesting.
During testimony to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) officials were asked specifically about Trump documents and how they could *KNOW* fulsome return of documents had not taken place. The response from the NARA officials is enlightening:
Notice that NARA had knowledge these documents were in the possession of Trump and were pertinent to their archive retrieval. It was interesting at the time that NARA would know the content of the President Obama letter, and further interesting they would know there was more than one piece of correspondence between President Trump and Chairman Kim [Jong-un]. CNN even wrote about it HERE.
[Irrelevant note: Mr Bonsanko got the name wrong, Jong-il is dead]
Reminder, keep in mind the DOJ ferocity in not wanting anyone to know what documents they retrieved and/or defined.
We know, from President Trump describing the letter left to him by the former president, that Obama told Trump in the letter that the number one foreign policy and intelligence threat perceived by Obama (at the time of his exit) was a nuclear armed North Korea. This is where you overlay the Jack Smith writing in the indictment of national defense secrets and nuclear security issues.
We know, from President Trump speaking publicly about his communication and diplomacy with Chairman Kim Jong-un, that the two leaders exchanged letters relating to aligned national security interests that centered around DPRK nuclear ambitions and status.
Trump and Kim formed a geopolitical truce, a friendship of sorts, based on respect and trust around the nuclear issue. Chairman Kim decreased hostilities; President Trump no longer used inflammatory language about “Little Rocket Man.” A diplomatic détente was created.
NARA was looking for the letter written by Obama that described DPRK nukes, and NARA was looking for letters between Trump and Kim that touched on DPRK nukes.
Now, does the wording in the Jack Smith indictment that pertains to “nuclear concerns” and “national security matters” make more sense?
Would all of this hullaballoo really stem from President Trump not giving up personal letters written to him by President Obama and Chairman Kim? YES! Would President Trump even characterize those as government property? NO!
Can you see the way it unfolds? Of course, when you apply the Lawfare lingo, an approach entirely based on maintaining the targeting of Trump, then suddenly the seemingly innocuous becomes horribly nefarious.
In order to pull this off two things would be needed: (1) the DOJ would need to write about it in a certain way in the indictment√; and (2) simultaneously, the DOJ would need to stop anyone from viewing the actual documents, as they misleadingly described them√. Hey, wait… that’s exactly what they did.
But wait, it gets better….
First, why would President Obama write about the DPRK nuclear threat in his letter welcoming President-elect Trump to the White House? It always struck me as odd, even years ago, when Trump would talk about this issue. It never made sense why President Obama would memorialize that type of an issue in writing, until today.
Normally that type of policy and leadership issue would be part of a conversation. “Mr. Trump, as I depart office the number one issue you might first want to deal with on a national security basis is the nuclear ambitions of North Korea, here’s my opinion”… and so it would go. Why write it down? If the intention was to create a record that would always mean the letter was going to remain hidden from public review, then writing about DPRK nukes would be a solid tool for that motive.
Lastly, who would know about the content of the letter that President Obama wrote to President-elect Trump, specifically as it centers around a national security issue? Who would know what Obama wrote to Trump?
Lisa Monaco would certainly know the content of the letter written by Barack Obama to Donald Trump; she, Susan Rice and Kathryn Ruemmler might have even assisted in the writing of it. Remember, it was Susan Rice who wrote the January 20th “by the book” memo memorializing the FBI targeting of Trump, and Kathryn Ruemmler represented Susan Rice as her lawyer when investigators made inquiry.
Lisa Monaco was previously President OBama’s senior advisor for national security.
Currently Deputy Attorney General, Lisa Monaco is the head of the DOJ operation that was targeting the Trump Mar-a-Lago documents and framing the legal issues for the DOJ to use in court. Special Counsel Jack Smith also reports to Lisa Monaco.
Posted originally on the CTH on June 12, 2023 | Sundance
Nothing shouts “complicity” quite like paying $290 million to make the issues disappear. However, according to the Wall Street Journal, fortunately ““The U.S. Virgin Islands will continue to proceed with its enforcement action to ensure full accountability for JPMorgan’s violations of law,” said a spokeswoman for the U.S. Virgin Islands attorney general.”
