Your last point is exactly valid and reasonable. Some people simply can't have rationale debate and instead go to partisan memes when asked to.
Don't see any thread about Trump's lawyer having his home and office raided
- Thread starter fried-chicken
- Start date
Your last point is exactly valid and reasonable. Some people simply can't have rationale debate and instead go to partisan memes when asked to.
It's just become ridiculously repetitive.
Step 1) Trump does something stupid
Step 2) people say, "hey maybe the POTUS shouldn't be doing this stupid thing"
Step 3) Trumpets: "but Hillary reeeeee!!!!"
He didn't, he discovered it in the course of his innvestigation and then referred it because it wasn't in his scope. Pretty standard.
He seems to be "stumbling upon" a lot of things that have absolutely nothing to do with his stated mandate.
And as a reminder, the "Russia collusion" piece of this has yielded exactly nothing of substance.
So far today you have contributed absolutely nothing other than multiple personal attacks and advocating for breaking WC rules.
Yeah Bob, it would be nice if you turned it down a bit. We seem to have settled into some good discussions. I think everyone’s got your point by now.
Right, this certainly has all the appearance of a “Show me the man and I’ll tell you his crime” situation which is not how our justice system is supposed to work.
I can understand that feeling. The roles were reversed for 8 years so it is very familiar. I think a lot of that is natural but you are right that deflecting to someone else who did bad is an extremely weak argument if that’s all you have.
You have to remember though, a federal judge granted a no knock warrant for a lawyer. We are not privilege to the information shown to grant such an unusual warrant, so it's probably pretty juicy.
Exactly. For a federal judge to grant this warrant, there has to be stuff there. Whether or not Hillary broke a law is irrelevant to this case. If the FBI/Justice Department want to, they can reopen any investigation into HRC and go down those trails. But, as for THIS case, something big has to be in there to justify such a warrant being issued.
Probable cause is all you need for a warrant. You guys are acting like this is the first warrant ever and it's unprecedented.
Maybe , but maybe not too . When you start dealing with high level politics like we are here crazy shit can happen . People over step their authority with regularity , sometimes getting reined back in , sometimes not . Time will tell . I can say that if this doesn’t yield some damning info on trump it’s going to be a bad look on all involved . Not saying it will or won’t by the way . IDK
There has to be probable cause of something being there. And they very well may find stuff on this guy that is worth the warrant. I don't think anyone pretends that this lawyer is a saint. But that still doesn't necessarily justify the possible unconstitutional nature of breaking attorney/client privilege IF the intent is to execute the warrant on the hopes that they dig something up on Trump.
This isn't how our laws are supposed to work. The premise given for going into his offices, improper "in kind campaign contributions", was just totally refuted by the last acting FEC chairman.
That's why I tend to think there is SOMETHING there. Because the amount of egg on face if there isn't will be huge. Talk about a shitstorm.
But if they have seized communications because they have evidence that there was something illegal going on, the attorney/client privilege thing is moot. That is voided if you are conducting illegal activity with, or on behalf of, your client.
But it seems like no one on either side fears the shit storm anymore. It's the wild wild west
There really won't be though. If it were a Dem president sure, but if nothing comes of this it will not be mentioned in the news.
Well, the only thing I've read so far is that the FBI drummed up this "in kind campaign contribution" charge. It'd be a problem if the payment actually fit that charge (which the FEC chairman refuted) and if Trump directed him to do it (which we don't know and they probably can't prove yet).
13 Russians have been indicted for election interference. Without his probe they wouldn't have been charged. We'll see what else he's got but he's been productive.
This is all from a Mueller referral. That’s the root of a lot of the issue that I have with this. This should have been outside of the scope and would have been the fruit of him exceeding his scope, which would make this entire thing fruit of the poisoned tree. Much like doing a full search because you couldn’t find anything in plain sight.
These are law enforcement people. They don't ignore a crime outside their jurisdiction they refer it to who needs to check it out. If they heard someone on a recording talking about where they buried a body do you want them to check if the body is Russian before they decide if they are allowed to tell local PD about it?
Unless you're telling me that Russia will extradite them to the US for trial, that's nothing more than a symbolic indictment.
They don't ignore crimes if it's outside their scope they refer it off regardless of the crime.
It's not porn star hush money its campaign finance fraud. Same thing John Edwards was charged with and a serious violation that carries a 5 year prison maximum per occurrence.
This is different though. A special prosecutor has great power with little oversight so should have a clear and limited scope. Mueller got his scope opened up to everything. He’s picked Trump as his target and is working through his associates looking for anything to take them down. You can see this clearly in the fact that the process crimes they are being charged with have nothing to do with Russia. This approach is the exact opposite of what should be happening, where you would first find a crime and then work to find evidence to charge the individuals involved.
