Trump Corruption

Newsweek reports: President Donald Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani branded the impeachment inquiry worse than the McCarthyism of the 1950s and called it a “frame-up.” Giuliani is under scrutiny by federal prosecutors in part because of his activities in Ukraine. The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York has hit multiple Giuliani associates with subpoenas in recent weeks, The …

Axios reports: President Trump keeps losing in court, but his legal strategy is winning as he plays for time, The New York Times reports. Why it matters: Even as the Democrats take Trump to court over ignored subpoenas, he benefits by letting it all bleed out slowly. Voters won’t be learning new damaging facts about him before they hit the …

The New York Times reports: The Justice Department’s inspector general found no evidence that the F.B.I. attempted to place undercover agents or informants inside Donald J. Trump’s campaign in 2016 as agents investigated whether his associates conspired with Russia’s election interference operation, people familiar with a draft of the inspector general’s report said. The determination by the inspector general, Michael …

Politico reports: The anonymous Trump administration official who set Washington ablaze with an op-ed detailing an insider plot to restrain President Donald Trump has vowed to expose their identity as the 2020 election heats up. “Trump will hear from me, in my own name, before the 2020 election,” the official declared in a Reddit “Ask Me Anything” session on Tuesday …

The Washington Post reports: President Trump’s personal attorney, Rudolph W. Giuliani, negotiated earlier this year to represent Ukraine’s top prosecutor for at least $200,000 during the same months that Giuliani was working with the prosecutor to dig up dirt on vice president Joe Biden, according to people familiar with the discussions. The people said that Giuliani began negotiations with Ukraine’s …

The Washington Post reports: Two officials at the White House Office of Management and Budget recently resigned in part over concerns about the holdup on Ukraine aid, a career employee of the agency told impeachment investigators, according to a transcript of his testimony released Tuesday. Mark Sandy, the only OMB official to testify in the impeachment inquiry, did not name …

Via the watchdog group CREW: President Trump hit an important milestone as he returned to Florida over the Thanksgiving holiday: 100 visits to Mar-a-Lago. In 1,040 days as president, he has prioritized visiting his properties over the course of his presidency, making time for nearly 400 visits to the businesses that he still owns and profits from. Of all of …

The New York Times reports: President Trump had already been briefed on a whistle-blower’s complaint about his dealings with Ukraine when he unfroze military aid for the country in September, according to two people familiar with the matter. Lawyers from the White House counsel’s office told Mr. Trump in late August about the complaint, explaining that they were trying to …

Bloomberg reports: Donald Trump denied directing Rudy Giuliani to go to Ukraine to look for dirt on his political rivals, in an interview with former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly. “No, I didn’t direct him, but he is a warrior, he is a warrior,” Trump told O’Reilly in an interview streamed on the internet on Tuesday. Giuliani has said publicly …

A rather fascinating stunt: “Anonymous,” the senior Trump administration official who wrote the blockbuster New York Times op-ed that was turned into a bestselling book, will make a public appearance of sorts — albeit online with an undisclosed identity for now, according to a person close to the author. The author of “A Warning” is hosting a Reddit “Ask Me …

Courthouse News reports: Riding on a unanimous Supreme Court ruling effectively blocking the Trump administration from including a citizenship question on the 2020 census, the House Oversight Committee on Tuesday sued Attorney General Bill Barr and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross for not responding to a congressional subpoena for records on the hotly debated issue. Barr and Ross have refused to …

The Washington Post reports: When Rudolph W. Giuliani went to Madrid in August to confer with a top aide to the Ukrainian president and press for political investigations sought by President Trump, he also met with a previously unidentified client with very different interests. While in Spain, Giuliani stayed at a historic estate belonging to Venezuelan energy executive Alejandro Betancourt …

The Guardian reports: Trump has just sent a tweet thread claiming he would “actually like” his current and former aides to testify in the impeachment inquiry but that he is “fighting for future Presidents and the Office of the President.” This claim should be treated with a healthy dose of skepticism, given Trump’s past assertions that he would actually love …

The Washington Post reports: President Trump has made his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, the de facto project manager for constructing his border wall, frustrated with a lack of progress over one of his top priorities as he heads into a tough reelection campaign, according to current and former administration officials. The president’s son-in-law and senior adviser is pressing U.S. Customs and …

USA Today reports: The Supreme Court on Monday ordered a continuing legal block on a powerful House committee’s access to years of President Donald Trump’s tax returns and financial records from his longtime accounting firm. Acting as presidential impeachment proceedings seemed to inch forward, the court blocked the effect of a recent federal appeals court ruling in favor of the …

The Washington Post reports: Former White House counsel Donald McGahn must comply with a House subpoena, a federal court ruled in a case that could affect the impeachment inquiry. The finding came in a case testing whether top presidential advisers have absolute immunity from congressional demands for information. The ruling in a lawsuit brought by the House Judiciary Committee has …

CNN reports: David Pecker, the head of the company that publishes the National Enquirer, has spoken with prosecutors with the New York district attorney’s office as part of its investigation into the Trump Organization’s handling of hush money payments to women who alleged affairs with President Donald Trump, sources with knowledge of the meeting tell CNN. The America Media Inc. …

The Wall Street Journal reports: Subpoenas issued to people with ties to President Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, and his associates indicate a broad federal investigation into possible money laundering, obstruction of justice and campaign-finance violations, and suggest that prosecutors are looking closely at the work of Mr. Giuliani himself, according to people familiar with the matter. Story is behind …

Axios reports: A federal judge on Monday issued a preliminary injunction ordering the Department of Defense and the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to comply with a Freedom of Information Act request for records relating to the Trump administration’s freeze on security aid to Ukraine. Allegations that Trump froze nearly $400 million congressionally-approved military aid in order …

Bloomberg reports: Rudy Giuliani discussed representing a state-owned Ukrainian bank in a legal dispute over the summer even while publicly pressing Ukraine on behalf of the U.S. president. Though he ultimately did not take on the client, the talks expose his enthusiasm for foreign business and his willingness to insert himself in matters rife with potential conflicts. In fact, the …