Trump Corruption

Foreign Policy reports:  President Donald Trump personally made the decision to curtail the testimony of former chief White House political strategist Steve Bannon before the House Intelligence Committee, according to two people with firsthand knowledge of the matter. Trump acted to limit Bannon’s testimony based on legal advice provided by Uttam Dhillon, a deputy White House counsel, who concluded that …

Mediaite reports: CBS has released a preview of their extensive interview with Ty Cobb, a lawyer for President Donald Trump. And in it, the president’s counsel went on record as saying his client is quite willing to give an interview to special counsel Robert Mueller. Speaking with CBS White House correspondent Major Garrett on The Takeout‘s upcoming podcast, Cobb said …

McClatchy reports: The FBI is investigating whether a top Russian banker with ties to the Kremlin illegally funneled money to the National Rifle Association to help Donald Trump win the presidency, two sources familiar with the matter have told McClatchy. FBI counterintelligence investigators have focused on the activities of Alexander Torshin, the deputy governor of Russia’s central bank who is …

Newsweek reports: Almost one year after President Donald Trump took the oath of office, millions of dollars from his leftover inauguration funds have still not been donated to the charities they were promised to. Trump’s inauguration committee raised a record-breaking $107 million as his administration prepared to assume the White House last year, but very little has been disclosed about …

Axios reports: Steve Bannon made one conspicuous slip up in his closed-door hearing on Tuesday with the House Intelligence Committee, according to four sources with direct knowledge of the confidential proceedings. Bannon admitted that he’d had conversations with Reince Priebus, Sean Spicer and legal spokesman Mark Corallo about Don Junior’s infamous meeting with the Russians in Trump Tower in June …

CNN reports: Steve Bannon has struck a deal with special counsel Robert Mueller’s team and will be interviewed by prosecutors instead of testifying before the grand jury, two people familiar with the process told CNN. He is expected to cooperate with the special counsel, the sources said. The sources did not say when the interview will take place or if …

Starting earlier than usual at 1PM: What kind of questions can we expect Sanders to field? She’ll no doubt receive a few about Sen. Jeff Flake’s incendiary speech on the Senate floor today, which called out President Donald Trump for demonizing the media. There’s also any lingering questions surrounding Dr. Ronny Jackson and the president’s stellar health report, in which …

Axios reports: Steve Bannon, who was inside the White House when FBI Director James Comey was fired and has strong opinions about what happened, “intends to fully cooperate with Mueller,” according to a source familiar with Bannon’s thinking. The Daily Beast’s Betsy Woodruff scooped Bannon’s legal strategy last night. The source said that the White House has placed zero restrictions …

Politico reports: President Donald Trump’s former adviser Steve Bannon refused to answer questions Tuesday from the House Intelligence Committee about his time in the White House, prompting panel members to subpoena him on the spot, according to a person familiar with the interview. Bannon appeared before the committee as part of its investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential …

The Associated Press reports: The White House will hold a press briefing Tuesday afternoon with press secretary Sarah Sanders. Dr. Ronny Jackson, the White House physician who last week declared President Donald Trump in “excellent health,” will provide more details of the President’s medical exam during a briefing on Tuesday. The White House said last week that Jackson would join …

The New York Times reports: Stephen K. Bannon, President Trump’s former chief strategist, was subpoenaed last week by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, to testify before a grand jury as part of the investigation into possible links between Mr. Trump’s associates and Russia, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter. The move marked the first …

This morning Hair Furor is using his famed “executive time” from his cheeseburger-strewn bedroom to launch a tweetstorm of bullshit, including retweets of his own rants from over the holiday weekend. He’s apparently especially angry that former sycophant Steve Bannon is testifying on Russian collusion in a closed-door meeting of the House Intelligence Committee. Bannon’s comments in Michael Wolff’s Fire …

Reuters reports: President Donald Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon will meet behind closed doors on Tuesday with a U.S. House of Representatives committee that is probing whether Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election. The interview with the House Intelligence Committee comes after Bannon’s public falling out with the president over comments Bannon made to author Michael Wolff for …

The Hill reports: Conservative filmmaker James O’Keefe claims in a forthcoming book that President Trump asked him to “get inside” Columbia University and obtain a copy of former President Barack Obama’s college records. O’Keefe writes in his book “American Pravda: My Fight for Truth in the Era of Fake News,” that Trump “suspected Obama had presented himself as a foreign …

Law & Crime reports: The Federal Election Commission (“FEC”) is allegedly turning a blind eye to influence peddling orchestrated by a private prison company which made illegal contributions to a pro-Trump Super PAC. In response, non-partisan public interest watchdog, the Campaign Legal Center (“CLC”) filed a lawsuit against the FEC alleging the agency violated federal law by unlawfully delaying enforcement …

Yet another Fox & Friends fueled furor: President Donald Trump suggested the FBI used the Russia dossier to “spy on the Trump campaign” and “influence the Election” in an early morning tweet sent out Thursday. He also threw out some speculation in his tweet, asking whether the “Dems or Clinton” paid Russians, of the location of “hidden and smashed DNC …

The Hill reports: President Trump said Wednesday it is “unlikely” he will have to sit down with special counsel Robert Mueller for an interview, arguing that there was “no collusion” between his campaign and Russia. Trump repeatedly dodged whether he would submit to an interview with Mueller by citing his claim there was no collusion during the 2016 presidential election. …

Vox reports: Yesterday Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) ignored the objections of her Republican colleagues on the Senate Intelligence Committee and released the full transcript of Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson’s extensive congressional testimony about Christopher Steele’s famous dossier on Donald Trump and Russia. Today, President Trump woke up angry and tweeting about the situation — pretending that there’s something illegal …

And his first year isn’t even over yet. The Washington Post reports: President Trump has broken 2,000. With just 10 days before he finishes his first year as president, Trump has made 2,001 false or misleading claims in 355 days, according to our database that analyzes, categorizes and tracks every suspect statement uttered by the president. That’s an average of …

USA Today reports: President Trump’s companies sold more than $35 million in real estate in 2017, mostly to secretive shell companies that obscure buyers’ identities, continuing a dramatic shift in his customers’ behavior that began during the election, a USA TODAY review found. In Las Vegas alone, Trump sold 41 luxury condo units in 2017, a majority of which used …