Congress must appoint an independent counsel and commission to determine whether the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians to win the 2016 Election.
Former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates mortally wounded President Trump yesterday when she testified before a senate subcommittee regarding what she told White House Counsel Don McGahn when she warned him about National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. President Trump fired her two days later.
Although she declined to discuss what prompted her to warn McGahn, because the information is classified and the FBI is investigating Flynn, I think it’s clear from the available evidence that Flynn had 5 phone calls with the Russian ambassador on 12/29 to assure him that Trump was going to remove the sanctions that Obama had just imposed that day against Russia for interfering in our election. No other explanation makes any sense.
I think it’s also clear that Flynn lied to the FBI when they questioned him about those phone calls on 1/25, and that’s why Yates warned McGahn the following day that they had a national security problem with Flynn. Lying to the FBI is a felony pursuant to 18 USC 1001 and his lies made him potentially vulnerable to Russian blackmail because they had transcripts of those calls.
According to Press Secretary Sean Spicer, WH counsel told Trump about Yates’s concerns the next day.
After firing Yates on 1/30, Trump did nothing about the situation for 18 days until after the WaPo published its story about Flynn lying to Pence about the calls with the Russian ambassador. Trump fired Flynn, but blamed the media for forcing him to do it.
This 18 day gap may bring down Trump’s presidency.
Trump later said that, although he did not order Flynn to contact the Russian ambassador, he would have if Flynn had not already done so.
Considered by itself, this incident does not prove the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians to influence the outcome of the election, but it certainly raises serious questions that need answers. For example, Trump fired Sally Yates on 1/30, ostensibly because she refused to back his Muslim immigration ban. However, earlier that day, she had her final contact with the White House counsel about Flynn. Yet, Trump contacted the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel and ordered them to proceed with enforcing the Muslim travel ban without notifying Yates. In other words, he did not even bother to discuss her objections to the ban before he fired her. This makes no sense unless he had already decided to fire her because she was attacking Flynn. Therefore, I have concluded that he probably used her objection to his Muslim travel ban as a cover for protecting Flynn.
Trump benefited from Russian hacking and interference in the November 8th election and he invited the Russians at a press conference on 7/27 to hack into the Democratic National Committee’s computers. If Trump intended to cancel the reasonable and appropriate sanctions that Obama imposed on 12/29, I think Congress has a responsibility to find out if Trump assisted the Russians or merely reaped the benefits of their interference. As Flynn’s lawyer recently said in support of a request for immunity from prosecution, Flynn “certainly has a story to tell.” If Trump assisted, he should be impeached and prosecuted.
With few exceptions, Republicans have resisted efforts to determine whether the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians to interfere with the 2016 election to defeat Hillary Clinton and elect Donald Trump. Given their resistance despite Trump’s unwavering support of Putin and Flynn, we need an independent prosecutor and commission to get to the bottom of this scandal.
Frederick Leatherman Law Blog 
Correction
Deputy AG Rosenstein, or someone he designates at DOJ, is the only person who has the authority to appoint an independent special prosecutor. AG Sessions is disqualified because of his conflict of interest.
Congress can appoint an independent commission to investigate what happened and issue a report, but only the independent special prosecutor can initiate a criminal prosecution.
Our task is to keep pushing and pushing until we get what we want. If we don’t succeed, at least we tried.
I will not give up.
The administration’s argument that Democrats are being hypocritical by protesting Comey’s firing is invalid. Yes, they wanted him fired for stepping on the election last Fall when he announced the discovery of additional emails on the Abedin/Wiener computer before the FBI checked them. That’s a judgment problem. There was no complaint about how he ran the investigation.
Comey is apparently competently managing the Russia Gate investigation well enough that Flynn and Trump are worried about being taken down. That is, both investigations have been handled appropriately.
Therefore, there is no reason to fire Comey. As a matter of law, firing him is obstruction of justice, a felony.
Democrats have a duty to object to Trump’s obstruction of justice.
BREAKING NEWS: President Trump fired FBI Director Comey this afternoon. Although the 3 page letter cited a number of incidents to justify the firing, they are not current incidents. The RussiaGate investigation is closing in on Trump, however, and I believe that is why he fired Comey.
Time to demand a Special Prosecutor.
Comey did his job and he was a little clumsy, but he did it well. He seems to have been kicked to the curb but he will be ok. They play us, keep us arguing amongst ourselves, those rich guys. We think it’s something complicated, but it’s simple. They want more. They always want more. Then when they start crowding each other, they send us, to push back. All dressed up in fancy clothes, and pretty uniforms, but it’s not pretty when our children come home in body bags, or bro ken. And we cry. And we morn. And the game goes on.
Democrits shot theirself in the foot by going with so many lousy candidates. Namely the Pantsuit. Well Benny Sanders did say a lot of nice stuff, that’s about all he was good for, to mouth old populist left leaning good sense. No danger of that ever going nowhere, and they didn’t even discuss his agedness and grey haired looks, because it was too obvious he wasn’t a real candidate, just a supporting actor.
The real ”hackers” were most likely disgruntled democratic campaign workers… who leaked to Wiki… You for real? (Do you drink the Kool-aid that Russians played any part?
It’s too easy to paint one’s distructive hacks with some Cyrillic lettering, that shouldn’t deter real investigations
Try running a better candidate next time, one who can be ”Man enough” to address their f’n supporters at the night they loose instead of doing a melt down.
PS: If the Russians had anything to do with Trump win, they sure must be sorry now that he has morphed into ObammaHitlary NEOCON redux!
Hillary wasn’t a “real” candidate? Then who would you see as a real candidate?
Bernie should have been allowed to go the distance in a real convention. The ”Super Delegate” issue wasn’t democratic in spirit. Democrats are a Big Tent Inclusionary hodgepodge of angry… well… Deplorables with out a purpose, it sure ain’t what it used to be. By the way, when Trump became the worst nightmare of the Republican establishment, he started to look good to many!
Thank you for this post. I don’t even do the “news” anymore because nobody is doing anything about the orange humpty-dumpty. And I just can’t take it anymore. Everything President Obama did was a crime, but with this one, they can find nothing wrong.
Check out Claude Taylor @TrueFactsStated on Twitter. Might give your spirits a lift.
Thank you!
The GOPers will do their best to ignore this. Frankly, it looks to me like Flynn will get away with it simply because all the people with the power to do something about it are GOPers.
The Republicans will certainly resist investigation & prosecution, but they are risking being accused of acting like coconspirators in a conspiracy to obstruct justice. Meanwhile, as I wrote over at the Lake, “Comey admitted in response to questions by Senator Mazie Hirono that there are active investigations at Main DOJ and the ED of VA. Claude Taylor @TrueFactsStated (on Twitter) has reported that a grand jury in the ED of VA may be about to return an indictment.
That would be wonderful. It would put tremendous pressure on TrumpInc to pardon Flynn to prevent him rolling over.