On March 24, Der Führer Former President Trump filed a 108 page federal lawsuit against former US Senator and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the Democratic National Committee and 26 other people and entities claiming they all claims conspired to undermine his 2016 campaign by falsely tying him to Russia. The lawsuit asks for more than $24 million in costs and damages.
In his federal lawsuit, Der Führer Trump names dozens he has accused during his 4 years in office years of orchestrating a “deep state” conspiracy against him. Those accused include Clinton, Clinton campaign advisors, former FBI Director James Comey and other FBI officials. He specifically identified retired British spy Christopher Steele and his associates who prepared a dossier on Trump’s business dealing with Russa and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The lawsuit alleges in part:
“Under the guise of ‘opposition research,’ ‘data analytics,’ and other political stratagems, the Defendants nefariously sought to sway the public’s trust … They worked together with a single, self-serving purpose: to vilify Donald J. Trump.”
The federal lawsuit takes aim at Der Führer Trump’s main political opponents and highlights the grievances that he has complained about in the past. Trump claims Democrats and government officials perpetrated a “grab bag “of offenses, from a racketeering conspiracy to a malicious prosecution, computer fraud and theft of secret internet data. Many of the key elements of Trump’s far-reaching accusations in the lawsuit have previously been debunked by the Justice Department inspector general and by a bipartisan report from the Senate Intelligence Committee.
The civil suit alleges that Clinton and top Democrats hired lawyers and researchers to fabricate information tying Trump to Russia. It goes on to allege that they promoted the lies to the media and to the US government in order to destroy his chances of winning in 2016 Presidential election. Trump claims they were assisted by “Clinton loyalists” at the FBI, who abused their powers to investigate him out of political hostility towards him.
Trump claims that Clinton and the other defendants conspired to trigger an “unfounded investigation” by the FBI into potential Trump-Russia collusion in the 2016 election. Multiple federal judges upheld the legality of that investigation, which was later taken over by special counsel Robert Mueller and uncovered dozens of connections between Trump associates and Russian officials.
The investigation established that Russia intervened in the 2016 election to help Trump win, through a hack-and-leak operation against Clinton, and with a sophisticated disinformation campaign targeting US voters on social media. The probe also found that Trump’s campaign sought to capitalize on Russia’s interference, though it did not establish a criminal conspiracy between Trump aides and any Russians.
Links to quoted news source material are here:
https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/24/politics/trump-sues-hillary-clinton/index.html
PROBE INTO RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE WITH 2016 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
In the morning of July 27, 2016, then candidate for President Der Führer Trump encouraged Russian hackers to find emails that had been deleted from Hillary Clinton’s private server that she used while serving as secretary of state.
“I will tell you this, Russia: If you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing … “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.” Trump said at a press conference in Florida.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-russia-clinton-hack_us_5b48d9d0e4b0e7c958faf810
On July 27, 2016, Vladamir Putin and Russia were listening and heeded Trump’s call for help to get him elected President. According to the federal indictment of 12 Russian intelligence officers for their involvement in hacking the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 election, the Russian hacking occurred on July 27, 2016 and hours after Trump gave his press conference and encouraged Russian hackers to find Clinton’s emails.
TWO WAIVES OF INDICTMENTS
On Friday, July 13, 2018, the Justice Department announced charges against 12 Russian intelligence officers for hacking offenses during the 2016 presidential election.
https://www.abqjournal.com/1196225/12-russians-accused-of-hacking-democrats-in-2016-us-election.html
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein announced the indictments as part of the ongoing special counsel probe into potential coordination between the Trump 2016 campaign and Russia.
The Russians were accused of hacking into the computer networks of the Democratic National Committee, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton, and then releasing stolen emails on the internet in the months before the election.
In making the announcement Rosenstein said:
“The internet allows foreign adversaries to attack Americans in new and unexpected ways. … Free and fair elections are hard-fought and contentious and there will always be adversaries who work to exacerbate domestic differences and try to confuse, divide and conquer us.”
Rosenstein, who said he had briefed President Donald Trump on the indictment, said there was no allegation that the hacking altered any vote count or that any Americans were knowingly in communication with any of the Russian officers. The statement that the hacking did not alter any vote is laughable and what is important is that Trump asked for the hacking and Putin and Russia accommodated his request.
The indictment states that on July 27, 2016, the same day as Trump’s press conference, Russian hackers, “for the first time,” attempted to break into email accounts, including those used by Clinton’s personal office.