In one of the biggest settlements within the banking industry relating to sexploitation, JPMorgan Chase has agreed to pay the victims of Jeffrey Epstein $290 million in damages in order to settle a class action lawsuit against the bank. Epstein used JPMorgan and Deutsche Bank as the financial mechanisms to pay for the sex trafficking operation he ran. There are other civil and legal cases still ongoing, but JPMorgan hopes to extricate themselves from the collateral damage of Epstein’s horrific exploits.
Wall Street Journal – JPMorgan Chase JPM -0.25%decrease; red down pointing triangle agreed to pay $290 million to settle a lawsuit over its ties to Jeffrey Epstein, said lawyers for Epstein accusers, shortly after top executives were questioned about the bank’s years of dealings with the convicted sex offender.
The lawsuit on behalf of women who accused Epstein of abuse helped expose details about the bank’s relationship with Epstein for years after his conviction, forced Chief Executive Jamie Dimon to answer questions under oath, and led the bank to turn around and sue a former top leader, Jes Staley.
Dimon said in his deposition last month that he had never discussed Epstein or his accounts. Staley was deposed over the weekend.
The lawsuit was brought by an unnamed accuser who claimed the bank ignored red flags about Epstein until 2013 because he was bringing wealthy clients to the bank. JPMorgan has denied any wrongdoing. The bank still faces a related lawsuit from the government of the U.S. Virgin Islands, where Epstein had a residence.
[…] “The parties believe this settlement is in the best interests of all parties, especially the survivors who were the victims of Epstein’s terrible abuse,” JPMorgan and lawyers for the women said in a press release.
[…] JPMorgan said that it was a mistake to have any association with Epstein and that it regrets its association with him. “We would never have continued to do business with him if we believed he was using our bank in any way to help commit heinous crimes,” a bank spokeswoman said.
Brad Edwards, a lawyer representing Epstein accusers, said, “A settlement of this size finally acknowledges the magnitude of the suffering of Epstein’s victims, the degree to which our system is broken, and the extent of Epstein’s influence to corrupt our system.”
[…] “The U.S. Virgin Islands will continue to proceed with its enforcement action to ensure full accountability for JPMorgan’s violations of law,” said a spokeswoman for the U.S. Virgin Islands attorney general.
The Doe plaintiff said she was sexually abused by Epstein from 2006 to 2013 and trafficked to his friends. She alleged that Epstein paid her and other victims with cash withdrawn from JPMorgan. She accused America’s biggest bank of profiting from Epstein’s activities and assisting in his alleged sex trafficking by enabling him to make payments to women for sex acts.
Epstein became a client of JPMorgan around 1998, and over the years the bank came to manage dozens of Epstein-related accounts containing hundreds of millions of dollars. Epstein turned to Deutsche Bank after JPMorgan closed his accounts in 2013. Both banks worked with Epstein for years after he was publicly accused of abusing girls and pleaded guilty in a Florida state court in 2008 to soliciting prostitution from a minor. (read more)
Does anyone really believe these banks didn’t know what the background of Epstein was all about?
Posted originally on the CTH on June 11, 2023 | Sundance
I have been reviewing interviews, looking at discussion, and some of them I will share in the next few articles. However, for a solid representation of the state of our current dynamic, as it relates to the targeting of President Donald J. Trump, this interview below is a solid outlook from the detractors.
CBS News legal analyst Rikki Klieman and CBS News investigative correspondent Catherine Herridge join “Face the Nation” to discuss what’s in the indictment — and what it means for Trump. [Transcript Here]
Before getting to the video, it’s valuable to see Rikki Klieman representing the interpretation of the media outlook toward the indictment handed down by Special Counsel Jack Smith. It is also valuable to see CBS’s Catherine Herridge represent the defenders of the institutions, from the outside vulgarian personage of Trump.
Klieman buys the Lawfare narrative completely, including the framework of classified documents as opposed to documents containing classified markings. She sells the Lawfare outline as gospel and makes all assertions from that position. Herridge looks at how the bureaucracy responds to Trump, including how the institutions hold power of determination higher than a President of the United States.
