United States Senate

[fraurosena]

Sweet, loving Rufus. 

 

 

[fraurosena]

Marty Lederman is a law professor at Georgetown University Law Center. In this rather interesting thread he explains what could be happening with this whistleblower complaint from a law perspective, and sets out four possibilities that could happen:

You can find the unrolled version here.

 

[fraurosena]

Meanwhile, in non-impeachment related news...

NRA Was 'Foreign Asset' To Russia Ahead of 2016, New Senate Report Reveals

Quote

The National Rifle Association acted as a "foreign asset" for Russia in the period leading up to the 2016 election, according to a new investigation unveiled Friday by Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore.

Drawing on contemporaneous emails and private interviews, an 18-month probe by the Senate Finance Committee's Democratic staff found that the NRA underwrote political access for Russian nationals Maria Butina and Alexander Torshin more than previously known — even though the two had declared their ties to the Kremlin.

The report, available here, also describes how closely the gun rights group was involved with organizing a 2015 visit by some of its leaders to Moscow.

Then-NRA vice president Pete Brownell, who would later become NRA president, was enticed to visit Russia with the promise of personal business opportunities — and the NRA covered a portion of the trip's costs.

The conclusions of the Senate investigation could have legal implications for the NRA, Wyden says.

Tax-exempt organizations are barred from using funds for the personal benefit of its officials or for actions significantly outside their stated missions. The revelations in the Senate report raise questions about whether the NRA could face civil penalties or lose its tax-exempt status.

Attorneys general in the state of New York and the District of Columbia are conducting separate probes into alleged wrongdoing at the gun rights organization. These probes have a broader scope than the Senate report, which focuses on Russia.

Majority response: This is overblown

The Republican majority on the Senate Finance Committee, which was consulted periodically throughout the Democrats' investigation, said Friday the report was overblown.

In the Republicans' analysis of Wyden's report, the majority argued that it does not account for U.S.-Russia relations at the time and contains "much conclusory innuendo... and repeatedly attempts to paint a picture that does not exist."

The Republicans also argued that if the NRA committed any infractions, they would be small and do not put the NRA's tax-exempt status at risk.

"To the extent NRA funds were used improperly in any facts discussed in the [Democratic report led by Wyden], it appears to have been minor, hardly a rounding error for an organization with hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue each year and nothing that cannot be corrected with minor intermediate sanctions," the Republican analysis states.

Kremlin links were clear

Wyden's 77-page report centers on Butina — a convicted Russian agent now in federal prison — and Torshin, a former Russian government official who has been sanctioned by the United States.

The report indicates that top NRA officials were aware of Butina's and Torshin's links with the Kremlin even as they sought to work more closely together under the banner of gun rights.

In an email later circulated to two senior NRA staff members, Butina wrote that a purpose of the 2015 Moscow trip was that "many powerful figures in the Kremlin are counting on Torshin to prove his American connections" by showing he could bring prominent NRA officials to Russia.

At another point, Butina suggested to participants on the 2015 NRA trip to Russia that she might be able to set up a meeting between them and President Vladimir Putin, referring to him as "Russia's highest leader."

NRA facilitated political access

Despite these declarations about their ties to the Russian government, NRA officials paid for and facilitated Torshin and Butina's introduction into American political organizations.

Butina and Torshin received access to Republican Party officials at NRA events.

It was a explicit interest expressed by Butina: In one 2015 email to an NRA employee, Butina wrote, "is there a list of U.S. governors or members of Congress that might be present at some time during the [NRA] annual meeting?"

The employee responded with a list.

The NRA also helped them forge connections with groups such as the Council for National Policy, the National Prayer Breakfast, the National Sporting Goods Wholesalers Association and Safari Club International.

"NRA resources appear to have been used to pay for membership and registration fees to third party events for [Torshin and Butina] as well as to arrange for transit to and lodging for many of those events throughout 2015 and 2016," the report states.

Report contradicts NRA denials

The Senate report notes that in 2018, then-NRA spokeswoman Dana Loesch repeatedly denied that the group leaders' 2015 trip to Moscow was sanctioned by the gun rights group.

But in a letter obtained by the committee, then-NRA President Allan Cors wrote to Torshin on NRA letterhead after consulting with NRA staff and former NRA President David Keene.

Cors designated two NRA figures to lead the trip: "Dave Keene and [top NRA donor] Joe Gregory will represent the NRA and our five million members better than anyone else," he wrote.

During the course of the investigation, Brownell's lawyer also told the committee that Brownell believed the trip was an official NRA event.

This view is further strengthened by the committee's evidence that NRA staff prepared itineraries, gathered briefing materials, applied for tourist visas, paid for some of the travel expenses, and provided the delegation with NRA gifts to give to Russian officials.

The Senate investigation also found evidence that the NRA tried to hide various payments related to the trip.

Brownell covered approximately $21,000 in expenses related to the trip; in June 2016, the NRA reimbursed Brownell just over $21,000.

