Trump Corruption

MSNBC reports: President Donald Trump’s longtime political ally Roger Stone invoked his Fifth Amendment protection as he declined to share documents and testimony with members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, according to a letter posted Tuesday by the committee’s top Democrat, Sen. Dianne Feinstein. “Mr. Stone’s invocation of his Fifth Amendment privilege must be understood by all to be the …

The Palm Beach Post reports: Paul Manafort’s efforts to make sure his wife could continue living in the couple’s Palm Beach Gardens home should he go to prison fizzled after special counsel Robert Mueller III filed court papers last week asking a judge to throw out the deal because Manafort lied. Also in the plea deal, Manafort agreed to forfeit …

Reuters reports: U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office will make a sentencing recommendation for former national security adviser Michael Flynn on Tuesday, in a court filing that is expected to shed light on the extent of Flynn’s cooperation in the Russia probe. Flynn, who held the White House job for only 24 days, pleaded guilty in December 2017 to lying …

Politico reports: A federal judge on Monday said lawyers for Maryland and Washington, D.C., can begin issuing subpoenas in a lawsuit that accuses President Donald Trump of using his luxury hotel in Washington to unconstitutionally profit from his political office. The attorneys general in Maryland and Washington say they plan to serve as many as 20 companies and government agencies …

Yahoo News reports: Special counsel Robert Mueller’s prosecutors have told defense lawyers in recent weeks that they are “tying up loose ends” in their investigation, providing the clearest clues yet that the long-running probe into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election may be coming to its climax, potentially in the next few weeks, according to multiple sources close to the …

ProPublica reports: Newly released emails about the three Trump associates who secretly steered the Department of Veterans Affairs show how deeply the trio was involved in some of the agency’s most consequential matters, most notably a multibillion-dollar effort to overhaul electronic health records for millions of veterans. Marvel Entertainment chairman Ike Perlmutter, West Palm Beach physician Bruce Moskowitz and lawyer …

Law & Crime reports: Kellyanne Conway‘s attorney husband George was quick to respond on Monday to President Donald Trump‘s latest anti-Robert Mueller Twitter tirade. Trump rattled off a series of tweets this morning, lamenting the latest news about Michael Cohen, praising Roger Stone for having “guts” (i.e. saying that he will “never testify against Trump), and calling Mueller “a much …

The Hill reports: Conspiracy theorist and conservative author Jerome Corsi released on Monday his complaint against special counsel Robert Mueller, alleging misconduct and wrongdoing in the course of the Mueller investigation. The complaint, filed by his attorney Larry Klayman, the founder of conservative watchdogs Judicial Watch and Freedom Watch, requests that the Department of Justice (DOJ) open criminal and ethics …

NBC News reports: A spokesman for Russia’s government said Saturday that only two emails and a phone call took place between President Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer Michael Cohen and Russian officials about a planned Trump Tower project. But Russian officials gave the exchanges no more attention than any other business proposition, spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on the sidelines of …

The Hill reports: Roger Stone said Sunday that he’s had no discussions with President Trump or his team about a potential pardon should he be implicated in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation. “There’s no circumstance under which I would testify against the president because I’d have to bear false witness against him. I’d have to make things up. And I’m …

The New York Daily News reports: Plans for a party celebrating the 25-year anniversary of Rudy Giuliani becoming the mayor of New York City are “fizzling out” because the 74-year-old politico is “too toxic,” according to a source who was invited. Ideally, the fete was to have taken place at the New York Hilton hotel where Giuliani celebrated his election …

The New York Times reports: As Federal Trade Commission lawyers investigated a Miami company accused of defrauding thousands of customers, they were stunned to learn last year about a new job for a figure in their inquiry, Matthew G. Whitaker: He had been named chief of staff to Attorney General Jeff Sessions. “You’re not going to believe this… Matt Whitaker …

Politico reports: President Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer Michael Cohen said Friday he was in “close and regular contact” with Trump’s White House staff and legal team when he prepared a statement for Congress that he now says falsely downplayed Trump’s effort to land a Trump Tower Moscow deal during the 2016 presidential campaign. In a filing seeking a lenient …

Government Executive reports: The Secret Service has allocated more than $90,000 for golf cart rentals in South Florida this winter, ostensibly to protect president Donald Trump while he hits the links. According to federal spending data, the agency is set to pay a Delray Beach company as much as $92,740 between now and June for an unspecified number of “golf …

Politico reports: Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke on Friday accused the House Natural Resources Committee’s top Democrat of “drunken” behavior and paying “hush money” after the Democrat called for the secretary to resign for his series of ethics scandals. “It’s hard for him to think straight from the bottom of the bottle,” Zinke wrote on his official Interior Department Twitter account …

The Washington Post reports: Months after joining the advisory board of a Miami-based patent company in 2014, Matthew G. Whitaker began fielding angry complaints from customers that they were being defrauded, including from a client who showed up at his Iowa office to appeal to him personally for help, records show. Yet Whitaker, now the acting attorney general, remained an …

USA Today reports: A federal judge on Friday set March 5 to sentence Paul Manafort, President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman, after the collapse his plea agreement on charges of conspiracy and obstruction of justice. U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson’s hearing capped a busy week in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election. Mueller’s …

Buzzfeed News reports: President Donald Trump’s company planned to give a $50 million penthouse at Trump Tower Moscow to Russian President Vladimir Putin as the company negotiated the luxury real estate development during the 2016 campaign, according to four people, one of them the originator of the plan. Two US law enforcement officials told BuzzFeed News that Michael Cohen, Trump’s …

“It’s no surprise that Cohen lied to Congress. He’s a proven liar who is doing everything he can to get out of a long-term prison sentence for serious crimes of bank and tax fraud that had nothing to do with the Trump Organization. It is important to understand that documents that the Special Counsel’s Office is using to show that …

NBC News reports: President Donald Trump on Thursday cancelled his planned meeting with Russian leader Vladimir Putin at the upcoming G-20 summit in Argentina. Trump blamed the cancellation on the failure of Russia to return ship and sailors recently seized from Ukraine. But the announcement of the scuttled meeting came an hour after he told reporters that he would probably …