In this incremental update on the Trump Russia probe it appears that more and more of Trump’s lies and diversions are gradually falling apart. Specifically the original letter he had drafted giving his reasons for firing FBI Director James Comey has made it’s way into Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s hands and what it reveals is not pretty.
The multi-page letter blasted Comey over his investigation of Trump’s Democratic presidential opponent, Hillary Clinton. And, according to a person with direct knowledge of the contents of the letter, it conveyed Trump’s displeasure that Comey would not say publicly what he had told the president three times privately: that the FBI’s probe into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election was not focused on him.
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The draft, which was first reported by the New York Times, establishes Trump’s thinking prior to the firing and contradicts initial statements from White House officials about why he dismissed his FBI director.
But the draft letter, which was prepared with the help of senior policy adviser Stephen Miller and described by people familiar with it as a “rant,” makes clear what the White House eventually acknowledged: that Trump had essentially decided to fire Comey before he solicited recommendations from Sessions and Rosenstein.
The second letter drafted by Rosenstein and signed off by Sessions — even though he was supposed to be recused from the investigation — was nothing but a smokescreen and a sham designed to hide Trump’s true justifications. Both fired WH Chief of Staff Reince Preibus and fired WH advisor Steve Bannon opposed firing Comey saying it would cause more problems than it solved, and Mueller seems interested in speaking to Preibus about it.
Meanwhile Mueller has also received grand jury testimony by lobbyist/hacker/potential spy Rinat Akhmetshin who had attended Donald Jr.’s secret meeting with anti-Magnitski Act and former Russian Government Lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya trying to get negative information on Hillary Clinton last June. Donald’s false letter claiming this meeting was only about “Russian” adoption continues his obvious trend of convenient lies to throw the American people and potential investigators off the scent, placing yet another building block in the obstruction case against Trump while his lawyers flailingly try to argue it wasn’t obstruction to fire Comey — which it wasn’t, lying about it to cover up the attempts to protect Flynn, Donald Jr. and Sheriff Arpaio is obstruction.
All of that is in addition to potentially violating the Trading with the Enemy Act by attempt to erect a Trump Tower Moscow for the third time with financing from sanctioned Russian bank VTB during the middle of the campaign while saying at the same time they had “nothing to do with” Russia.
Mueller has also concocted a scenario to override Trump’s ability to pardon his targets by teaming up with New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman particularly on the issue of money laundering by Paul Manafort, whom has faced increasing pressure since a no-knock warrant for financial documents was issued against his house at 5am.
A new campaign to cut off the Mueller investigation at six months has begun in Congress and on Fox and Friends, although Rep. Schiff says it’s “probably past time” to begin issuing subpoenas to the White House and our relationship with Russia has hit a new low as Tillerson orders 3 of their consulates closed and Lavrov vows “retaliation.”
Also North Korea has the H-bomb, so think happy thoughts everyone. Good times.
[This post is part of a larger series including my original Master Timeline which begins in 1986 when Trump first began talking about becoming a diplomat/negotiator with Russia so he could “end the Cold War in an hour” which has been split due to length into Master List Vol 2 beginning in Mid-June and then current Master List Vol 3 beginning in Late-August.
There are also view previous incremental updates for August 24th, August 17th, August 4th, July 28th, July 14th, July 10th, July 9th, July 4th, June 21st, June 18th, June 14th, June 12th, June 9th, June 6th, and June 2nd.]
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August 29th —
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Trump visits the Texas Hurricane Harvey damage zone and talks about how “Great the Crowd” to see him is, looks forward to being congratulated for doing such a “great job” on the recovery which has only just begun, promises lots of “home loans” for Houston, shows not the slightest sign of empathy or caring for those who are displaced or dead — and also hawks a bunch of his new “USA” hats.
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Daily Beast reports that Felix Sater in order to attack rivals such as former Bayrock CFO Jody Kriss had registered the domain names “IAmAF*ggot.com, IAmADirtbag.com, several variations of F*calBoy.com and F*calMatter.info, C*ntMan.net, Blackmailer.net, and V*ginaBoy.com”
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Former FBI agent Clint Watts scolds Trump’s Houston speech and his focus on home loans “Not everything is about money, people are dying.”
