🐱 US probing potential bribery, lobbying scheme for pardon

US probing potential bribery, lobbying scheme for pardon

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department is investigating whether there was a secret scheme to lobby White House officials for a pardon as well as a related plot to offer a hefty political...

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WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department is investigating whether there was a secret scheme to lobby White House officials for a pardon as well as a related plot to offer a hefty political contribution in exchange for clemency, according to a court document unsealed Tuesday.

Most of the information in the 18-page court order is redacted, including the identity of the people whom prosecutors are investigating and whom the proposed pardon might be intended for.

But the document from August does reveal that certain individuals are suspected of having acted to secretly lobby White House officials to secure a pardon or sentence commutation and that, in a related scheme, a substantial political contribution was floated in exchange for a pardon or “reprieve of sentence.”

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A Justice Department official said Tuesday night that no government official was or is a subject or target of the investigation. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation.

The existence of the investigation, first reported by CNN, was revealed in a court order from U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell, the chief judge of Washington’s federal court. In it, she granted investigators access to certain email communications connected to the alleged schemes that she said was not protected by attorney-client privilege. The investigative team will be able to use that material to confront any subject or target of the investigation, the judge wrote.

The order was dated Aug. 28, and prosecutors had sought to keep it private because they said it identifies people not charged by a grand jury. But on Tuesday, Howell unsealed select portions of that document while redacting from view any personally identifiable information.

As part of the investigation, more than 50 devices, including laptops and iPads, have been seized, according to the document.

Pardons are common at the end of a president’s tenure and are occasionally politically fraught affairs as some convicted felons look to leverage connections inside the White House to secure clemency. Last week, President Donald Trump announced that he had pardoned his first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, even as a federal judge was weighing a Justice Department request to dismiss the case.

 

[Buttigieg2020]

A Justice Department official said Tuesday night that no government official was or is a subject or target of the investigation. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation.

So did some guy try to PayPal the White House with a “pardon pls” attached or something?

 

[Standardized Profile]

They're investigating a "scheme" and not an actual charge of accepting bribes, and no one in the government is under investigation. Looks like someone baited a hook but didn't catch anything. Biden's AG will quietly kill the investigation.

Most of the information in the 18-page court order is redacted, including the identity of the people whom prosecutors are investigating and whom the proposed pardon might be intended for.

Fix that fucking preposition, AP.

 

[murdered meat bag]

Last week, President Donald Trump announced that he had pardoned his first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, even as a federal judge was weighing a Justice Department request to dismiss the case.

This is a lie. not surprised at all but it's super annoying.

 

[Unpaid Emotional Labourer]

How is this different from every outgoing administration ever? They’re always lobbied for pardons and if anyone thinks it’s for no benefit to the outgoing President, lololol.

 

[Secret Asshole]

So did some guy try to PayPal the White House with a “pardon pls” attached or something?

No, it was the janitor who was there on work release and is also a paranoid schizophrenic. That's their justice department official.

 

[Karl der Grosse]

Does anyone but me remember Hillary's hideous brothers raking in the cash for pardons at the end of Bill's second term? They made a fortune.

 

[It's HK-47]

https://www.dcd.uscourts.gov/sites/dcd/files/20gj35%20Partial%20Unsealing%20Order.pdf

This is an odd one. Not only is every single name and date in this document redacted, but it's very unusual in that the DOJ itself published the document, despite the fact that this is an ongoing case in the midst of grand jury proceedings. This is essentially a status report on what looks like an ongoing investigation, and while you frequently see people push for the release of these sorts of things, it's practically never granted, especially smack in the middle of one.

Grand juries tend to be so secretive that the DOJ doesn't typically even announce that one's been seated, let alone offers the public any update as to what they're doing. Barr's had a history with these in the recent past, where the House attempted to hold him in contempt for refusing to divulge grand jury information pertaining to the ongoing Mueller investigation. He didn't budge an inch at the time and nothing much came of their threat thereafter, but this one was specifically requested and granted, which doesn't happen without Barr's approval.

The crux of the court's ruling here is spent explaining why attorney-client privilege is moot in this regard, because the two lawyers involved sent communications to a third party who was not their client, meaning that all of this information is fair game and available for the public, because if it was confidential information that was purely between them and their clients, they wouldn't have included this person in the communications.

That the media immediately leaped to the conclusion that this relates to Trump is indicative of their own bias, because you don't even need to be the President or a Presidential elect in order for this to be applicable. This could have been anyone on the campaign trail who was willing to take a political donation for the promise of a pardon should they make it into the Oval Office, or this could even be former Presidents for all we know, but I'm not prone to believing that the DOJ would make such a racket over this if it was some obscure whoever-the-fuck that didn't even make it as far as the debate stage.

This could shape up to be pretty interesting, depending on whose name is behind those redactions.