Category Archives: Trump Administration

Have you Met John Durham?

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Attorney General Bill Barr is moving in mach speed to clean up the swamp it seems. Just remember too that timing is everything in Washington DC. Barr is working presently with DNI Dan Coates, CIA Director Gina Haspel and FBI Director Chris Wray on the early stages of the misconduct of government agencies.

When a Special Counsel is assigned, they are generally provided a file to review where the evidence and testimonies gathered so far. So, meet John Durham, the U.S. Attorney in Connecticut that AG Barr just assigned to examine all things as to how the whole Russian collusion scandal began.

John Durham Named Interim U.S. Attorney; Presidential ...

Durham has been reviewing the case actually for several weeks, which was noted a few weeks ago in Barr’s testimony before a Senate hearing. The focus of the Durham assignment is to review the use of FBI informants (read spies), improper use of the FISC and warrants and the counterintelligence operation.

We may soon find out just how many CIA/FBI operatives were assigned to all things Trump including who Stefan Halper really was working for and who is alleged assistant was, named Azra Turk.

Durham has a stellar pit bull reputation. He has worked in government law since he graduated from last school in the late 1970’s. Imagine the cases…

As The Federalist noted, consider the following:

While Comey’s record on truth-telling is decidedly mixed, he is correct that facts matter and that the FBI’s use of informants is governed by strict guidelines. How and why many of those guidelines came to be are important facts that the American public deserves to know as it considers revelations that the FBI used wiretaps and spies to surveil Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, his transition, and perhaps even his presidential administration.

Those guidelines, many of which the Government Accountability Office found were not being followed as recently as 2015, were put in place after rogue FBI agents working in the Boston field office routinely worked to cover up murders committed by their informants. You might say they were the direct result of justifiable attacks on the FBI for unconscionable violations of the public trust.

In fact, years-long violations of the rules about the FBI’s use of secret spies have led to massive investigations across every branch of government, including a multi-volume, 3,528-page congressional investigative report in 2003, a scathing 314-page report from the Department of Justice (DOJ) inspector general in 2005, and even a scathing 228-page, $102 million ruling against the government in 2007 after a federal judge ruled that the FBI deliberately withheld evidence, leading to the wrongful convictions of four men, in order to protect a mob informant. (Three of the men were originally sentenced to death; two died in prison awaiting justice for a crime they didn’t commit.)

Attorney General Michael Mukasey enlisted Durham to investigate the destruction of the CIA video tapes regarding the enhanced interrogation operations of terror detainees. His mandate was to only look at the chance the interrogations went beyond the guidelines. Both Eric Holder Michael Mukasey and John Durham all concluded the interrogators all acted in good faith within the guidance and no one was prosecuted with respect to the interrogations or the destruction of the tapes.

From 1975 to 1977, Mr. Durham worked as a Volunteer in Service to America (VISTA) on the Crow Indian Reservation in Montana.

Mr. Durham graduated, with honors, from Colgate University in 1972 and the University of Connecticut School of Law in 1975.

Mr. Durham has served as an Instructor in the Criminal Justice Department at the University of New Haven, as a Moot Court Judge at the Yale School of Law, and as a lecturer for the Connecticut Bar Association.

 

#Occupy Venezuelan Embassy in Washington DC

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Enter Madea Benjamin, only to refuse to leave. #OccupyVenezuela or something like that. And…the ANSWER Coalition is there too.

The Embassy building, located in Georgetown, is owned by the Venezuelan government and is a protected international compound by the Vienna Conventions. Progressive activists have been working and living inside the Embassy as invited guests for weeks.

The Embassy Protection Collective was initiated by CODEPINK and Popular Resistance, and the ANSWER Coalition has been mobilizing support for this effort in Washington and around the country. Many ANSWER volunteers and organizers are inside the Embassy.

Image result for answer coalition venezuela

“The people inside this Embassy are here at the invitation of its lawful owner, the Government of Venezuela,” said ANSWER’s National Director Brian Becker. “The Trump administration is acting as the world’s number one international pirate as it seizes Venezuelan assets, properties and diplomatic compounds. In pure colonial fashion, U.S. and European entities have grabbed hold of Venezuela’s oil revenue, gold reserves and bank accounts — while openly championing the Monroe Doctrine. We are joining with the people of the world to declare that the days of the Monroe Doctrine are over.”

Becker continued, “Any action to evict the Embassy’s current tenant guests by the MPD, Secret Service or other police agencies would be an illegal and unlawful arrest under both D.C. and international law. What we are doing here in this Embassy is not an act of civil disobedience. International law and D.C. law are on our side. The violator of these laws — the criminal in this case — is none other than the Trump White House and the U.S. State Department.”

A letter was sent last night from the Embassy Protection Collective, with the assistance of lawyer Mara Verheyden-Hilliard of the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund, to the U.S. State Department:

Members of the Embassy Protection Collective are writing to make it expressly clear and ensure all personnel are put on notice that any arrest of persons inside the embassy would constitute an unlawful arrest. We understand from our communications with your office that you are threatening to arrest persons inside the Venezuelan embassy.