Notably, the indictment specifies that the hack happened in the evening, meaning the Russian officials could have done it after Trump’s press conference.
On December 17, 2019 Special Counsel Robert Mueller announced that 20 people and 3 companies had been charged in the investigation of Russian interference with the 2016 presidential election to help Trump get elected.
The charges included 4 former Trump campaign and White House aides and 13 Russians accused of participating in a clandestine social media campaign to sway American public opinion in the 2016 election to get Donald Trump elected.
SPECIAL COUNSEL INVESTIGATION COMPLETED
On May 29, 2019, US Justice Department Special Counsel Robert Mueller ended his two-year investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. He did so with a remarkable, 10-minute public statement taking no questions. Special Counsel Mueller announced he was closing the special counsel’s office saying “Our investigation is complete”, He announce his resignation and returned to private life.
You can view the statement in full here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdQypBnitXM
Mueller outlined 5 primary conclusions of his investigation and made it clear that the next steps belong to the United States Congress to decide to impeach, convict and remove President Trump.
The 5 major points made by Robert Mueller in his statement were clear:
1) Had he been able to clear the president on the question of obstruction, he would have done so, but he did not. Mueller noted the Justice Department’s longstanding policy against indicting a sitting president and said that his office was never able to even consider bringing charges against Donald Trump, either openly or under seal until Trump left office.
According to Mueller:
“We concluded that we would not reach a determination—one way or the other—about whether the president committed a crime. … Charging the president with a crime was therefore not an option we could consider.
The department’s written opinion explaining the policy makes several important points that further informed our handling of the obstruction investigation.
Those points are summarized in our report and I will describe two of them for you:
First, the opinion explicitly permits the investigation of a sitting president, because it is important to preserve evidence while memories are fresh and documents available. Among other things, that evidence could be used if there were co-conspirators who could be charged now.
And second, the opinion says that the constitution requires a process other than the criminal justice system to formally accuse a sitting president of wrongdoing.
As set forth in our report, after that investigation, if we had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said that.”
2) What happens now is up to the United States Congress. Mueller went out out of his way to describe how his investigation team had gathered and preserved evidence for future investigators, adding pointedly “The Constitution requires a process other than the criminal justice system to formally accuse a sitting president of wrongdoing.”
3) Americans should be deeply concerned by Russia’s broad and systemic interference with the 2016 election. According to Mueller, “There were multiple, systematic efforts to interfere in our election. That allegation deserves the attention of every American.” In his report, Mueller made cleat Russian efforts were aimed at hurting Democrat Hillary Clinton.
4) Mueller doesn’t intend to say anything further but if he testifies before congress, he will not deviate from his report and said:
“Any testimony from this office would not go beyond our report. It contains our findings and analysis, and the reasons for the decisions we made. We chose those words carefully, and the work speaks for itself. The report is my testimony.”
5) Mueller took deliberate issue with the accusations Trump and others have made that his investigation had been conducted by conflicted, angry Democrats on a witch hunt by saying:
“I want to thank the attorneys, the FBI agents, the analysts, and the professional staff who helped us conduct this investigation in a fair and independent manner. These individuals, who spent nearly two years with the Special Counsel’s Office, were of the highest integrity.”
https://www.wired.com/story/robert-mueller-breaks-silence-russia-investigation/
THE FULL LIST OF MUELLER INDICTMENTS AND PLEA DEALS
The two-year Mueller investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential election led to indictments and successful prosecution of 38 individuals, including many very close associates of Trump. Those indictments were:
1) GEORGE PAPADOPOULOS: former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser, was arrested in July 2017 and pleaded guilty in October 2017 to making false statements to the FBI. He was sentence to 14-days in jail sentence.
2) PAUL MANAFORT: Trump’s former 2016 Presidential Campaign Chairman, was indicted on a total of 25 different counts by Mueller’s team, related mainly to his past work for Ukrainian politicians and his finances. He had two trials scheduled, and the first ended in a conviction on eight counts of financial crimes. To avert the second trial, Manafort struck a plea deal with Mueller in September 2018, though Mueller’s team said that he later breached that agreement by lying to them. He was sentenced to a combined seven and a half years in prison.
3) RICK GATES: A former Trump campaign aide and Manafort’s longtime junior business partner, was indicted on similar charges to Manafort. But in February 2018 he agreed to a plea deal with Mueller’s team, pleading guilty to just one false statement charge and one conspiracy charge. He was sentenced to 45 days in prison and 3 years of probation.
4) MICHAEL FLYNN: Trump’s former national security adviser, pleaded guilty in December 2017 to making false statements to the FBI.