As Bill Barr said emphatically earlier today, “The documents do not belong to Trump,” continuing with “The documents belong to the government who created them, not the man for whom they were created.” So sayeth the defender of the omnipotent Dept of Justice. This is where a sharp intellectual knife to cut through the chaff and countermeasures is needed, and notice no one brings up the visible and practical deconstruction point.
If the documents did not belong to President Donald J. Trump, then why did the government dump them in the parking lot of the White House and tell him to deal with them?
If the documents belonged to the government, and not to the man for whom they were created, then why did that same government give them to him and force him to take them to a location of his choosing? Can you see the obtuse argument fall apart when simple pragmatic questions are raised?
The institutions are presented, by the sellers of the Lawfare narrative, as higher than the authority of the President of the United States. This is how ridiculous our government has become.
Institutions are not omnipotent entities; they are buildings and networks full of people who facilitate processes that are an outcome of policy. Those buildings and offices are not the government. The elected politicians who we send to Washington DC are not subservient to the processes, norms and morays they determine within the bureaucracy that the politicians are in charge of.
The argument(s) against Donald Trump are akin to a business saying that all work product created during the tenure of employment belongs to the enterprise of the business and not to the employee. If you want to hold that line of thought, fine. However, you then need to reconcile that the business enterprise intentionally gave all the work product to the employee, dumped it in their lap, told them to take it and leave, and then comes back at a later date and says – we now need to review the stuff we forced you to take because some of it might not actually belong to you.
Does this happen anywhere else? Of course not.
The fact that the National Archives and Record Administration refused to take custody of the documents upon the end of the White House tenure, combined with the fact the NARA dumped those documents in the parking lot of the White House for Trump to deal with, is a direct statement the bureaucracy was telling President Trump these are your records. His records – not their records on loan to him.
The Presidential Records Act is the overriding legislative guidance for the flow of work product post term in office. These are essentially document arguments. The fact that NARA together with the Biden administration would weaponize the disposition of documents, they intentionally forced Trump to take ownership of, speaks to an intent within the bureaucracy that is transparently obvious.
Bill Barr’s entire mindset is based on a belief the institutions are of a higher power than the individuals we elect to control them. In essence, the President of the United States is subservient to the bureaucracy. This is nonsense. This is also why former AG Bill Barr was more concerned about preserving the institutions than stopping the weaponizing activity that flows from them.
President Trump could store his “presidential records” anywhere he wants to; they are his records.
Now, watch Klieman obscure the difference between classified documents and documents containing classified markings. Despite her pontifications to the contrary, the indictment is not based around any classified documents. The classification of the documents is technically and factually moot to the ridiculous point the special counsel is making.
.
[Transcript] -JOHN DICKERSON: For more on the legal implications, we’re joined by senior investigative correspondent Catherine Herridge and CBS News legal analyst Rikki Klieman.
Rikki, I want to start with you.
You have been a prosecutor and a defense lawyer. So what stands out to you, now that you have read this indictment?
RIKKI KLIEMAN: I think what stands out, obviously, is the magnitude of detail in this indictment.
It’s not only that you’re dealing with 31 counts under the Espionage Act, which simply means the unlawful, willing retention of classified information, or even unclassified information that would hurt the defense of the United States and aid our enemies. It’s the detail of a speaking indictment.
We have to remember that much of this indictment, John, is to educate not only ultimately a court and jury, but it’s really to educate the public. Much of this indictment, in terms of the detail, may not even come into evidence, in terms of what’s admissible or not in the course of a trial.
What also strikes me, John, is, the overwhelming detail leaves the Trump legal team with real need to have powerful motions to dismiss, because, if this goes to trial, the way it reads, it’s rather overwhelming for anyone to be able to fight it on the facts themselves.
JOHN DICKERSON: And I want to get to that motion-to-dismiss question in a moment.
But, Catherine, you have been doing reporting about the risk assessment about just what was in these documents. Educate us on that.
CATHERINE HERRIDGE: Well, what jumps out to me, John, is when you go to the section the willful retention of national defense information, by my count, there are 21 top secret documents, and the disclosure of top secret information has the expectation of exceptionally grave damage to national security.