Not only are we here at the invitation of persons lawfully in charge of the premises but we are also here as people with lawful rights under Washington, DC tenancy law.

It is our intention to hold responsible any person who orders or effectuates any unlawful actions against us.

We have received no eviction notice and due process opportunity to challenge any attempted eviction as is required by law.

No water or electricity.

Pepco, with protection from the Secret Service, cut electricity and water to the building,” says Ariel Gold, the national co-director of the antiwar activist organization Code Pink. “All of the utility bills have always been paid in full by the government of Venezuela.”

Carlos Vecchio, the Venezuelan ambassador to the U.S. appointed by the opposition government, took responsibility on Twitter for the power outage. Activists have prevented him from entering the embassy.

For the last month Code Pink activists have been occupying the Venezuelan embassy in Washington D.C. Not in protest but in support of the government led by socialist dictator Maduro.

With no electricity, activists who have been living inside the building are adjusting to the latest obstacle in their month-long occupation of the embassy.

Getting food inside has been one of the biggest challenges for the past 10 days, with anti-Maduro protesters and Secret Service barricades blocking most of the doors. Then Thursday, activists announced they would be cutting back on their primary source of communication with the outside world: social media. With no power to charge their devices, there will be less tweeting and fewer video streams…

About two weeks into Code Pink’s residency, Venezuelan and Venezuelan American protesters began to gather outside. They have not left since.

Note, the ones occupying the embassy are (liberal, duh) Americans from groups like Code Pink, Answer Coalition, Popular Resistance and Black Alliance for Peace, while most of the pro-opposition protesters are actual, real-life Venezuelans. Who are the nasty American imperialists now, Code Pink?

And of course Max Blumenthal is in the mix too –>

Video Emerges of ISIS Leader al Baghdadi

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He released a speech about the end of the ISIS caliphate as he sat beside 3 other ISIS members. He praised the attack in Sri Lanka. He has not been seen in an estimated 5 years. He urged his members to persevere and continue fighting everywhere. The authenticity of the video remains unclear, which is the same for his whereabouts.

Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was pictured in a new video for the first time since July 2014, SITE Intelligence Group said Monday.

The video was released by ISIS’s propaganda arm al-Furqan.

Rumors of al-Baghdadi’s death have persisted as ISIS militants who have surrendered to U.S.-backed coalition forces, believed their ideological leader abandoned their cause.

Baghdadi also suffers from diabetes, high blood pressure and injuries sustained during an airstrike years ago.

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The United States is offering up to $25 million for any credible information that leads to his capture.

Zarif/Iran Making War Noise, Pentagon Ready

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Iran of course is angry the United States declared the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp a terror organization. Well, it is. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif is making the media rounds and he is throwing out words like war, military intervention and conflict. Reinforcing Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s stance, Zarif warned: “If the United States takes the crazy measure of trying to prevent us from doing that, then it should be prepared for the consequences.” He did not give specifics.

Kerry, Zarif named candidates for 2016 Nobel Peace Prize

Zarif is even making noise about prisoner swaps as this shows some desperation including blocking the Strait of Hormuz from maritime oil tanker traffic. Stop the oil sanctions and we can pursue a prisoner swap..hummm. Zarif has also suggested possible cooperation with the United States to bring stability to Iraq and Afghanistan, a priority for both Tehran and Washington, but did not mention Syria.

US Central Command Chief General Kenneth McKenzie said on Saturday that the United States would deploy the necessary resources to counter any dangerous actions by Iran, Sky News Arabia reported.

“We’re gonna continue to reach out to our partners and friends in the region to ensure that we make common cause against the threat of Iran,” McKenzie, on an official visit to the Gulf region, was quoted as saying by Sky News Arabia.

“I believe we’ll have the resources necessary to deter Iran from taking actions that will be dangerous,” he said, according to a transcript released by the Abu Dhabi-based channel.

He said: “We will be able to respond effectively.”

Tensions between Tehran and Washington have risen since the Trump administration last year withdrew from an international nuclear deal with Iran and began ratcheting up sanctions.

Earlier this month, the United States blacklisted Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.

Washington on Monday demanded buyers of Iranian oil stop purchases by May or face sanctions, ending six months of waivers which allowed Iran’s eight biggest buyers, most of them in Asia, to continue importing limited volumes.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and some senior military commanders have threatened to disrupt oil shipments from Gulf countries if Washington tries to strangle Tehran oil exports.

McKenzie also said a reduction of US troops in Syria would be done cautiously.

“On the long term, we’re gonna reduce our forces in Syria, we recognize that, that’s the guidance in which we are operating.”

“That will be something that we will look at very carefully as we go forward,” the general said.

President Donald Trump had ordered the withdrawal of US troops Syria in December after he said they had defeated ISIS extremist group in Syria.

In February, a senior administration official said the United States will leave about 400 US troops split between two different regions of Syria.

McKenzie also said he was confident that the US is going to have “a long term presence in Iraq, focused on the counter-terror mission.”