After questions were raised about the trip in 2018, Brownell paid the NRA $17,000 — a transaction that Brownell's lawyer told the committee was requested by the NRA as a way of "getting the trip off the NRA's books."

NRA leaders sought business opportunities

The Senate investigation concludes that a number of NRA figures on the 2015 trip traveled to Russia "primarily or solely for the purpose of advancing personal business interests, rather than advancing the NRA's tax-exempt purpose."

Brownell, then a vice president of the NRA, is the CEO of a major firearms supplier bearing his last name.

In an email to a staffer at his business, Brownell described his trip as "an opportunity to be hosted in Russia to broaden our business opportunities ... to introduce our company to the governing individuals throughout Russia."

The NRA directly facilitated Brownell's effort to travel to Moscow early to explore business opportunities with Russian weapons manufacturers," the report concludes.

Another member of the trip, NRA donor and then-Outdoor Channel CEO Jim Liberatore, told the Senate committee through his lawyer that his participation in the 2015 Moscow trip was "purely commercial."

Wyden seeks IRS probe

Wyden, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said at the conclusion of his investigation that his staff had revealed information that shows that the National Rifle Association may have abused its tax-exempt status.

The next step, he says, is for the IRS to launch its own inquiry.

"The totality of evidence uncovered during my investigation, as well as the mounting evidence of rampant self-dealing, indicate the NRA may have violated tax laws," Wyden said. "The IRS needs to examine these findings and investigate other publicly reported incidents of potential lawbreaking."

[fraurosena]

Sweet Rufus, I was not aware of this. So many people and entities interconnected and connected to Russia via the NRA. 

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Sadly, this is something I could imagine Lindsey saying:

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[GreyhoundFan]

I'm glad some residents are holding Joni's feet to the flame: "‘Where is the line?’: A Joni Ernst town hall questioner sums up the GOP’s Trump dilemma"

Spoiler

Iowa resident Amy Haskins asked Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) an important question about President Trump on Thursday.

“Where is the line?” Haskins asked at a town hall. “When are you guys going to say, ‘Enough,' and stand up and say, ‘I’m not backing any of this?’”

I don’t mean that this was a good question in a moralistic way, as if it’s beyond time for Ernst and her GOP colleagues to take a stand. (People are welcome to make that call for themselves.) I mean it quite literally as “Where is the line?” — because Republicans need to start asking themselves just how far Trump will go if they don’t start setting boundaries.

The past week or so has shown the peril of the GOP’s see-no-evil approach to Trump. After a rough transcript showed the president suggestively talking about how good the United States is to Ukraine before asking Ukraine’s president for investigations that carry political benefits for him, Republicans offered a muted response. A handful — most notably Sens. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) and Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), and even Sen. Patrick J. Toomey (R-Pa.) to an extent — said the call was bad. But the vast majority of elected GOP officials basically stayed silent.

The GOP’s reward for that silence was that Trump basically took what he said on that unearthed July 25 call and said it out loud — this time about China. “ … China should start an investigation into the Bidens, because what happened in China is just about as bad as what happened with Ukraine,” Trump declared Thursday.

Suddenly, the president — who in 2016 insisted that “Russia, if you’re listening” was just a joke — was saying China, if you’re listening with an unambiguous seriousness. China now becomes the third country he has requested politically helpful information from, with no end in sight as to how far he, his personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani and even Attorney General William P. Barr will take this.

The Republican Party’s gamble on Trump has paid off thus far; that much we can say with plenty of certainty. Yes, they lost the House in 2018 and could well lose the presidency in 2020. But the former is pretty normal, and the latter is to be determined. In the meantime, they have filled two Supreme Court vacancies with conservative jurists, tipping the court 5 to 4 to their side, and stocked lower courts with a huge number of like-minded judges. They have gotten tax cuts passed and regulations rolled back. They have repealed Obamacare’s individual mandate. They have gotten the U.S. Embassy moved to Jerusalem and withdrawals from the Paris climate accord and the Iran nuclear deal. None of these were hugely difficult with the GOP-controlled Congress that Trump inherited, and many of them were done unilaterally by Trump. But they would not have happen without him winning the presidency.

But just because it has paid off thus far does not mean it always will. And the risk with Trump has always been less that he would lose reelection or be something of a middling failure as president, and more that his presidency would (a) inflict irreparable damage to American government/politics and or (b) be the kind of catastrophe that would define the GOP for years to come.

The latter has not happened yet, and it is too early to say that is coming down the pike. But it is getting more difficult to dismiss the possibility, as Trump continues to blatantly violate norms that Republicans once held sacred and feeds the impeachment inquiry that now promises to be the dominant story of his presidency, with plenty of disclosures apparently in the offing.

