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Post by Admin on Dec 13, 2018 18:11:45 GMT
Despite President Donald Trump's public declaration that he isn't concerned about impeachment, he has told people close to him in recent days that he is alarmed by the prospect, according to multiple sources. Trump's fear about the possibility has escalated as the consequences of federal investigations involving his associates and Democratic control of the House sink in, the sources said, and his allies believe maintaining the support of establishment Republicans he bucked to win election is now critical to saving his presidency. On Wednesday Trump was delivered another blow when federal prosecutors announced an agreement with American Media Inc, in which the publisher of the National Enquirer admitted to making a $150,000 payment in 2016 to silence a woman alleging an affair with Trump, in coordination with his presidential campaign, to prevent her story from influencing the election. The agreement with prosecutors in the Southern District of New York follows the admission by the president's former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, that he violated campaign finance laws by arranging hush payments to women in 2016 at the direction of Trump. “The entire question about whether the president committed an impeachable offense now hinges on the testimony of two men: David Pecker and Allen Weisselberg, both cooperating witnesses in the SDNY investigation," a close Trump ally told NBC News.
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Post by Admin on Dec 14, 2018 17:40:30 GMT
Donald Trump was the third person in the room in August 2015 when his lawyer Michael Cohen and National Enquirer publisher David Pecker discussed ways Pecker could help counter negative stories about Trump's relationships with women, NBC News has confirmed. As part of a nonprosecution agreement disclosed Wednesday by federal prosecutors, American Media Inc., the Enquirer's parent company, admitted that "Pecker offered to help deal with negative stories about that presidential candidate's relationships with women by, among other things, assisting the campaign in identifying such stories so they could be purchased and their publication avoided." The "statement of admitted facts" says that AMI admitted making a $150,000 payment "in concert with the campaign," and says that Pecker, Cohen and "at least one other member of the campaign" were in the meeting. According to a person familiar with the matter, the "other member" was Trump.
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Post by Admin on Dec 18, 2018 18:05:34 GMT
Former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn is to be sentenced Tuesday morning in Washington, D.C., for lying to the FBI about conversations he had with Russian Envoy Sergey Kislyak. The special counsel's office has recommended that Flynn receive zero to six months of incarceration due to his "substantial assistance" in the investigation. He met with the special counsel 19 times as part of his agreement to cooperate with the government in its investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. The special counsel says Flynn has been cooperating in "several ongoing investigations." Flynn helped government investigators on a "range of issues, including interactions between individuals in the Presidential Transition Team and Russia." Michael Flynn, Donald Trump’s former national security, has asked for a delay in sentencing. Judge Emmet Sullivan earlier said Flynn had committed a “very serious offence” in lying to the FBI.
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Post by Admin on Dec 19, 2018 17:38:55 GMT
President Donald Trump reacts to the sentencing of his former personal attorney, Michael Cohen and his 46 percent job approval rating in an exclusive interview with Harris Faulkner on 'Outnumbered Overtime.' It’s been obvious for months that President Trump was lying when he said he did not direct Michael Cohen to make hush money payments to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal prior to the 2016 election. On Thursday morning, he essentially admitted it, tweeting that the responsibility would have fallen on his former lawyer-fixer, not himself, to determine whether the payments were legal. “I never directed Michael Cohen to break the law,” Trump wrote. “He was a lawyer and he is supposed to know the law. It is called ‘advice of counsel,’ and a lawyer has great liability if a mistake is made.” Trump went on to claim that “many campaign finance lawyers” agree “strongly” that he did nothing wrong, and that “this was not campaign finance.” Campaign finance law does apply, though, if the payments in question were made to aid the campaign. Cohen and American Media Inc., the tabloid publisher that bought the rights to McDougal’s story of her alleged affair with Trump, have both admitted this to be the case. The difference between criminal and civil charges is whether Trump knowingly broke the law. This is hard to prove, although some would argue that Trump repeatedly lying about his knowledge of the payments implies he knows he did something wrong. Regardless of his attempts to downplay the severity of the charges, the SDNY believes Trump conspired with Cohen to commit a felony. This isn’t a good look for a sitting president, and it’s an even worse look for a civilian, which Trump could become as soon as January 2021, or, if he is impeached, far earlier. According to NBC News, the president is growing concerned over the “earlier” scenario, telling friends he is “alarmed” by the prospect of being removed from office.
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Post by Admin on Dec 20, 2018 17:45:24 GMT
On Tuesday evening, CNN host Chris Cuomo announced that the network has obtained a letter of intent personally signed by Donald Trump to proceed with a lucrative Trump Tower Moscow project that would have provided his company with a $4 million upfront fee. Cuomo brandished the document on his show and highlighted how it contrasts with what Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, said as recently as Sunday, when he told CNN that Trump Tower Moscow “was a real estate project. There was a letter of intent to go forward, but no one signed it.” Giuliani’s claim is incorrect. It turns out Trump himself signed the letter of intent, which is dated October 28, 2015 — five months after Trump launched his presidential campaign, and during a period in which he was lavishing praise on Russian President Vladimir Putin.
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