Shit gets real for Donnie

[JAFF]

https://www.ajc.com/politics/fulton-...B3D5LKA7TIQQM/

Fulton grand jury subpoenas Giuliani, Graham, Trump confidantes

. The Fulton County special grand jury investigating potential criminal interference in Georgia’s 2020 elections has subpoenaed key members of former President Donald Trump’s legal team, including his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, according to copies obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.


In addition to Giuliani, among those being summoned are John Eastman, Cleta Mitchell, Kenneth Chesebro and Jenna Ellis, all of whom advised Trump on strategies for overturning Democrat Joe Biden’s wins in Georgia and other swing states.

The grand jury also subpoenaed South Carolina U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, one of Trump’s top allies in the U.S. Senate, and attorney and podcast host Jacki Pick Deason.

The subpoenas, were filed July 5 and signed off by Fulton Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney, who is overseeing the special grand jury. Unlike subpoenas issued to Georgians, the summons were required to receive McBurney’s blessing since they are for people who reside outside the state.

The 23-person special grand jury has heard testimony in recent weeks from a parade of witnesses, including some who had direct contact with Trump and his associates. But Tuesday’s subpoenas are the closest jurors have gotten to the inner circle of the former president.

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Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, testified before Georgia legislators on three separate occasions in late 2020. His comments, which have become a major interest to the special grand jury, were filled with sensationalist claims and conspiracy theories about tens of thousands of people voting illegally and rigged voting machines that were quickly debunked by state authorities or rejected in the courts. He was suspended from practicing law in New York in June 2021 in part because of his testimony in Georgia.


Eastman, a former law professor, was a key architect of the plan to press Vice President Mike Pence to reject the official Democratic electors in Georgia and other swing states and opt for an alternative slate of GOP electors. A federal judge in March argued that “it is more likely than not that President Trump and Dr. Eastman dishonestly conspired to obstruct the Joint Session of Congress on January 6, 2021.”

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The latest on the Trump grand jury probe
Eastman testified at a Georgia legislative hearing after the election, during which he argued that there was “more than enough” evidence of fraud and improper conduct to warrant lawmakers picking an alternative slate of presidential electors.

“I don’t think it’s just your authority to do that,” Eastman said, “but, quite frankly, I think you have a duty to do that to protect the integrity of the election here in Georgia.”


Mitchell, a conservative lawyer based in Washington, D.C., advised Trump on the infamous Jan. 2, 2021, call that the Republican placed to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. During that conversation, in which Trump asked Raffensperger to “find” 11,780 votes, Mitchell aided Trump as he made unsubstantiated claims about Georgia’s elections.

Graham separately called Raffensperger in the days following the November 2020 elections and allegedly questioned whether the secretary of state had the power to reject more legally cast absentee ballots to help Trump narrow his deficit in Georgia. Graham denied the allegation.


Bob Costello, Giuliani’s attorney, declined to comment and said his client had not been served any subpoena.

It may be difficult for Fulton prosecutors to secure testimony from Giuliani, Eastman, Mitchell, Chesebro and Ellis, since they could argue attorney-client privilege. Eastman argued for the exemption as he sought to block the handover of evidence to the select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack, though he was largely shot down by a federal judge.

Fulton County DA Fani Willis launched the criminal probe into Georgia’s elections in February 2021, weeks after a recording of the Trump-Raffensperger phone call leaked. She’s since expanded the investigation to include the fake GOP electors, Giuliani’s testimony to state legislators and other efforts to pressure Georgia officials to act in Trump’s favor.

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Fulton DA faces biggest decision of career as Trump grand jury looms
The special grand jury has permission to meet until May 2023, though Willis said she’s expecting the group’s work to wrap up long before then. Jurors are expected to draft a report at the end of their service recommending whether Willis should press charges against Trump or his allies, though the final decision ultimately rests with Willis, a Democrat.

Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, several of his deputies and Attorney General Chris Carr have already testified before the grand jury. Gov. Brian Kemp, who rebuffed pressure from Trump to call a special session of the state legislature to reverse the election results, is slated to give a video statement later this month.