While Trump’s tenure has avoided tenure-defining crises like a new armed conflict or a poorly handled mass disaster, there are increasing signs that his China trade war could pull the economy in a downturn — with nobody quite certain how far he will continue to push the standoff with Beijing. As with Trump’s request for foreign investigations, free-market Republicans do not seem to know what to say about a trade war that you just know they despise deep inside.

And given Trump’s unwieldiness and apparently, lack of carefulness, you never know when a scandal is suddenly going to become the scandal. Trump has inoculated himself against that by building a devoted base that has barely blinked at anything he has done, but everybody has a breaking point. The dam did not break on Richard Nixon, either ... until it did.

The threshold for tolerating Trump’s various apostasies might be higher than it ever was for Nixon, given his base and given our current polarization. But at the least he is doing things that are putting Republicans in a very uncomfortable spot. And for what: Feeding unfounded conspiracy theories about a Democratic presidential candidate who finished fifth in the last presidential primary he ran in?

Republicans have never really been able to stop Trump from being Trump, and they have often paid a price when they have tried. That is a big reason they do not really try anymore. They have been stung too many times when they thought this was their time to abandon ship. They might have even convinced themselves he knows something they do not about how all this works.

But there has to be a line somewhere. It may not be where the Amy Haskins’s of the world wants it to be, but it is something the likes of Ernst and her colleagues should probably start thinking pretty hard about, given the events of the past two weeks.

 

[fraurosena]

Lindsey Graham got pranked by the Russians and accidentally told them more than he should have.

 

[WiseGirl]

Not sure where to put this one but I do like Democratic Senators pointing out how bad the administration is.

[fraurosena]

His words are just air blowing in the wind. Pffffft.

 

[Audrey2]

Eh, Donnie and his minions will talk to Mitch and the plan to leave Syria will be the best plan ever!

[fraurosena]

41 minutes ago, Audrey2 said:

Eh, Donnie and his minions will talk to Mitch and the plan to leave Syria will be the best plan ever!

Not Trump. He is an idiot. Nobody listens to him, if it isn’t in their own interests to do so. Nah, McConnell only listens to the people with money. 

[fraurosena]

Rand Paul doesn't quite know how to adequately react to pushback from a reporter and ends up telling the truth.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

 

[GreyhoundFan]

My word, Rubio is such a dumbass:

 

[Audrey2]

So, if Trump has been removed from office, will the next President change the venue, so the corrupt Trump corporation can't profit from his corruption.

[fraurosena]

17 hours ago, Audrey2 said:

So, if Trump has been removed from office, will the next President change the venue, so the corrupt Trump corporation can't profit from his corruption.

I don't think any self-respecting person that doesn't have the name Trump would want to hold the G-7 in bedbug heaven.

By the way, if Trump is really is removed from office, his name will be forever tainted. His business emporium will implode. Nobody will want that name on any building. Nobody will want to frequent anything that carries his name, or that is owned by him. And honestly, I think that happening is one of the best knock-on effects of his removal from office that I can imagine. His mooching kids will be left with nothing. Not even their name. The thought alone makes me grin with malicious delight.

[GreyhoundFan]

Ted, showing his normal moral courage:

[GreyhoundFan]

The Repugs are frantically trying to ruin America before the 2020 election:

@47of74, if you run across Joni in IA, please flip her off for me.

[fraurosena]

Repugs are actively killing democracy. 

 

[fraurosena]

Huh.

Lindsey Graham will give Judiciary chairmanship back to Chuck Grassley

Quote

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) plans to hand the chairmanship of the Senate Judiciary Committee back to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa.) in the next Congress.

Graham took over the panel this year from Grassley, who left to chair the Senate Finance Committee. In an interview Thursday, Graham said Grassley asked to come back after his tenure on the Senate Finance Committee. Graham responded “absolutely.”

“Love Chuck Grassley. That’s the way the Senate works,” Graham said. “He took the Finance Committee so I could be chairman, and he’ll come back and fill out his time, and I’ll come back, and somebody else will come along.”

Senate Republicans allow their members to chair a committee for six years in total, regularly leading to rounds of musical chairs as senators face committee term limits.

Grassley has more seniority on the Judiciary Committee than Graham. Graham added that the Iowa Republican is “a very special friend” who has two more years in which he could be chairman of the Judiciary Committee.

Grassley’s role as chairman would depend on Republicans keeping the Senate in 2020.

Grassley said on Wednesday he would “absolutely” want to go back to being Judiciary chairman and spoke to Graham about the request in November.

As Judiciary chairman in the last Congress, Grassley oversaw the hotly contested confirmations of Supreme Court Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Here's hoping we have a blue tsunami in 2020 and have a Dem chairperson instead of either Graham or Grassley.

[GreyhoundFan]

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Lindsey Graham should be ashamed of what Lindsey has turned into.

[fraurosena]

Lindsey is going to show those dems he can hold hearings too. So there! 

Because the deep state did bad things with those FISA warrants for Carter Page, and Lindsey's going to get to the bottom of it! Now stop looking at his tin foil hat. He's serious, you know!