But what out — stands out to me is some of the classified codings, like TK, or Talent Keyhole. You don’t see that very often. That’s about intelligence from overhead imagery. For example, if we’re looking at a terrorist target, do we have such good visibility that we can count the hairs on their head? Can we see what they’re eating for breakfast on their terrorist patio?
Those are capabilities that we don’t want our adversaries to know that we have. And then also Special Access Programs, or SAP, these are highly restricted programs because of the sensitivity of the intelligence and the technology, such as stealth technology, for example.
Think of classified information like the Pentagon. Special Access Programs are these handful of rooms where there are just a limited number of keys to control and restrict access to that information.
JOHN DICKERSON: So it’s not just secret; it’s the top of the — top of the top?
CATHERINE HERRIDGE: Some of these are way beyond top secret, like, I said, Talent Keyhole, when you’re talking about Special Access Programs or SCI, sensitive, compartmentalized information.
These really are the crown jewels of the U.S. intelligence community.
JOHN DICKERSON: Rikki, let me ask you about a part of this indictment which seems to come — which comes from one of the former president’s lawyers.
Educate us on the crime-fraud exception, how it’s possible for a prosecutor to have this information. And is that a weakness? Because we know, from our reporting, that this is something that the Trump defense team is going to talk about, is the behavior of the prosecutors.
RIKKI KLIEMAN: We all believe that, when you go to a doctor, that there’s a privilege, that what you say and what your ailments are will remain confidential.
Same thing if you go to a clergyperson. And it’s exactly the same thing. When you go to a lawyer. You believe that, if you are a client, that what you say will never be disclosed to anyone, let alone in the grand jury or court of law. It’s called the attorney-client privilege. It protects all conversations relating to legal advice.
So, how did it get broken? That is, how did a court in Washington, D.C., a judge, and then an appellate court affirm the idea that you could hear, listen, read the notes and the voice memos of a lawyer to testify against his own client?
It’s called the crime-fraud exception. So what the court believed was, the conversations between Evan Corcoran, the lawyer, and Donald Trump were really in furtherance of a crime or a fraud, and he was ordered and forced to testify.
Now, one could say, well, that’s one and done. So now Mr. Corcoran is going to be a witness in this case, should it go to trial. But we have to remember that that took place, that decision, in the District of Columbia. Now we are in Florida. So can it come up to a new judge? Might a new judge decide that it is not admissible at trial? Yes.
Will that hurt the case? Not necessarily. There’s plenty of other evidence.
JOHN DICKERSON: Catherine, I have got two questions for you.
The first is, what happens if you’re just a regular old Joe and you have this kind of information? Legally, what happens to you? What’s happened?
CATHERINE HERRIDGE: Well, as one example, I have contacts who work in the nuclear weapons capability arena.
Let’s say you have a nuclear document, it’s on top of the photocopier, and you walk away, you leave it there. Your clearance is gone. You are out the door. There are immediate consequences.
JOHN DICKERSON: Let me ask you about a number of the president’s defenders.
Well, first of all, we should note, the current president is under investigation by a special counsel.
CATHERINE HERRIDGE: Correct.
JOHN DICKERSON: We don’t know much about that. But Republicans have brought that up in defending the president. They have also brought the case of Hillary Clinton.
You have been looking at that. Give us a sense of the apples and oranges or apples and apples in comparison with what’s on the table here.
CATHERINE HERRIDGE: Well, what strikes me, John, in this indictment is I think the special counsel, Jack Smith, specifically charged willful retention of national defense information in an effort to sort of blunt criticism that these cases may be the same.
If you go back to the summer of 2016, then-FBI Director James Comey said that they found multiple e-mail chains on Hillary Clinton’s private server that she used for government business that contained highly classified information, including these Special Access Programs that we just discussed, but, in his view, it should not be charged because he didn’t feel there was sufficient evidence of intent or willfulness.
Critics would say that even just purchasing the server was an example of intent. And then, finally, you have to look at just the scope of the information and also the timeline. But I think this charging of willful retention really is by design.