5) MICHAEL COHEN: In August 2018, Trump’s former lawyer pleaded guilty to 8 counts, tax and bank charges, related to his finances and taxi business, and campaign finance violations, related to hush money payments to women who alleged affairs with Donald Trump, as part of a separate investigation in New York that Mueller had handed off. But in November, he made a plea deal with Mueller too, for lying to Congress about efforts to build a Trump Tower in Moscow.
6) ROGER STONE: In January 2019, Mueller indicted longtime Trump adviser Roger Stone on 7 counts. He accused Stone of lying to the House Intelligence Committee about his efforts to get in touch with WikiLeaks during the campaign and tampering with a witness who could have debunked his story. He was convicted on all counts after a November 2019 trial.
MANAFORT and GATES were charged with a series of offenses related to their past work for Ukrainian politicians and their finances. PAPADOPOULOS and FLYNN Both admitted making false statements to investigators to hide their contacts with Russians. COHEN admitted making false statements to Congress.
7) RICHARD PINEDO: This California man pleaded guilty to an identity theft charge in connection with the Russian indictments and has agreed to cooperate with Mueller. He was sentenced to 6 months in prison and 6 months of home detention in October 2018.
8) ALEX VAN DER ZWAAN: This London lawyer pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI about his contacts with Rick Gates and another unnamed person based in Ukraine. He was sentenced to 30 days in jail and has completed his sentence.
9) KONSTANTIN KILIMNIK: This longtime business associate of Manafort and Gates, who’s currently based in Russia, was charged alongside Manafort with attempting to obstruct justice by tampering with witnesses in Manafort’s pending case last year.
10 to 23) 13 RUSSIAN NATIONALS AND THREE RUSSIAN COMPANIES: All were indicted on conspiracy charges, with some also being accused of identity theft. The charges related to a Russian propaganda effort designed to interfere with the 2016 campaign. The companies involved are the Internet Research Agency, often described as a “Russian troll farm,” and two other companies that helped finance it. The Russian nationals indicted include 12 of the agency’s employees and its alleged financier, Yevgeny Prigozhin.
24-38) 12 RUSSIAN GRU OFFICERS: These officers of Russia’s military intelligence service were charged with crimes related to the hacking and leaking of leading Democrats’ emails in 2016.
The link to the unedited and fully quoted news source is here:
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/2/20/17031772/mueller-indictments-grand-jury
A ROADMAP FOR IMPEACHMENT BUT NOT REMOVAL
Despite the fact that the special counsel’s report on Russian interference did not come to a conclusion as to whether President Trump obstructed justice, the Mueller Report did disclose at least 10 “discrete acts” in which Trump may have “obstructed justice”. Mueller left it up to congress to decide for themselves if there was obstruction of justice.
Any one of the 10 acts could form the basis of impeachment by the Democratic Controlled US House of Representatives, but not necessarily result in a conviction by the Republican US Senate. The Mueller Report says the 10 instances of potential obstruction of justice can be divided into “two phases, reflecting a possible shift in the president’s motives.”
The first phase of obstruction of justice took place before Trump fired FBI Director James Comey after Trump had been reassured by Comey he was not personally under investigation. After Comey was fired by Trump and after Mueller’s appointment as special counsel, the report states Trump realized or knew he was under investigation for possibly obstructing justice, and he changed course and became more aggressive to discredit the investigation.
The Mueller report states:
“At that point, the president engaged in a second phase of conduct, involving public attacks on the investigation, non-public efforts to control it, and efforts both in public and private to encourage witnesses not to cooperate with the investigation.”
CBS News did an exceptional summary of the 10 times Trump may have obstructed justice. Following are the 10 times Trump may have obstructed justice quoting a CBS News article with the link below:
1.”THE CAMPAIGN’S RESPONSE TO REPORTS ABOUT RUSSIAN SUPPORT FOR TRUMP”
“The first instance of possible obstruction detailed in the report occurred during the 2016 campaign, when questions first “arose about the Russian government’s apparent support for candidate Trump. The report states that while Mr. Trump was publicly skeptical Russia had released emails from Democratic officials, he and his aides were also trying to get information about “any further Wikileaks releases.” The report also notes that despite Mr. Trump’s insistence he had no business connections to Russia, his namesake company was trying to build a Trump Tower in Moscow. And once the election was over, Mr. Trump “expressed concerns to advisers that reports of Russia’s election interference might lead the public to question the legitimacy of his election.”