Willis is currently fighting with at least two current and former Republican officials in Georgia over subpoenas. Attorneys for Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan and ex-Sen. William Ligon argued last week that the state Constitution shields them from testifying about anything related to their legislative activities.

Explore
'Breakdown — The Trump Grand Jury' Episode 3: Is there a criminal case?
The District Attorney’s office argues that activities that seek to reverse certified election results are not protected by so-called legislative immunity.

“Where dishonesty or misinformation was the result, Members should be subject to questioning by the special purpose grand jury,” the DA wrote in a recent court filing.

McBurney, who heard arguments from the DA’s office and the lawmakers, is currently drafting a framework about the types of questions prosecutors can ask without violating immunity rules.

[omahacolt]

let the charges fly, Georgia.


you will be well regarded in the history books

[JAFF]

Originally Posted by omahacolt

let the charges fly, Georgia.


you will be well regarded in the history books

Somebody grew a pair

[omahacolt]

Lindsey Graham and Guiliani won't obey the subpeona.

what are they afraid of?

innocent people wouldn't do that. yet crickets

[JAFF]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/polit...d152fd2c28b54f

Sen. Mitt Romney says a "classic example of denial" comes from former President Donald Trump's false claims that he won the 2020 election, defeating President Joe Biden in a landslide victory.

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"Perhaps this is a branch of the same delusion that leads people to feed money into slot machines: Because I really want to win, I believe that I will win," Romney, a former GOP presidential nominee who represents Utah in the Senate, wrote in a July 4 essay in The Atlantic.

The essay takes aim at "wishful thinking" across the political spectrum and the nation's "blithe dismissal of potentially cataclysmic threats."

"More and more, we are a nation in denial," he wrote. "I have witnessed time and again—in myself and in others—a powerful impulse to believe what we hope to be the case."

He cited other examples of denial: drought as part of a reversible cycle, the debt taking care of itself with economic growth and the January 6 insurrection being a "false-flag operation."

"When entire countries fail to confront serious challenges, it doesn't end well," he warned. "During the past half century, we Americans have lived in a very forgiving time, and seeing the world through rose-colored glasses had limited consequences."

Romney, who voted twice to convict Trump in his impeachment trials, said leadership is the cure for "wishful thinking." But he's not looking to Trump or giving Biden high marks.

"President Joe Biden is a genuinely good man, but he has yet been unable to break through our national malady of denial, deceit, and distrust," he wrote. "A return of Donald Trump would feed the sickness, probably rendering it incurable."

[Spike]

I'm not much of a fan of Mitt Romney, but I will thank him for this statement.

As Biden approached the one-year mark in office last month, Romney said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the president has had “52 weeks of bad weeks.”

Romney listed inflation, higher gas prices, the southern border, lack of COVID-19 tests available amid the omicron variant surge, the U.S. troop withdrawal in Afghanistan, and Russia threatening Ukraine among the areas in which the Biden administration has dropped the ball.

https://www.deseret.com/utah/2022/2/...nistitute-utah

[JAFF]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/polit...56027634c1176c

Judge Holds Real Estate Giant Cushman and Wakefield in Contempt Over Donald Trump Case

On Tuesday afternoon, a clearly irked Justice Arthur F. Engoron signed an order ripping into the real estate behemoth for missing a deadline to turn over documents—after having two months to meet it.


In his order, Engoron said he “is incredulous as to why Cushman & Wakefield would wait until two days after the court-ordered deadline had lapsed to initiate the process of asking for yet another extension.”

He criticized the company, which routinely helped Trump value properties in ways that benefited him directly, for dragging its feet.

“Cushman & Wakefield fails to identify any good cause” for blowing the deadline, he wrote.

The massive, national real estate firm was supposed to deliver documents related to its valuations of all kinds of properties—so that state investigators could compare how the company treated other projects compared to Trump developments.

The office of New York Attorney General Letitia James issued subpoenas between September 2021 and February 2022 that the firm still hadn’t complied with, so the judge ordered the company play ball in April. But the firm fought that in appellate court—and lost.