Marc Elias, the Dubious Lawyer of Politicians

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Marc Elias is the Chair of the law firm Perkins Coie. You know that firm because that firm hired Fusion GPS, then Christopher Steele, the former British spy that eventually gave us that funky Trump dossier.

OOPS: Lawyer Linked To Trump Dossier Was Sitting Right ... Elias and Podesta

The Democrat National Committee paid Perkins Coie at least $7 million for legal work on the matter of Fusion GPS. Not to be overlook, the Obama campaign (OFA) also paid Perkins Coie almost $1 million in 2016 for ‘legal services’. Oh, and the Hillary for America paid Perkins Coie $5.1 in 2016 ad the DNC paid Perkins Coie $5.4 million in 2016.

Sidebar: (the wife of a Fusion GPS employee, Shailagh Murray, who previously worked for the Washington Post went on to work in the Obama White House as a communications adviser. Murray is married to Neil King, who formerly worked for the Wall Street Journal, the very place and time that Glenn Simpson of Fusion GPS was there. And those back channels just keep open with high traffic of shady people…

During some testimony….the FBI general counsel, James Baker revealed that Michael Sussman, a former DoJ lawyer was the point person that got a thumb drive that had documents related to Russian interference of the election and hacking. Sussman..well yes works at Perkins Coie.

Famed lawyer and legal professor, Jonathan Turley had an item from October of 2017 that read in part: Here is the nut of the report:

“Podesta was asked in his September interview whether the Clinton campaign had a contractual agreement with Fusion GPS, and he said he was not aware of one, according to one of the sources. Sitting next to Podesta during the interview: his attorney Marc Elias, who worked for the law firm that hired Fusion GPS to continue research on Trump on behalf of the Clinton campaign and DNC, multiple sources said. Elias was only there in his capacity as Podesta’s attorney and not as a witness.”
If this and the earlier report is true, Elias not only falsely denied any connection between the Clinton campaign and the dossier to two New York Times reporters but sat silently as Podesta gave false information to congressional investigators.

Okay now that we have that part covered, let us move on to Kamala Harris shall we? When she launched her presidential campaign, she needed a lawyer. Yup, she hired Marc Elias. He came with high recommendations from Hillary as Elias worked for her campaign and he also worked for the John Kerry presidential campaign. Elias represents the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, the Congressional Committee and oh yeah, the Democratic Governors Association. Pssst, he also represented Al Franken and his 2008 senate campaign.

Elias is the legal fixer.

During the two highly contested races in Florida including the senate race and the governor race….guess who Marc Elias represented? Yes, Andrew Gillum and Bill Nelson, the democrats and both had to concede. Elias was again the shady lawyer that pulled all the levers for making absentee ballots, mismarked ballots and irregular ballots get counted.

He is the loud voice behind the repeated headlines that the Republicans support voter suppression of youth voters. Hence part in parcel the reason there is a new debate of lowering the voting age. If you just read his Twitter feed, you will see how he plants the seeds of new voting laws. He does have a cool dog though named Bode.

Shortly before the 2016 election, billionaire left-wing donor George Soros gave at least $5 million to Elias and his firm to challenge what left-wing activists allege to be restrictions that deter Democrats and left-wing constituencies from voting, such as photo identification requirements at polling places. In early 2017, Elias joined the board of Priorities USA as it was announced that the organization would begin focusing on similar work. Soros also contributed $5 million to the Priorities USA super PAC during the 2018 election cycle.

Elias recently had a 5 minute Q&A. Of note is the following:

What law would you change, abolish or create?
I would enact universal voter registration and otherwise modernize our voting laws.

How has the practice of representing public officials, parties and organizations evolved over the years?
The field of political law has grown dramatically in size since I started, and has changed dramatically. What was once a side-practice for a handful of lawyers is not a fully-fledged specialty. We now deal with so many more issues than just campaign finance. We need to advise on intellectual property, business law, leases, employment law, and litigation — to name a few areas. As campaigns grow in size so do their legal needs.

Who is your legal hero?
I have a deep and abiding respect for my mentor and fellow Partner at Perkins Coie, Bob Bauer, who literally invented this area of the law.

Sheesh Bob Bauer was a White House lawyer and private attorney for Barack Obama. At that time there were at least three cases of note. 1) the whole Obama/Blagojevich case 2) letters written to TV stations forbidding them from running ads that tied Obama to Bill Ayers and Weather Underground and then 3) the Tony Rezko affair.

Another sidebar: Bob Bauer’s wife is Anita Dunn, who also worked in the Obama White House. For those with a short memory, she was the one who said she admired Mao Zedong….

Ah, so now we have a major Federal investigation in Illinois….no real surprise there except this has to do with the new Governor, J.B. Pritzker. The federal criminal investigation is for a dubious residential property tax appeal that critics highlighted in last year’s gubernatorial race. Those details are here.

Oh…guess who is the lawyer of record for Pritzker? SURPRISE it is….Marc Elias. Can you imagine the case files he has on democrats and their nefarious actions?