If the majority of us had someone looking at everything that we did, no matter how benign we are, they are going to find something that we did wrong to charge us with. There are so many laws on the books that make this possible. We should not stand for this. Especially if they violate attorney-client privilege to do it.
Of course, we don’t yet know the details so this is speculation for sake of conversation.
There needs to be a crime to even open a special investigation. Mueller shouldn't even be there.
You don't know what this is about! Why are you incapable of understanding that trump might have done more than just cheat on his wives?
What do you think Mueller should do if he uncovers a potential serious crime outside of his scope?
Ok, good hot take.
Unfortunately, not only is it not currently a crime it's a normal part of our justice system used all the time by both parties for when investigations involve politically charged issues.
I think a lot of people are missing this point. For all we know Mueller could have discovered information that Cohen had an HD video of trump and Cohen murdering a prostitute attached to the gun used along with gps coordinates of the body in his hotel. We don't know what was found, the judge does, and I'm assuming it was juicy enough to warrant this kind of invasion of privacy. If not, then yes the judge should be absolutely be prosecuted.
There needs to be a crime to appoint a special investigator. That is why it is not used as a political weapon and is not used all the time like you say. There have been four special counsels since 1990.
600.1 Grounds for appointing a Special
Counsel.
The Attorney General, or in cases in
which the Attorney General is recused,
the Acting Attorney General, will appoint
a Special Counsel when he or she
determines that criminal investigation
of a person or matter is warranted
and—
(a) That investigation or prosecution
of that person or matter by a United
States Attorney’s Office or litigating
Division of the Department of Justice
would present a conflict of interest for
the Department or other extraordinary
circumstances; and
(b) That under the circumstances, it
would be in the public interest to appoint
an outside Special Counsel to assume
responsibility for the matter.
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/granule/CFR-2010-title28-vol2/CFR-2010-title28-vol2-sec600-1
That doesn’t have any real requirement that there be probable cause or reasonable suspicion or any other standard. That only has when the AG feels criminal investigation is warranted, which is a wide open standard. Unless there is other law, precedent, or policy that defines what the AG can consider worthy of investigation.
The thing all these ignorant people who are whining about "violating attorney client privilege" (Trump included) don't understand is it does not give the attorney carte blanche to commit crimes.
If Mueller has evidence Cohen has committed a crime, and the judge agreed enough to grant a no knock warrant, then how about we let it play out and see what this evidence and crime consisted of. If it's sketchy, then yes start whining and get Mueller and the judge fired. If it's legit, you will have looked like a fool.
If Mueller has evidence Cohen has committed a crime, and the judge agreed enough to grant a no knock warrant, then how about we let it play out and see what this evidence and crime consisted of. If it's sketchy, then yes start whining and get Mueller and the judge fired. If it's legit, you will have looked like a fool.
How do you start a criminal investigation without probable cause or evidence of a crime? It's not an investigation or an inquiry, it is a criminal investigation, meaning there were crimes committed.
It depends. If it is something uncovered in the course of his lawful investigation but outside of collusion, then obviously turn it over. If it has something to do with Russia or collusion, he’d handle the investigation. If OTOH, he seizes records and communications outside of the scope of investigating the Russian aspect that have no relevance to the investigation and are privileged between Trump and Cohen pertaining to anything not involved in a Russian collusion and he knew that they weren’t Russian oriented and went ahead anyways, then he can’t use them and can’t pass them on either because they should’ve been illegally obtained.
But his damn charter is so wide open that he has access to anything and can investigate everything with no oversight. This is a very dangerous precedent to set.
Actually we do understand that. What other ignorant people are doing is totally dismissing that the stated reason behind the warrant (what is "leaked" to media anyways), is that Cohen paying Daniels was an "in kind campaign contribution" and yet that was dismissed by the last guy who ran the FEC.
If there's other evidence then let's have it. But right now all we have is this knowledge, which is incredibly suspect at best.
So you are admitting that you realize there is a very real chance there is more info, yet you act like it doesn't matter?
Let's re-read what I wrote.
The FBI is, yet again, leaking things left and right to their buddies in the media. What I've read is that the forefront of this entire warrant was the "in kind campaign contribution" angle, based upon the Cohen settlement with Daniels, that they're trying to claim is against campaign finance law. The previous FEC commissioner, the guy tasked with regulating elections in this country, dismissed this outright just 2 days ago.
This is 2018. Nothing relevant that can make Trump look bad doesn't get leaked by our esteemed government officials. If there was a smoking gun beyond this I'd bet anything we would have heard by now. This is why I am convinced Mueller has come up with a big fat 0 in the "Russia collusion" corner, since if he had, the partisans at the FBI would have leaked it to every media outlet in the world by now.