JOHN DICKERSON: Right, the facts of the case quite different. But thank you so much for that and for all your other answers.
And, Rikki Klieman, thank you.
And Face the Nation will be back in one minute. Stay with us. (link)
Published originally on the CTH on June 11, 2023 | Sundance
Appearing on Rupert Murdoch’s network Fox News, former Attorney General Bill Barr frame his false construct in the documents case against President Trump.
First, the obvious. Barr is motivated in his position because this is the constructed inflection point against Donald Trump. The severity of his position, the pretending not to know things, the defensive position about the power of government institutions, all of it is expressed in sum and total for one primary purpose; this is the moment they have manufactured to take Trump down. This is the DC Republican moment all preceding moments were designed to support.
Second, on the details. Barr states with emphasis, the “presidential daily brief (PDB) is not the president’s personal document,” it is a document provided for him by the U.S. intelligence community (IC). Worth noting here is a little factoid that runs in opposition to Barr:
WASHINGTON – […] “while through most of its history the document has been marked “For the President’s Eyes Only,” the PDB has never gone to the president alone. The most restricted dissemination was in the early 1970s, when the book went only to President Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, who was dual-hatted as national security adviser and secretary of state.
In other administrations, the circle of readers has also included the vice president, the secretary of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, along with additional White House staffers. By 2013, Obama’s PDB was making its way to more than 30 recipients, including the president’s top strategic communications aide and speechwriter, and deputy secretaries of national security departments.” [Source]
No one is saying the Trump PDB is Trump’s “personal document“, the point is the PDB’s in question -those noted in the indictment- were part of President Trump’s papers, his administration records; able to be reviewed and critiqued by anyone the president would assign, including speechwriters. Barr us making a non-sequitur.
Third, Barr notes the documents created by government officials are different from personal papers of the President. Perhaps technically true, an argument and debate that takes place after all administrations. However, if government owned, why did government officials (NARA) then stack the documents in the White House parking lot for President Trump to take.
Lastly, like all pundits and commentators all weekend, everyone is intentionally pretending not to know the difference between ‘classified documents’ and ‘documents containing classification markings’. The former is not part of the argument, the latter wording is artful Lawfare language.
Posted originally on the CTH on June 9, 2023 | Sundance
Good news, bad news and granular news..
First, the good news.The judge assigned to the Trump documents case is U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon. She is the same judge who handled the lawsuit last year after the FBI raided Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate. Judge Cannon was the judge who appointed the “special master” to review the documents the DOJ was claiming were classified, but Team Trump was contending that definition.
Now the bad news. The DOJ is no longer legally arguing that Donald Trump held any classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. The DOJ is arguing that President Trump held documents vital to U.S. defense security. It’s a farce but that’s their position. The classification status of documents is moot, nonexistent, except to create the predicate for the proverbial FBI nose under the tent.
The DOJ-NSD (that’s Lisa Monaco) got a warrant to look for classified documents, but never intended to use classified documents as a case cornerstone because President Trump had full declassification authority. The DOJ got a search warrant by convincing a judge they were looking for something that wasn’t even a violation of law. That’s why the DOJ would not reveal the probable cause affidavit. The search was built upon a fraudulent pretense. “Classified” is a snipe hunt.
You will notice Jack Smith never discussed “classified documents” in his remarks, and the issue of classified documents appears nowhere except in the indictment as a purposeful lawfare description of documents. The DOJ is not legally charging anything relating to the classification status of the documents. That’s the Lawfare and media banter to create a talking point. The term “classified” is all over the indictment, but as a lawfare adjective only; it’s like using the word “stash”.
The special counsel legal framework is centered around documents the DOJ define as vital to “the defense security” of the United States. EVERYTHING is predicated on 31 counts of an 18 U.S. Code § 793(e) violation. The DOJ defines what is considered a defense document, and that intentionally has nothing to do with classification.
The granular news. You might have heard that two of Trump’s lawyers, Jim Trusty and John Rowley, quit today. The media wants to use their exit as a point to indicate Trump is in legal jeopardy; however, that’s not the case.
