How Could We Know Who Colluded If The Three People Most Closely Associated with Collusion Never Talked?
The three persons most associated with Russian collusion who were also associated with Donald Trump were Paul Manafort, Roger Stone, and Donald Trump Jr. We know that Paul Manafort, Donald Trump's original Campaign Manager, gave election information to the Russians. Roger Stone, who has been friends with Donald Trump for about 40 years, said he met with Julian Assange, the man who ran Wikileaks, the company that distributed stolen Clinton campaign emails, right around the time that Wikileaks was releasing the Clinton campaign stolen emails. Later, Roger Stone said he was only joking after the Mueller investigation began. Donald Trump Jr. accepted an offer for help from the Russian’s offered via Rob Goldstone in an email.
About The Alleged Collusion Of Paul Manafort And Roger Stone
Paul Manafort originally said that he wanted to cooperate with Mueller, then ended up not doing it, Roger Stone took the Fifth Amendment on Thursday, and has consistently indicated that he would not cooperate with Mueller’s team. Manafort is facing jail time, and Stone is facing a trial and possible jail time. if the Trump Campaign committed no conspiracy with Russia, why did both of them refuse to cooperate with Mueller? Why did they refuse to cooperate if no one did anything wrong? Why did Manafort say he wanted to cooperate, then pretend to cooperate, then lie when he was supposedly cooperating, and then refuse to cooperate?
Also, why did about 14 members of the Trump Campaign have about 100 contacts with the Russians, most of the contacts while these members of the Trump Campaign were right in the middle of the Presidential campaign? if they were not trying to get the Russians to help them, what were they doing? Were they talking about how much the Russians hated sanctions, and not talking about how much the Trump Campaign wanted help? If Donald Trump was willing to ask for the Russians to help with Clinton's emails in public on video, are we supposed to believe that the campaign never asked for help in private, even though we know Donald Trump Jr. said yes to the Russian’s offer for help in an email, and even though we know that Paul Manafort gave the Russians campaign data? And why did Trump's people keep lying about their meeting with the Russians, over and over, and over again, sometimes under oath?
About Donald Trump Jr.’s Alleged Collusion
On June 3, 2016, at 10:36 AM, Rob Goldstone sent Donald Trump Jr. an email which included the following passage:
The Crown prosecutor of Russia met with his father Aras this morning and in their meeting offered to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father.
On June 3, 2016, at 10:53, Donald Trump Jr.emailed Rob Goldstone back saying…
Thanks Rob I appreciate that. I am on the road at the moment but perhaps I just speak to Emin first. Seems we have some time and if it's what you say I love it especially later in the summer. Could we do a call first thing next week when I am back?
Later, President Donald Trump helped his son Donald Trump Jr. lie about the 2016 Trump Tower meeting which resulted from that letter. If Trump's team was doing nothing wrong, why was Donald Trump helping his son lie about the meeting?
Perhaps the most confusing item in the whole Trump-Russia collusion case involves the fact that as far as I can tell, no one ever talked to Donald Trump Jr. According to the Washington Post in an article entitled “Why hasn’t Mueller talked to Donald Trump Jr. yet?”, as of March 15, 2018, Donald Trump Jr. had not talked to the Mueller Team a year ago. The Washington Post apparently found it quite odd that Mueller had not talked to him by then. Then, in an article dated Feb 21, 2019 entitled, "What we know we don’t know from Mueller’s investigation”, the Washington Post stated the following:
Why didn’t Mueller interview Donald Trump Jr.? At no point, it seems, did Mueller’s team interview Donald Trump Jr., seemingly someone central to the investigation, given his role in the campaign broadly and in interactions with Russians before and during the meeting at Trump Tower in June 2016.
When we noted last year that Trump Jr. hadn’t been interviewed, Elizabeth de la Vega, a former federal prosecutor, offered one possible explanation for that gap: that Trump Jr. “is a serious subject or, quite possibly, a target of the special counsel investigation.”
“Federal prosecutors rarely interview targets of an investigation,” she said. “Instead, they build the case around them, with documents, emails, public admissions and other witnesses.” At one point last year, Politico reported that Trump Jr. expected to be indicted.
OK, so if I have this right, perhaps Mueller never talked to Donald Trump Jr. because Donald Trump Jr. might have been a target that Muller might have at one time been considering indicting. So, once Mueller decided not to indict Donald Trump Jr., he was no longer a target, right? Why did Mueller not interview him then to see what he knew?