2022 is shaping up to be a legal nightmare for Trumpworld. Here's a timeline of upcoming court cases and legal obstacles.


2022 is shaping up to be a legal nightmare for Trumpworld. Here's a timeline of upcoming court cases and legal obstacles.

Donald Trump and his allies are facing a flurry of legal challenges this year.
Investigations into his company's finances are ongoing, along with others related to January 6.

Here are the dates to watch out for this year.

Former President Donald Trump has had a number of surprising legal victories ever since he left the White House — though his greatest potential battles are still looming.

In November, Summer Zervos, who had accused Trump of sexual assault following her appearance on "The Apprentice," dropped her lawsuit against him before he was forced to sit for a deposition. At around the same time, a New York state judge dismissed a lawsuit from Michael Cohen seeking to have the Trump Organization reimburse his legal fees for work he did on Trump's behalf.

But greater dangers loom. The Trump Organization is the subject of a sprawling investigation from the Manhattan district attorney's office and the New York attorney general's office into alleged financial misconduct.

In Atlanta, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is weighing charges over his conduct in the 2020 election. Those investigations are proceeding as the Justice Department comes up on the five-year deadline to prosecute Trump over acts of possible obstruction that former Special Counsel Robert Mueller III scrutinized as part of his investigation into Russia's interference in the 2016 election.

Meanwhile, the Biden administration is sending a steady stream of Trump's White House records to the House committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. And Trump — along with many of his allies — face federal investigations and lawsuits stemming from the January 6 insurrection. Expect the judges in those cases to set court dates later this year.

While Trump mulls whether to run for president again in 2024, 2022 is shaping up to be a year of legal headaches for the former president and his associates. Here's a timeline of the threats Trumpworld faces.

Read the original article on Business Insider
Judge Engoron then set a new deadline for Cushman and Wakefield to deliver the goods: June 29. The real estate firm then missed that deadline.

Time is of the essence. State investigators are set to interview former President Donald Trump and two of his children—Don Jr. and Ivanka—in closed-door depositions the week of July 18. And investigators have said they need to review the evidence from Cushman and Wakefield before those interviews.

But on Wednesday at 11:32 p.m., with less than half an hour to go before the midnight deadline, the real estate company’s lawyers filed a document in court asking the judge for a last-minute delay.

On Friday, the A.G.’s office asked the judge to step in and force the company to comply with a subpoena to turn over key evidence.

In his letter, Assistant Attorney General Austin Thompson noted that the real estate company had actually slipped up by seeming to admit that it didn’t do any work at all for several weeks because it had essentially made a stupid bet and lost—holding off on accumulating the mountains of evidence because it thought its appeal would win.

He pointed to this sentence in an affidavit—written on the very last day of the deadline—by the outside company helping Cushman and Wakefield sort through the evidence: “Platinum has been working around the clock for more than a week to accomplish its delegated tasks.”

Thompson pointed out that the real estate firm had eight weeks—not one—to get started.

“This suggests that Cushman waited until [it lost its appeal] to begin the process of compliance in earnest. If Cushman made a strategic decision to assume it would obtain a stay and to not use the eight weeks since the April 26 order to prepare to comply, it is not incumbent upon [the attorney general’s office] or the court to relieve it from the consequences of that decision,” he wrote.

In a statement to The Daily Beast on Tuesday, the company said it “has gone to great expense and effort to identify, collect, review and produce the massive set of documents.” It criticized the attorney general for “misleading the court by belittling our significant efforts to comply with the court’s order.”

[JAFF]

Cipollone reaches deal to give transcribed interview to January 6 committee Friday

https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/06/polit...eek/index.html

Trump White House Counsel Pat Cipollone has reached a deal with the January 6 committee to participate in a transcribed interview behind closed doors on Friday, multiple sources told CNN.

Cipollone will be appearing under subpoena. A source familiar with his thinking says Cipollone intended to comply with the subpoena issued on June 29 for a July 6 interview, and it was extended until July 8. The interview will be on video, two of the sources told CNN.