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SecDef Mattis freezes implementation of Trump anti-Trans military policy until it can be reviewed by experts.
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Putin’s favorite congressman Dana Rorhabacher meets Julian Assange and wants to talk to Trump about the Seth Rich/DNC fantasy.
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FBI refuses open records request from lawyer Ty Clevenger who appears bent on getting Hillary prosecuted for perjury saying “there isn’t enough public interest” to honor the request.
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Trump aims to get rid of Obama era rule requiring employers to reporter pay rates by gender and race because that won’t make it easier to get away with employer bias and discrimination even a little.
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LAPD says they don’t need the surplus military gear Trump is now offering after reversing another Obama era rule to limit their distribution to local police forces.
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Trump Jr. is scheduled to meet with the Senate Judiciary staff for a closed door “transcribed interview.”
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Mueller’s grand jury issues subpoenas for testimony and documents from Manafort’s attorney Melissa Laurenza and his spokesman Jason Maloni.
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Black Church terrorized by KKK and Neo-Nazis who claim the “Day of the Rope” is coming which comes from the climatic chapters of The Turner Diaries were all non-Whites are summarily executed by hanging all around the U.S.
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Disgraced televangelist Jim Bakker says a “Christian Civil War” will commence if Trump is impeached. Charles Blow argues that this is exactly by plan and design.
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Rep Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) reportedly files an amendment to a House spending bill that could cut off funding to Mueller’s investigation after six months.
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Fox News goes off the air in Britain for lack of viewers.
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ACLU sounds the alarm that ICE is planning to destroy documents showing their systematic abuse of immigrants.
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Some legal experts say Trump trying to “pardon his way out of the Russia scandal” would be the stupidest possible plan, particularly since it would like trigger local and state prosecutors like Eric Schneiderman in NY to start looking into these matters and Trump can’t pardon anyone from State charges.
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Trump says “All options are on the table” in response to North Korea’s most recent missile launch over Japan.
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UN states Hurricane Harvey’s intensity and record rainfall are likely linked to Climate Change.
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NBC reports that Mueller is looking at whether Trump committed obstruction by manipulating Don Jr.’s initial statement about his meeting with Russians last June.
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August 30th —
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Trump is in his “worst mood ever” with his ongoing feud with Tillerson and Cohn over his Charlottesville comments neither of whom he can afford to fire. He just keeps wondering “When does all this get better?” [You could try asking the transgender soldiers you’re trying to fire for no reason but honestly for you? Never pal, not until it’s over.]
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Politico reports that Homeland Security had warned local police in Charlottesville in advance about violent clashes between alt-Right/Neo-Nazi protestors and others, but on the day of the event they just stood back and did nothing even when a gunshot was fired just feet from their position.
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Fox decides what they’re really missing after the sexual harassment exodus is a young, loud, obnoxious white blonde racist chick on their payroll: so they hire fired ex-Blaze correspondent Tomi Lohren. Meanwhile NBC is in a panic over Fox exiter Megan Kelly who seems to only be able to attract “Old White Guys” to her show as they regret firing popular POC host Tamron Hall. [Whoopsie!]
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Bloomberg reports that the GAO is investigating the circumstances of Trump’s lease arrangement with the government for his Trump International Hotel DC which makes him both the owner/operator and lease holder at the same time.
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TPM reports that TrumpCo had tried to open a tower in Moscow three times starting in 2005 with a deal they signed with Bayrock LLC, again in 2013 with their Miss Universe Moscow partners the Agalarov’s and lastly in 2016 right during the Presidential campaign with sanctioned VTB bank.
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Financial Times reports that Rinat Akhmetshin the former Russian Army Official who is now a lobbyist and apparent private fixer with links to international hacking efforts in support of various friends of Putin who just happened to wind up in a meeting last June at Trump Tower with Don. Jr, Manafort and Kushner spent several hours testifying to the Mueller Grand Jury on August 11th.