2.”CONDUCT INVOLVING FBI DIRECTOR COMEY AND MICHAEL FLYNN”
“The second instance involves Mr. Trump’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, who left the administration just weeks into Mr. Trump’s presidency after he misled FBI agents and top administration officials — including Vice President Mike Pence — about his conversations with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Flynn had said he had not discussed sanctions on Russia with Kislyak, a lie that Pence and others then repeated. The day that Mr. Trump found out Flynn had lied to Pence and the FBI, he had dinner with Comey, whom he asked for “loyalty.” Mr. Trump then secured Flynn’s resignation on Feb. 13, 2017. “Now that we fired Flynn, the Russia thing is over,” he told an outside adviser, who disagreed with the president’s assessment. That same day, Mr. Trump had another meeting with Comey and encouraged him to stop investigating Flynn. “I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go. He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go,” Mr. Trump said. The president then asked Deputy National Security Adviser K.T. McFarland to draft an internal memo “stating that the president had not directed Flynn to discuss sanctions with Kislyak. McFarland declined because she did not know whether that was true, and a White House Counsel’s Office attorney thought that the request would look like a quid pro quo for an ambassadorship she had been offered.”
3.”THE PRESIDENT’S REACTION TO THE CONTINUING RUSSIA INVESTIGATION”
“The third instance involves then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who was debating whether to recuse himself from the Russia investigation in February 2017, as well as Comey. Mr. Trump asked White House Counsel Don McGahn to talk Sessions out of recusal,and became angry when Sessions announced he would recuse himself on March 2. The president then asked Sessions to “unrecuse” himself. After Comey testified to Congress that there was an FBI investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, Mr. Trump reached out to his CIA and NSA directors to help “dispel the suggestion that the President had any connection to the Russian election-interference effort.” Comey had told Mr. Trump he wasn’t under investigation, and, against Mc Gahn’s advice, the president twice called the FBI director to ask him to say that publicly.”
4.”THE PRESIDENT’S TERMINATION OF COMEY”
“The fourth instance stems from Mr. Trump’s decision to fire Comey, which directly led to Mueller’s appointment. Mr. Trump decided to fire Comey in May 2017 — days after the FBI director declined to tell Congress that Mr. Trump wasn’t under investigation. After Mr. Trump dismissed Comey, the White House insisted he had done so at the recommendation of the Department of Justice. In reality, Mr. Trump had not consulted with the Justice Department before deciding to fire Comey. In conversations that followed, Mr. Trump indicated the Russia investigation was the real reason he had let Comey go: “The day after firing Comey, the president told Russian officials that he had ‘faced great pressure because of Russia,’ which had been ‘taken off’ by Comey’s firing. The next day, the president acknowledged in a television interview that he was going to fire Comey regardless of the Department of Justice’s recommendation and that when he ‘decided to just do it,’ he was thinking that ‘this thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story.’”
5.”THE APPOINTMENT OF SPECIAL COUNSEL AND EFFORTS TO REMOVE HIM”
“The fifth instance revolves around Mr. Trump’s reaction to Mueller’s appointment. Upon hearing the news that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein had tasked Mueller with investigating the Russia matter in May 2017, the president privately declared it was “the end of his presidency.” Mr. Trump then demanded Sessions’ resignation, although he did not accept it at the time, and told aides Mueller had conflicts of interest that should preclude him from acting as the special counsel. It was then reported in June that Mueller was investigating Mr. Trump for obstruction of justice, prompting the president to publicly attack Mueller and the Justice Department. Within days of the first report, he told Mc Gahn to tell Rosenstein that Mueller had conflicts of interest and must be removed. Mc Gahn ignored the request, explaining that he would rather resign.”
6.”EFFORTS TO PREVENT PUBLIC DISCLOSURE OF EVIDENCE”
“The sixth instance stems from the June 2016 meeting between top campaign aides and “a Russian lawyer who was said to be offering damaging information about Hillary Clinton as ‘part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.’” Mr. Trump told his aides “not to publicly disclose the emails setting up the June 9 meeting, suggesting that the email would not leak and that the number of lawyers with access to them should be limited.” Donald Trump Jr., who had been present at the Trump Tower meeting, wrote a press release saying “the meeting was with ‘an individual who [Trump Jr.] was told might have information helpful to the campaign’” — a line that was edited out about the president. Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer then denied to reporters the president had “played any role” in Trump Jr.’s statement.