Cipollone, who many former administration officials credit with helping to prevent then-President Donald Trump from taking legally questionable actions in the months around the 2020 presidential election, has long been considered a key witness by the committee. He has resisted talking further with the committee after previously sitting for a closed-door interview on April 13.
The New York Times first reported that Cipollone would testify behind close doors Friday.
A spokesperson for the committee declined to comment.
CNN has previously reported ahead of the interview being set that the topics would limited to specific topics to avoid privilege issues, a lawyer familiar with Cipollone's thinking has told CNN.


The committee said in its subpoena letter that it has obtained evidence that Cipollone is "uniquely positioned to testify," but he had "declined to cooperate" past that interview, leaving the panel with "no choice" but to issue the subpoena. During recent public hearings, members of the panel publicly pressured Cipollone to testify.

Mississippi Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson, the panel's chairman, and Wyoming Republican Rep. Liz Cheney, the panel's vice chairwoman, said in a statement after issuing the subpoena that "the Select Committee's investigation has revealed evidence that Mr. Cipollone repeatedly raised legal and other concerns about President Trump's activities on January 6 and in the days that preceded."

Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a California Democrat who's also a member of the committee, previously told CNN's Anderson Cooper on "AC360" that the panel was willing to work through privilege issues with Cipollone to facilitate his testimony.
Lofgren said there are "quite a few things that he could tell the committee that would not be subject to privilege."

[JAFF]

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/don...-dut-rcna37479

Jan. 6 panel: Ex-White House lawyer spoke of 'Trump’s supreme dereliction of duty'
The statement came amid reports that former Trump White House lawyer Pat Cipollone had invoked executive privilege for some questions Friday.
Image: Pat Cipollone
Pat Cipollone waits for the beginning of a Cabinet meeting in the East Room of the White House on May 19, 2020.Alex Wong / Getty Images file
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July 10, 2022, 1:37 AM EDT
By Dennis Romero
The House Jan. 6 committee Saturday issued a statement describing the input of an ex-White House lawyer as "reinforcing" alleged misconduct by former President Donald Trump.

The idea that the former Trump White House counsel Pat Cipollone might have confirmed others witnesses' damning accounts in his much-anticipated private interview Friday was initially tempered by the possibility that he may have invoked executive privilege, a legal concept intended to allow presidents to speak freely with legal advisers.

Responding to multiple reports that Cipollone had invoked that privilege during his daylong testimony under subpoena, a committee spokesman suggested a different storyline.

"In our interview with Mr. Cipollone, the Committee received critical testimony on nearly every major topic in its investigation, reinforcing key points regarding Donald Trump’s misconduct and providing highly relevant new information that will play a central role in its upcoming hearings," the statement from House Select Committee spokesman Tim Mulvey read.

It continued: "This includes information demonstrating Donald Trump’s supreme dereliction of duty."

Trump and his representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment late Saturday.

Mulvey did not confirm or deny the reports on privilege, but said Cipollone was never guided by the panel to avoid potentially privileged information.

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In fact, the statement suggests that in Cipollone, the committee got another voice to back up some of the vivid testimony of Cassidy Hutchinson, assistant to former Trump Chief of Staff Mark

'Closing argument': Jan. 6 panel makes final hearings push
She testified that on Jan. 6, 2021, Trump was filled with rage and ordered his Secret Service detail to take him to the Capitol so he could join supporters who would eventually enter the complex and attack police while trying to reach lawmakers and Vice President Mike Pence, all participating in certifying Trump's loss.

She said Secret Service agents in a presidential SUV with Trump refused to take him, and the president lunged for the steering wheel from behind the front seats and then tried to grab the throat of one agent, claims Trump has denied.

She also testified that Trump showed no sympathy for Pence as the rioters were getting potentially life-threateningly close to the vice president and Trump allegedly had the time and the power to call them off. The former president has denied this as well.

On Saturday Mulvey said in the committee's statement that Cipollone "corroborated key elements of Cassidy Hutchinson's testimony."

[Lov2fish]

When are you going to start posting the negative shit Biden does/done? You seem hellbent on dragging one tard through the mud while seemingly giving the other tard a pass.