Look at this video.
Yes, there’s all the lie-packed verbal spew. He hits all the usual notes… witch hunt, conflicts of interest, investigators are all democrats, Hillary Clinton, blah blah blah. Shouldn’t have hired Sessions. He dials up the inflammatory rhetoric by calling the raid an “attack on our country,” Louis XIV-style (“L’état? C’est moi!” ), and “everything we stand for.” Is this a call to his minions to start a civil war to defend him?
But ignore all the words. Look at the body language. Especially in the second half. Arms wrapped around himself, body movements almost like rocking, eyes frequently cast down.
He is terrified.
This is a man who knows he’s about to be caught. He’s fighting for his life with the words, because empty words are all he has.
He knows what’s in the materials that the FBI captured when they did their we-are-going-to-get-everything-by-going-everywhere-at-once-and-not-knocking raid on his long-time lawyer.
WaPo, emphasis added to parts that point at Trump:
FBI agents on Monday raided Cohen’s Manhattan office, home and hotel room as part of the investigation, seizing records about Cohen’s clients and personal finances. Among the records seized were those related to a 2016 payment Cohen made to adult-film star Stormy Daniels, who claims to have had a sexual encounter with Trump, according to another person familiar with the investigators’ work.
Investigators took Cohen’s computer, phone and personal financial records as part of the search of his office at Rockefeller Center, the second person said.
The broad seizure collected communications between Cohen and his clients — including some with Trump, according to both people.
Cohen has been Trump’s lawyer for a long time. How far back do those records go? The campaign in 2016? The Miss Universe pageant in 2013? That’s not that far back.
I am going to guess that Mueller just got proof of crimes involving Russia, crimes involving Stormy Daniels, and who knows what else. To get a warrant to do a raid like that, the Manhattan prosecutors to whom Mueller referred this matter had to convince a federal judge that a) it’s likely to turn up evidence of criminal activity and b) Cohen was likely to destroy or conceal evidence, making it impossible to get by subpoena.
Paul Manafort was the victim of the same type of raid, no-knock, early morning, before being charged with crimes that will likely send him to jail for life.
Sure, this is Trump’s lawyer, not Trump himself. But look at what’s bolded above again. Cohen’s info is probably vastly more well-organized than Trump’s, if Trump even keeps info at all.
Maybe the raid happened because Cohen is Trump’s highest record-keeper.
A very informative thread from a former federal prosecutor (click the tweet for the whole thing):
The money tweet, for those who don’t want to or can’t read it all:
That should worry Trump. It doesn't necessarily mean that investigators believe Trump committed a crime, but it suggests that they believe that his communications would have potentially contained useful evidence. He was, at least, in close proximity of a crime.
Mariotti also notes that judges really don’t like to let the FBI go after lawyers, as it can be used as, or seen to be used as, intimidation of defendants. So there had to be some extra-special evidence for the judge to grant the warrant.
At any rate, for our purposes, Trump’s body language while making his statement above is evidence in and of itself. It’s got consciousness of guilt all over it.
Guilt, and having been caught.
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P.S.:
3… 2… 1… “I never really knew him, he was just the coffee-boy.”
They’ve already erased Cohen here:
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