As soon as Trusty and Rowley saw their forced testimony was used in the indictment, they had no option except to exit the case. Despite the lawyers providing no damaging information against Trump, the DOJ used language in the indictment to turn Trump’s lawyers into material witnesses. Weissmann’s Lawfare tactic create a conflict, forcing the two Trump lawyers to depart.
WASHINGTON DC – Two of Donald Trump’s top lawyers abruptly resigned from his defense team on Friday, just hours after news broke that he and a close aide were indicted on charges related to their handling of classified documents.
Jim Trusty and John Rowley, who helmed Trump’s Washington, D.C.-based legal team for months and were seen frequently at the federal courthouse, indicated they would no longer represent Trump in matters being investigated and prosecuted by special counsel Jack Smith, who is probing both the documents matter and efforts by Trump to subvert the 2020 election.
The resignations were shortly followed by an announcement from Trump himself confirming that a close aide, Walt Nauta, had also been indicted by federal prosecutors. Nauta, a Navy veteran, had served as the former president’s personal aide and was a ubiquitous presence during his post White House days.
In their place, Trump indicated that Todd Blanche — an attorney he recently retained to help fight unrelated felony charges brought by Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg in April — would lead his legal team, along with a firm to be named later. Trump and his team have liked Blanche, who is expected to play a more elevated, central role. (more)
Weissmann, Eisen and Smith are using lawfare in the indictment to put the interests of Trump and his aide Walt Nauta against each other. Obviously, Nauta would not turn on Trump, so the prosecution made Nauta a target for a federal 1001 charge of lying to investigators and will pressure him throughout the case to take a plea in exchange for testimony against Trump. Nauta is the baseline of the “Conspiracy Elements” which require two or more people. Again, pure Lawfare.
Obviously, Jim Trusty was unaware last night that his forced testimony would be used in the indictment. WATCH:
Posted originally on the CTH on June 9, 2023 | Sundance
In the Trump indictment the DOJ is not, repeat NOT, arguing a classified documents case. The entire legal framework is centered around documents they define as vital to the defense security of the United States. EVERYTHING is predicated on this 18 U.S. Code § 793(e) violation:
18 U.S. Code § 793(e) Whoever having unauthorized possession of, access to, or control over any document, writing, code book, signal book, sketch, photograph, photographic negative, blueprint, plan, map, model, instrument, appliance, or note relating to the national defense, or information relating to the national defense which information the possessor has reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation, willfully communicates, delivers, transmits or causes to be communicated, delivered, or transmitted, or attempts to communicate, deliver, transmit or cause to be communicated, delivered, or transmitted the same to any person not entitled to receive it, or willfully retains the same and fails to deliver it to the officer or employee of the United States entitled to receive it.
According to the Trump indictment, COUNT #7 – page 29, a document “concerning communication with the leader of a foreign country” is considered a classified document in violation of US Code 793, vital to national defense interests.
Do you want a historic example of this exactU.S. Code § 793 violation taking place?
(Sept. 11, 2012) – ”Denis McDonough, Deputy National Security Advisor, left, updates the President and Vice President on the situation in the Middle East and North Africa. National Security Advisor Tom Donilon and Chief of Staff Jack Lew are at right.” (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza) [SOURCE]
In Joe Biden’s hands are the notes of a phone call, taken by then Vice-President Biden, recording the conversation between Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as recorded on September 11, 2012. [The night of the Benghazi, Libya, attack on the U.S. Consulate]
Posted originally on the CTH on June 9, 2023 | Sundance
I am deep in the weeds and assembling notes for outlines to be delivered in the next several articles. However, that said, perhaps the only time Mark Levin’s shouting was tolerable was last night as he responded to the indictment of President Trump. WATCH:
.
NOTE: Sixty nine documents in a Deep State rabbit hole! ~Sundance
I have created this site to help people have fun in the kitchen. I write about enjoying life both in and out of my kitchen. Life is short! Make the most of it and enjoy!
This is a library of News Events not reported by the Main Stream Media documenting & connecting the dots on How the Obama Marxist Liberal agenda is destroying America