US Politics Mega-thread - Page 1116

As a lobbyist and lawyer, David Bernhardt fought for years on behalf of a group of California farmers to weaken Endangered Species Act protections for a finger-size fish, the delta smelt, to gain access to irrigation water.

As a top official since 2017 at the Interior Department, Mr. Bernhardt has been finishing the job: He is working to strip away the rules the farmers had hired him to oppose.

Last week President Trump said he would nominate Mr. Bernhardt to lead the Interior Department, making him the latest in a line of officials now regulating industries that once paid them to work as lobbyists. Others include Andrew Wheeler, a former coal lobbyist who now heads the Environmental Protection Agency after the resignation of Scott Pruitt amid ethics scandals. William Wehrum, the nation’s top clean-air regulator, is a lawyer whose former clients included coal-burning power plants and oil giants.

If confirmed as the next Secretary of the Interior, Mr. Bernhardt would succeed Ryan Zinke, who left in January under a cloud of ethics investigations.

On February 14 2019 00:58 Plansix wrote:
The grift is the Trump administration goes beyond anything I’ve ever seen or read about. It is so brazen and overt. The next two years of the House ripping into that is going to be both fun and depressing.

WASHINGTON — A federal judge ruled on Wednesday that Paul Manafort, President Trump’s former campaign chairman, repeatedly lied to prosecutors after he agreed to cooperate with the special counsel’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.

The decision by Judge Amy Berman Jackson of United States District Court may affect the sentence she hands out in the coming weeks to Mr. Manafort, 69. Judge Jackson said that Mr. Manafort had intentionally lied about his contacts with a Russian associate during the campaign and after Mr. Trump was elected.

Prosecutors have said that the associate, Konstantin V. Kilimnik, has ties to Russian intelligence services. The judge also found that Mr. Manafort had lied about a payment that was routed through a pro-Trump political action committee to cover his legal bills, and about information relevant to another undisclosed investigation underway at the Justice Department.

Mr. Manafort was convicted last year of eight felonies, including tax and bank fraud. He later pleaded guilty to two additional conspiracy counts in a case before Judge Jackson, and agreed at that point to cooperate with prosecutors from the office of the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III.

Judge Jackson ruled in Mr. Manafort’s favor on two issues. She decided that prosecutors had failed to prove their assertion that Mr. Manafort had deceived them about Mr. Kilimnik’s role in a conspiracy to obstruct justice to which Mr. Manafort pleaded guilty. And she decided that the prosecutors failed to establish that Mr. Manafort had lied about later contacts with Trump administration officials.

On February 14 2019 10:35 Mohdoo wrote:
Huge news: Judge agrees Paul Manafort lied about 3 of the 5 things he talked about. That means Mueller was able to provide evidence proving he lied. That means Mueller has evidence Manafort did not think would come out. That means Manafort and Trump underestimated Mueller.

Remember: Republicans were at one point saying the entire idea of the Trump Tower meeting was insane and clearly just a conspiracy theory.

REMEMBER who those people were, both on TL and in person. Consider what they say through that lens.

Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/13/us/politics/manafort-mueller.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur&fbclid=IwAR3xWb8ooqo_hWtMhYzqEJHjGyLZM0BIWMaNms6FC1Efdm8QuJe1HXVB2HY

On February 14 2019 11:06 Introvert wrote:


I'm having trouble following the logical chain here, what Trump Tower conspiracy and what does that have to do with this story?

On February 14 2019 11:12 Mohdoo wrote:


Trump tower meeting never happened --> wait yeah it did, about adoptions --> wait no it was campaign related --> wait yeah so...shit --> [other major developments] --> Mueller proves Manafort lied about working with Russians on campaign related goals.

Remember when people kept insisting Flynn was innocent? And same for Manafort? I remember! Many people have moved the goalpost so far from where it was a year ago that they aren't considering how they would have reacted to modern news a year ago.

On February 14 2019 11:23 Plansix wrote:
Kinda doubt it going to be over soon. With the naked criminality around Trump and his very not smart family, the investigations are likely to never end. After all, these are pretty bad and brazen criminals.

And remember kids, this is why Harry Truman put his peanut farm in a blind trust. Because it is literally impossible to be president and not run afoul of laws if you don't put your assets in a blind trust. The trust is there to protect you from your new, very hard job as president.

On February 14 2019 11:26 Introvert wrote:


I mean this Meuller part, at least that's what all the "experts" say, and people have been leaving his staff. Prob why Adam Schiff is now out there saying they are going to keep Trump-Russia alive. It can't be allowed to die.

On February 14 2019 11:26 Introvert wrote:


I mean this Meuller part, at least that's what all the "experts" say, and people have been leaving his staff. Prob why Adam Schiff is now out there saying they are going to keep Trump-Russia alive. It can't be allowed to die.