Did Donald Trump Just Admit To Obstruction Of Justice On Twitter?
michael flynn mueller Trump

Did Donald Trump Just Admit To Obstruction Of Justice On Twitter?

Update: This is how the White House is “explaining” this (via WaPo):

Trump’s lawyer John Dowd drafted the president’s tweet, according to two people familiar with the twitter message. Its authorship could reduce how significantly it communicates anything about when the president knew that Flynn had lied to the FBI, but also raises questions about the public relations strategy of the president’s chief lawyer.

Two people close to the administration described the tweet simply as sloppy and unfortunate.

Earlier:

You know, at first glance, Trump’s opening salvo in what will almost certainly be a barrage of Michael Flynn tweets over the coming weeks seems some semblance of rational:

Fire

The capitalization is correct. There’s no unnecessary punctuation save the obligatory exclamation point. And it would appear that this was vetted by someone because it’s definitely not what he would have tweeted if he had been left to his own devices.

But maybe it wasn’t vetted.

Because when you think about it for a minute, it kind of seems like he just snitched on himself to 44 million people.

What that looks like is an admission that he knew Michael Flynn had lied to the FBI when he pressured James Comey to drop the investigation. Recall that on February 14, Trump said the following to then-Director Comey:

The President then returned to the topic of Mike Flynn, saying, “He is a good guy and has been through a lot.” He repeated that Flynn hadn’t done anything wrong on his calls with the Russians, but had misled the Vice President. He then said, “I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go. He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.” I replied only that “he is a good guy.” (In fact, I had a positive experience dealing with Mike Flynn when he was a colleague as Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency at the beginning of my term at FBI.) I did not say I would “let this go.”

Again: if he knew Flynn had lied to the FBI when he asked Comey to “let it go,” well then that’s obstruction. Almost unequivocally.

“Trump told reporters at the time that he had been forced to fire Flynn because he had misled Vice President Mike Pence about those conversations, but the White House gave no indication at the time that it knew Flynn had lied to the FBI in a January interview about those conversations – a federal crime that Flynn pleaded guilty to on Friday,” BI’s Natasha Bertrand reminds you, before adding that “Trump’s tweet on Saturday appears to indicate that Trump was aware Flynn had lied to the FBI when he departed the administration in February.”

“President Donald Trump on Saturday made his first public comments about his former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn after Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about speaking with Russian officials, suggesting for the first time that Trump knew Flynn had lied to the bureau at the time Flynn was fired,” NBC reports, picking up on the same thing.

Here’s former FBI counterintelligence agent Asha Rangappa

I think if the President knew Flynn had done anything illegal at the time he asked Comey to drop investigation, then yes, it strengthens the [obstruction] case.

I think it also has to be looked at in the context of both him and others on the campaign simultaneously and blanketly denying any contacts with Russia, when the statement of facts Flynn pled to clearly shows the opposite.

Make no mistake, a whole lot of people have noticed this:

https://twitter.com/Susan_Hennessey/status/937012963172642816

https://twitter.com/waltshaub/status/937010410946953218

And oh the poetic justice if a Saturday tweet is what finally does Trump in…

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

10 thoughts on “Did Donald Trump Just Admit To Obstruction Of Justice On Twitter?”

  3. What he has done and cannot be undone with a correction is this:

    He has handed Flynn a testimonial corroboration card for Flynn when he testifies to this effect:

    1. Trump knew and directed Flynn to make the calls to the Russian in December;

    2. Flynn’s directions came directly from Trump and/or through someone speaking on his behalf;

    3. After Flynn lied to the FBI in 2017, he immediately told Trump what he had done, Trump knew it at that time and before he spoke to Comey, and thus

    Flynn lays the irrefutable foundation, now corroborated by Trump, for why Trump was advised to and thus fired Flynn and needed to simultaneously protect Flynn from prosecution so that Flynn would never roll over on him regarding all the illegality that took place DURING THE CAMPAIGN AND AFTER THE CAMPAIGN.

    It’s why Trump fired Comey. It’s because Flynn held and holds the keys to the kingdom. What occurred yesterday was exactly what Trump feared from the moment he fired Flynn. His worst nightmare has arrived.

    However, we can surmise it was Kushner, the same moron who advised him to fire Comey who advised him to fire Flynn and come up with lie for his firing.

    Now this is something to celebrate!!

  4. Pingback:Did Donald Trump Just Admit To Obstruction Of Justice On Twitter? – ArticleZip.com

  6. Right, so another hilarious routine brought to us by the black-hatted White House and fucking moron™®️ President, is this piece of genius that Flynn was fired because he

    “had misled the Vice President”

    Hahahaahhahahaha

    We are talking about a gang of men and women, e.g., Trump, Pence, Flynn, Kushner, Bannon, Miller, Goerka, Priebus, Spicer, Huckabee, Conway, Manafort, Gates, Trump Jr., Page, and the others, for whom the word lie™®️is wholly trademarked and assigned a logo, and the idea that an act of “misleading” would be the reason he was fired can only be believed by the good people who make up the audience of Factless Foxnews and Brightless Breitbart.

    Recall, Trump repeatedly stated “I love the porrly educated.”

    =======

    As an aside, according to a study conducted by the U.S. Department of Education and the National Institute of Literacy in late April 2013, 32 million adults in the U.S. can’t read. That’s 14 percent of the population. 21 percent of adults in the U.S. read below a 5th grade level, and 19 percent of high school graduates can’t read.

  7. In true Trump fashion, his downfall may end up being due to tweets, and being a cheapskate that won’t pay legal bills. Flynn’s statement sure made it sound like his decision to flip was due, in part, to a million dollar legal bill. Makes you wonder if he wasn’t thumbing his nose at Donald for refusing to help fund his defense.

    1. You never know why I guy like him caves in.

      Just like you never know why a guy who “grew up as a Democrat in a very strong Democratic family,”* hooks up with the likes of Trump. One day he’s pro-women’s right to choose*, coy on same sex-marriage*, and the next day not so much so.**

      He comes from humble beginnings, made his way up to the rank of a three star and head of the DIA, screwed the pooch somewhere along the way and got fired by Obama*** and decided to make some money in the wrong places, e.g., Russia and Turkey, where his prior assignments put him with the DIA and as a military man. The taste of money, fame and power simply took him where many men have gone before, crashing into the wall.

      He probably woke up one morning and realized that wearing the black hat, broke, facing prison with his son, and being etched in history on the very worng side when he a last chance opportunity to right his ways was best for him and his family in every respect.

      *http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/10/politics/lt-gen-michael-flynn-donald-trump-vice-president-abc-this-week-dallas-shooting/

      **https://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/michael-flynn-abortion-stance-225401

      ***https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/08/us/politics/obama-flynn-trump.html

  9. Guaranteed nothing-burger on this – its not testimony and its out of context. The narrative will be that it was a figure of speech – that he just omitted the tag line “….as we now know….” inadvertently or due to Twitter space limitations.

    Believe me, I’d enjoy it to mean something because it will win me a money bet – but I’m not only not counting my money, I’ll be transferring funds to make good on the bet on New Years Eve. Hmm, I guess I’ll sell some TSLA.

    I’m not sure it matters anymore, to him or anyone else. If they get the tax bill through I’m assuming he can tell his kids “you’re welcome, I just made you $2B when I kick the bucket, so let’s get the hell out of here”

Monthly Letters

Monthly Letter

The Consultant

Monthly Letter

Survival Of The Richest

Monthly Letter

Turning Point

Order Now

NEWSROOM crewneck & prints