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Politico reports that prosecutors are concerned the likelihood of a pardon by Trump may limit their ability to obtain Manafort’s cooperation, so apparently they are coordinating with NYAG Schniederman, who had obtained a $25 Million settlement in the fraudulent TrumpU case in November, to apply state based pressure on him that can’t be affected by Trump. Former Watergate prosecutor Jill Wine-Banks states “I think it’s a brilliant idea, I think it absolutely could work because I believe that the abuse of the pardon power could actually amount to an obstruction of justice”
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NBC news does a panel with Trump voters and one expresses his dismay about Trump’s total lack of empathy. He believes in the message but feels “the messenger is flawed.”
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Philadelphia sues Jeff Sessions over his Sanctuary City rules.
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The Intercept reports that the U.S. ambassador to the UAE. Yousef Al Otaiba, an Emirati national and son of an OPEC oil baron, has been leading a hard-charger double life as a State Dept official and a partier involving sex-workers and money-laundering who happens to be a close personal friend of Kushner and CIA head Mike Pompeo.
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Eric Trump says his father “Ignores all the critics” or else he’d grow “suicidal from depression” if he did, meanwhile Trump tweets more complaints about his critics in “dying magazines” which is not exactly like “ignoring” his critics at all.
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August 31st —
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September 1st —
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Bloomberg reports that Russian cyberbots are now hyping the danger of AntifA activists arguing that they should be declared a “terrorist group” while downplaying the deadly danger of KKK, neo-Confederate, neo-Nazi and Alt-Right violence.
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Mueller obtains a multipage letter that White House Attys had spiked back in May written by Stephen Miller to Comey stocked with Trump’s long simmering complaints and whines about Comey “not publicly stating he isn’t under investigation” even though now he is for obstruction. WH Counsel had found the letter “problematic” as a justification for firing Comey, following which Rosenstein and Sessions were consulted which provided “cover” for a choice that was already decided. Whether this letter includes references to dropping the Flynn case isn’t revealed.
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Cantwell’s lawyer says he “was just joking about genocide” — which is funny where and how, ever?
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Tony Schwartz ghost-writer for “Art of the Deal” says there’s “No way Trump pays that $1 Million” to Harvey Victims.
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Government agencies still haven’t investigated the full impact of Russian cyberbots and troll pushing fake news stories onto social media, or just how many voters where impacted by the intrusion and manipulation of voter registration systems in 21 states.
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Trump gives Kelly a “dressing down” and he tells aides he hasn’t been spoken to like that in his entire 35-year career.
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Russian politician laments Trump’s incompetence “Why did we elect such a President? Trump is a political infant, who is being severely swaddled,” the host continued, to which a female host replied, “and placed into geopolitical coffin.”
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Politico reports, White House aides like now-fired staffer Reince Preibus tried to warn Trump against firing Comey because it could create a political “firestorm.” “It turned out to be what everyone was afraid of,” one adviser told Politico. “A pivotal point for his presidency, and not a good one.”
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Various attorneys begin to argue that Pence’s prior knowledge and involvement in the Miller letter makes him vulnerable to charges of Misprison of a Felony.
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Smoke emanates from the soon to be abandoned Russian consulate in San Francisco suggesting the implementation of the Russian intel process of burning sensitive documents when a facility is compromised.
Russia promises harsh response in retaliation for consulate closings.
Eric Trump claims CNN won't report Trump’s $1 Million pledge to Harvey victims, but they already had reported it meanwhile Trump still owes Sandy Victims and $5 Million for Obama Birth certificate. Besides Trump and Eric can’t use their foundations to donate to anyone because both are under investigation by NYAG Scheiderman.
Chat logs show that violent Charlottesville protestors organized by “Unite the Right” tried, but failed to hide their racism.
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Homeland security designates AntifA a “domestic terrorist threat” even though they’ve never killed or bombed anyone while Right-Wing groups such as the Army of God and Unite the Right have.
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Trump claims “rigged system” based on rumor for GOP Senator that Comey drafted a letter exonerating Clinton before the investigation was complete. He also circumvents COS Kelly’s strict rules for briefing him by making personal calls to his pals like Bannon on his personal phone, which probably violates the Presidential Records Act.
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September 2nd —
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September 3rd —
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September 4th —