The Tiny Scandals and Trials

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Brad Heath
@bradheath

Very FBI to go out of its way to dunk on people who thought they could evade the FBI.

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Another tourist to the Capitol on 1/6

[JazzNU]

"Wants" is an inaccurate way to phrase this by the reporter though, this isn't a request as you can see, it's an order.

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Court Suspends Giuliani’s Law License, Citing Trump Election Lies
The former mayor of New York, once the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan, is now temporarily barred from practicing law in the state and faces disbarment.

By Nicole Hong and Ben Protess
June 24, 2021
Updated 2:05 p.m. ET

Rudolph W. Giuliani, a former top federal prosecutor, New York City mayor and lawyer to a president, faces the possibility of disbarment after a New York court ruled on Thursday that he made “demonstrably false and misleading statements” while fighting the results of the 2020 election on behalf of Donald J. Trump.

The New York State appellate court temporarily suspended Mr. Giuliani’s law license on the recommendation of a disciplinary committee after finding he had sought to mislead judges, lawmakers and the public as he helped shepherd Mr. Trump’s legal challenge to the election results. For months, Mr. Giuliani, who served as Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer, had argued without merit that the vote had been rife with fraud and that voting machines had been rigged.

In its decision, the court said that Mr. Giuliani’s actions represented an “immediate threat” to the public and that he had “directly inflamed” the tensions that led to the Capitol riot in January.

“The seriousness of respondent’s uncontroverted misconduct cannot be overstated. This country is being torn apart by continued attacks on the legitimacy of the 2020 election and of our current president, Joseph R. Biden,” the decision read.


Mr. Giuliani now faces disciplinary proceedings and can fight the suspension. But the court said in its decision that he would be likely to face “permanent sanctions” after the proceedings conclude. A final outcome could be months away but could include disbarment.

Mr. Giuliani’s lawyers, John Leventhal and Barry Kamins, said in a statement that they were disappointed that the panel had acted before holding a hearing on the allegations.

“This is unprecedented as we believe that our client does not pose a present danger to the public interest,” they said. “We believe that once the issues are fully explored at a hearing, Mr. Giuliani will be reinstated as a valued member of the legal profession that he has served so well in his many capacities for so many years.”

Mr. Giuliani is also licensed to practice law in Washington, D.C., and the decision in New York could set off disciplinary proceedings there, although that is not automatic.

(...)

But while Mr. Giuliani repeatedly claimed he could prove widespread fraud in the election, including proving that dead people had cast ballots, he offered no evidence supporting that contention in court. He traveled the country to press his claims with lawmakers in several battleground states.

On Jan. 6, Mr. Giuliani addressed a rally by Trump supporters near the White House ahead of the certification of the Electoral College vote in Congress. Mr. Giuliani told the crowd he sought a “trial by combat.”

A short time later, hundreds of Trump supporters left the rally and swarmed the Capitol, breaking into the building and threatening lawmakers.

In Thursday’s decision, the New York court said that false statements like the ones made by Mr. Giuliani tarnished the reputation of the entire legal profession. Mr. Giuliani’s misconduct “directly inflamed” the tensions that led to the Capitol riot, the court said.

“One only has to look at the ongoing present public discord over the 2020 election, which erupted into violence, insurrection and death on Jan. 6, 2021, at the U.S. Capitol, to understand the extent of the damage that can be done when the public is misled by false information about the elections,” the court wrote.

The court noted, for instance, that Mr. Giuliani repeatedly claimed tens of thousands of underage teenagers had voted illegally in Georgia. An audit by the Georgia Office of the Secretary of State found that no one under the age of 18 voted in the 2020 election.

Still, Mr. Giuliani continued to repeat the false claim as recently as April 27 on his radio show, the court said, after a disciplinary committee had already petitioned the court to suspend his law license.

Mr. Giuliani is also facing a defamation lawsuit. Dominion Voting Systems, an election technology company, sued Mr. Giuliani in January and accused him of spreading “a viral disinformation campaign” about the company’s machines manipulating vote tallies.

Dominion is seeking more than $1.3 billion in damages. Mr. Giuliani has called the lawsuit an “act of intimidation by the hate-filled left-wing.”

William K. Rashbaum, Maggie Haberman and Benjamin Weiser contributed reporting

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/24/nyre ... e=Homepage

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Posting what is not behind the WSJ paywall. (I'll believe it when I see it)

Trump Organization and CFO Allen Weisselberg Expected to Be Charged Thursday

By Corinne Ramey
Updated June 30, 2021 12:50 pm ET

The Manhattan district attorney’s first charges in three-year probe will focus on alleged tax-related crimes at former president’s company

The Manhattan district attorney’s office is expected to charge the Trump Organization and its chief financial officer with tax-related crimes on Thursday, people familiar with the matter said, which would mark the first criminal charges against the former president’s company since prosecutors began investigating it three years ago.

Any charges against the Trump Organization and Allen Weisselberg, the company’s longtime chief financial officer, would be a blow to former President Donald Trump, who has fended off multiple criminal and civil probes during and after his presidency. But the initial charges won’t implicate Mr. Trump himself, his lawyer said, falling short of an expectation built during a high-profile probe that included a battle over the former president’s tax returns that went twice to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The defendants are expected to appear in court on Thursday afternoon, the people said.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-orga ... 1625060765

The Trump Organization and Mr. Weisselberg are expected to face charges related to allegedly evading taxes on fringe benefits, the people said. For months, the Manhattan district attorney’s office and New York state attorney general’s office have been investigating whether Mr. Weisselberg and other employees illegally avoided paying taxes on perks—such as cars, apartments and private-school tuition—that they received from the Trump Organization.

A sole focus on fringe benefits would be unusual, former prosecutors said. It is rare to charge an individual or company for failure to pay taxes on employee benefits alone, although such charges are used as part of larger cases.

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[dryrunguy]

So yet another subordinate will, at best, take the sword for Trump, because that's what they do. But Trump himself remains unscathed. And for 35-40% of the U.S. population, this is just another witch hunt...

[JazzNU]

By all accounts, it's not a small number, it's in the millions. That daughter-in-law who people were questioning what in the world she could know, had the records for the $500k in tuition paid for with Trump Org checks for her kids. And that's just one instance.

These charges are meant as a squeeze play. If charges against him don't get him to cooperate, the assumption has been charges will be brought against his son. Are both he and his son willing to go to jail for the Chief Insurrectionist? We'll see. Many who personally know him have said he'll roll at that point.

[ti-amie]

By all accounts, it's not a small number, it's in the millions. That daughter-in-law who people were questioning what in the world she could know, had the records for the $500k in tuition paid for with Trump Org checks for her kids. And that's just one instance.

These charges are meant as a squeeze play. If charges against him don't get him to cooperate, the assumption has been charges will be brought against his son. Are both he and his son willing to go to jail for the Chief Insurrectionist? We'll see. Many who personally know him have said he'll roll at that point.

Him being Weisselberg right?

[JazzNU]

Him being Weisselberg right?

Sorry, yes. Weiseelberg is the one they are trying to squeeze, the one whose daughter-in-law provided info on, and the one whose son is next in the firing squad line if he doesn't flip and provide evidence on Drumpf.

[dryrunguy]

I never know where to put these things. But here is a new NY Times video that chronicles the events of January 6. It is 40 minutes long but worth the watch.

It is beyond alarming. We've seen bits and pieces before, but this is... no words.