It would have taken less time than typing that post.
I don’t know the details of either the theoretical rules or the actual procedures at the White House, but it seems to me that it would be difficult to make all those Very Important People[tm] surrender their cell phones during the workday (and, of course, a modern smartphone could function as a “wire”, especially if the wireee is provided with custom software designed to keep the recording/storage/transmission operations discreet).
There’s also the fact that the Orange Oaf is rather clueless and careless about security in any case. I’m sure he tries to be more careful when the security in question is that of his own ass rather than that of the nation, but the cluelessness would remain in full effect.
Seth Abramsons wrote a thread outlining how Muellers investigation is a ten step process. We are in step 3, using charges agsinst low and mid level Trump workers to get them to flip on high level workers for Trump (Trump and his family, pence, etc).
However he implied step 10 is where the next president pardons everyone. That’ll suck.
I think he predicts it’ll be over sometime around sumer of next year. Just in time for midterms. Nice.
So, for an limited scope, a judge lifted attorney-client privilege for Manafort. Apparently (and appropriately) extremely rare.
Yup. I think a lot on the left have totally lost faith in America. It’s like there is no bottom. No matter how criminal, corrupt, incompetent, plutocratic, irrational, hypocritical, authoritarian, stupid, bigoted, etc the right becomes it never backfires on them. The public ignores it or forgives it within 2 years.
Even if we end up with mass indictments, impeachment under a democratic house because the gop refuses to investigate or impeach, a democratic president in 2020, etc the public will just hand congress back to the gop in 2022 or 2024.
I guess progressive energy will be devoted to state and city races in the future, less to federal ones after this is all over.
Hell, if anyone wants to know what was said in the White House, all they have to do is get the recordings from the bugs those Russians planted when they were ALONE with DJT in the Oval Office.
As I understand it, that’s something of a technical issue.
In this case, Manafort & Gates are accused of misleading the government about the nature of their work for foreign entities, and some of that misleading was in the form of letters sent by their lawyer on their behalf. So in order to make that charge stick, the SCO needs to confirm that those letters were in fact sent at the direction of M&G, and based on information that they provided. So they were permitted to ask the lawyer to disclose what exactly what M & G told her in the context of directing her to send these letters.
Makes sense to me. (Not that I’m a lawyer or anything.)
Nude Aides Huddled Around Trump Assure Him No One Wearing Wire (from The Onion)
I like that your parenthetical was actually necessary.
Take a close look where Trump’s eyes are focused.
Or maybe you shouldn’t.
Fairly accurate summary. But the point is that this exception to attorney-client privilege is quite rare. And the fact it was granted by a judge points to the seriousness of what went on. And it also points to the fact that this case will now be pretty much a slam-dunk, and Mueller is playing hard-ball. Manafort can expect lengthy jail time. His attorney is being compelled to give evidence against his (former) client. Pretty convincing.
I do wonder if discussions are underway to see if Manafort would like to become a cooperative witness against others.
I think you’re misreading this. The attorney was forced to confirm (presumably) that the letters were written on the client’s behalf with review by the client. But that would have been a pretty easy presumption anyway. This was i-dotting, not some crucial evidentiary victory.
That’s what I was contradicting in saying that it was “technical”. Having read the judge’s ruling, it doesn’t seem to me like either the “seriousness of what went on” or the strength of the evidence (beyond “prima facie”) were factors in that ruling.
It looks to me like any time there’s prima facie evidence that the lawyers actions themselves were part of the clients’ deception or crime, that the privileged would be waived. That circumstance might be rare, but on those rare occasions there’s not anything more to it than that.
The lawyer’s testimony would make it more difficult for M & G to argue that she acted on her own or based on her own knowledge of the facts, since she will undoubtedly testify otherwise. But I’m guessing they’re going to argue that their filing was not misleading or in violation of the law, in which case her testimony would have no impact.
I am pretty confident the FBI would know how to put an app on your cell phone that records stuff without it being obvious that it does so. Wires are so very 1986.
It is very rare that the crime-fraud exception is used to overcome solicitor-client privilege. It’s not a typical “i-dotting” that is a routine procedure.
The lawyer will have to confirm that his clients told him to lie to the government. Considering that the case will hinge on whether or not Manafort lied to the government, this will make the case that much more airtight.
It does make it seem that Mueller is covering his bases very, very carefully, and is not going to let anything slide.
It isn’t as uncommon as you make it sound. I’ve encountered it a few times in my career. It is much more common in fraud cases, obviously.
But my point was about the importance of the evidence, not the rarity of the procedure. The key issue in the case will be whether the statements were false, not whether the lawyer was making them for the client. They were never gonna get reasonable doubt on the latter. Getting it in was just i-dotting, which is what any prosecutor would do. It doesn’t say much about Mueller.
Practically, I don’t know.
I assume Mueller would need a warrant. And that the White House is under federal law - what are the laws on bugging the President without his knowledge? The White House is not a public space, in the sense of being a place where anyone can record anyone AFAIK.
Methinks I will ask in GQ.
Regards,
Shodan
I’ll accept your greater experience with these type of cases.
Still, even i-dotting makes me happy at this point.
Some of the best proof that Mueller is a top-notch lawyer with a top-notch team is the quality of the legal writing in the unsealed briefs. It is excellent. I will probably use them for teaching purposes.
It’s all Jared’s fault:
I guess he was so busy bringing peace to the Middle East along with all his other jobs that he didn’t have time to give good advice.