7.” FURTHER EFFORTS TO HAVE THE ATTORNEY GENERAL TAKE CONTROL OF THE INVESTIGATION”
“The seventh instance has to do with Mr. Trump’s repeated attempts to have Sessions “reverse his recusal.” Mr. Trump asked Sessions to do this in the summer of 2017. The following December, Mr. Trump told Sessions he would be a “hero” if he took control of the investigation. Additionally, in October 2017, the president asked Sessions to “take [a] look” at investigating Hillary Clinton.”
8.”EFFORTS TO HAVE MCGAHN DENY THAT THE PRESIDENT HAD ORDERED HIM TO HAVE THE SPECIAL COUNSEL REMOVED”
“The eighth instance concerns Mr. Trump’s efforts to get Mc Gahn to dispute press accounts that the president had instructed him to try and get rid of Mueller. In early 2018, Mr. Trump told White House officials to tell Mc Gahn to rebut the stories, but Mc Gahn told the officials the stories were true. Mr. Trump then personally appealed to Mc Gahn, telling him in an Oval Office meeting to deny the reports. In the same meeting, the president also asked McGahn why he had told the special counsel about the president’s efforts to remove the Special Counsel and why McGahn took notes of his conversations with the president,” the report states. “McGahn refused to back away from what he remembered happening and perceived the president to be testing his mettle.”
9.”CONDUCT TOWARDS FLYNN, MANAFORT”
“The ninth instance stems from Mr. Trump’s response to the prosecutions of Flynn and Paul Manafort, his former campaign chairman, as well as an individual whose identity was redacted. “After Flynn withdrew from a joint defense agreement with the president and began cooperating with the government, the president’s personal counsel left a message for Flynn ‘s attorneys reminding them of the president’s warm feelings towards Flynn, which he said ‘still remains,’ and asking for a ‘heads up’ if Flynn knew ‘information that implicates the president,’” the report states. When Flynn’s counsel reiterated that Flynn could no longer share information pursuant to a joint defense agreement, the president’s personal counsel said he would make sure that the president knew that Flynn’s actions reflected ‘hostility’ towards the president. Meanwhile, Mr. Trump praised Manafort during his “prosecution and when the jury in his criminal trial was deliberating. At one point, he praised Manafort as “a brave man” who refused to “break.”
10.”CONDUCT INVOLVING MICHAEL COHEN”
“The tenth and final instance of potential obstruction concerns Mr. Trump’s behavior toward Michael Cohen, his onetime personal lawyer. Mr. Trump profusely praised Cohen when he remained loyal to the administration, at one point personally calling to encourage him to “stay strong,” only to criticize him viciously when he began cooperating with the government. After the FBI searched Cohen’s home and office in April 2018, the president publicly asserted that Cohen would not ‘flip,’ contacted him directly to tell him to ‘stay strong,’ and privately passed messages of support to him,” the report states. Cohen also discussed pardons with the president’s personal counsel and believed that if he stayed on message, he would be taken care of. But after Cohen began cooperating with the government in the summer of 2018, the president publicly criticized him, called him a ‘rat,’ and suggested that his family members had committed crimes.”
The link to the full unedited CBS News report here:
A link to a related blog article is here:
COMMENTARY AND ANALYSIS
It is downright bizarre that Trump would now file a federal lawsuit, unless it is his attempt to distance himself from his association and admiration of Vladimir Putin and the invasion of Ukrain by Russia. The problem is that the general public has a very short memory. Trump’s and his associates’ dealings with Russian over the years can only be considered some of the darkest days of this country when a President of the United States actually curried favored with a known enemy of the United State and its democracy.
Der Führer Trump’s filed federal lawsuit against Hillary Clinton, the Democratic National Committee and 26 other people and entities claiming they all conspired to undermine his 2016 campaign by falsely tying him to Russia was very quickly labeled as frivolous and without merit. Like the 56 federal lawsuits file by Trump in states to contest the 2020 Presidential election, the lawsuit will likely be thrown out for lack of evidence, but that does not mean his party and his cult followers will not believe what he has alleged.
The lawsuit may be frivolous, but the damage Der Führer Trump has done to our democracy may never be repaired as he is allowed to continue his assault on many levels, aided by the Republican party, to destroy it at its very core.
Twice the traitor Trump was impeached, and twice the Republicans failed to go to the defense of our democracy by convicting him. The Republican Senate failed to impeach even when they themselves witnessed firsthand how he orchestrated a full assault on the capitol on January 6, 2020 to stop the certification of Joe Biden as President.
There is little doubt that the seeds of enablement to Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukrain were sown during the 4 years Trump was in office.