This is some transition team Mike Pence led. New York Times with another big scoop on disgraced national security adviser Michael Flynn:
Michael T. Flynn told President Trump’s transition team weeks before the inauguration that he was under federal investigation for secretly working as a paid lobbyist for Turkey during the campaign, according to two people familiar with the case.
Despite this warning, which came about a month after the Justice Department notified Mr. Flynn of the inquiry, Mr. Trump made Mr. Flynn his national security adviser. The job gave Mr. Flynn access to the president and nearly every secret held by American intelligence agencies.
Mr. Flynn’s disclosure, on Jan. 4, was first made to the transition team’s chief lawyer, Donald F. McGahn II, who is now the White House counsel. That conversation, and another one two days later between Mr. Flynn’s lawyer and transition lawyers, shows that the Trump team knew about the investigation of Mr. Flynn far earlier than has been previously reported.
McGahn knew a lot and he knew it early. It also brings into question McGahn’s second talk with Sally Yates—the one in which she had to explain to him why Flynn being compromised was worrisome. It makes one wonder if that second go was more of a fishing expedition, where McGahn had time to consider their first talk, mull over unanswered questions, and then figure out what else he needed to know if Yates knew.
Bottom line: Mike Pence was running the transition.
Thursday, May 18, 2017 · 2:28:10 AM +00:00 · David Nir
The news never stops: Flynn is also the subject of a damning new story from McClatchy, which reports that he ordered a planned military campaign to retake the Syrian city of Raqqa from ISIS be delayed, a move that was “consistent with the wishes of Turkey, which had long opposed the United States partnering with the Kurdish forces”—and which had secretly paid Flynn over $500,000 to represent its interests in Washington. Well, it was secret to everyone except, it seems, Trump’s inner circle.