About Donald Trump's Alleged Obstruction
Also, where was the subpoena demanding that President Donald Trump testify? According to CNN.com entitled, “Special counsel and DOJ deliberated seeking subpoena for Trump”, here's what a source had to say about that.
The source said the sensitive discussions between Justice Department officials and the special counsel team, and the determination that a subpoena would not be pursued, were based on the perception of the evidence and merits of the issues -- separate and apart from the fact that current department policy dictates that a sitting president cannot be indicted.
So they did not pursue a subpoena based on the "perception of evidence"? Donald Trump admitted that he fired Comey because of the Russia investigation on video in front of Lester Holt, and that was not enough evidence to demand that he talk with the Special counsel in person? Really? Former President Bill Clinton was accused of having an extramarital affair and then covering it up, and Kenneth Star made him testify. Are you kidding me? Please allow me to remind the reader about a few things. An article on CNBC.com entitled, “Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein said Trump ordered him to write the memo justifying James Comey's firing, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe writes” made the following points:
- Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein has said he did not plan to write the memo justifying former FBI Director James Comey's firing and was ordered to do it, ex-FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe writes in an upcoming book.
- Rosenstein complained about having to write the document, which is now part of a probe into whether the president obstructed justice by ousting Comey, McCabe writes, according to The Guardian.
OK, so what is so interesting about Trump demanding that Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein write a memo justifying the firing of James Comey, you ask? Well, according to an article from the website www.NYPost.com entitled, “McCabe: Trump wanted Russia probe in letter firing Comey”
Former acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe said that President Trump wanted Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to mention the Russia investigation in his memo outlining why FBI Director James Comey should be fired.
“He explained to the president that he did not need Russia in his memo. And the president responded, ‘I understand that, I am asking you to put Russia in the memo anyway,’” McCabe said in a new interview with “60 Minutes.”
Rosenstein didn’t want to include Russia, and told the president as much, because it could look like he was obstructing the Russia probe — and giving Trump cover.
Donald Trump wanted AG Rosenstein to write a memo outlining why James Comey should be fired, and Donald Trump expressly told Rosenstein that he should mention Russia as one of the reasons for the firing. Think about that for a second. According to James Comey, Donald Trump actually wanted AG Rosenstein to write, in the memo that he requested Rosenstein to write, the purpose of which was to explain why James Comey was being fired, that James Comey was being fired because he was investigating Donald Trump.
Exactly how much evidence of obstruction did Mueller's team need? Did Donald Trump need to carve, “I fired James Comey because he was investigating me about my connection to Russia” into a gold tablet, on video, onstage at Madison Square Garden in front of thousands of people while singing words to that effect, in order for Mueller's team to think that they might want to subpoena Trump? Seriously, how much evidence did Mueller's team need? This whole thing is insane.
So, No Indictment Means Exoneration For Republicans, But Does Not Mean That For Democrats?
In an online article from CNN.com posted March 23, 2019 entitled, “Inside Trump's evening for the ages: When he learned Mueller was done", we find out that Trump's allies think that the lack of any more indictments from Mueller means that Trump and his family are exonerated:
Still, Trump and his allies are already signaling the report is an unequivocal victory, once that exonerates the President from the various misdeeds -- collusion, obstruction -- that his opponents have used as bywords for what they regard as a shambolic presidency.
And yet later, in the same article, we have this:
Later, he [Trump] appeared on stage at an fundraiser for the Palm Beach Republicans underway in the Louis XIV-style ballroom named in his honor. Trump didn't mention the Mueller report in his remarks -- but as his close ally Sen. Lindsey Graham was calling on the FBI to investigate Hillary Clinton, Trump looked on as the crowd broke into a "lock her up" chant.
Apparently, Republican logic dictates that the lack of an indictment always clears all Republicans, but never clears a single Democrat. Apparently, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s lack of indictments will never clear her, despite what I estimate to be 10 Benghazi investigations and an email investigation, from which she received no indictments.
From my point of view, Donald Trump and his team have been exonerated of nothing. Trump just found a way to get the three people most closely associated with Russian collusion not to talk. Manafort and Stone probably never cooperated because they want pardons, but at least they talked to Mueller's team. Apparently, it is possible that Donald Trump and his team may get away with colluding with the Russians because Donald Trump has the ability to pardon people. My biggest question is, how exactly did Donald Trump Jr. manage to completely avoid talking to Robert Mueller, after having that email exchange with Rob Goldstein, if Robert Mueller decided not to indict him?