It doesn’t look like there will be an indictment of Trump today, but the sense of excitement at the likelihood that it will happen this week is palpable in today’s news and on social media. Unfortunately, there’s no indication this morning that Trump will be arrested today. New York City is preparing for possible civil unrest, but so far the protests Trump has been calling for haven’t materialized.
Somehow, the Mueller report lives on.
Here's a look at the role it plays with the Manhattan grand jury that might soon indict Donald Trump.
It all comes down to one guy: Rudy Giuliani's lawyer.
A Manhattan grand jury’s indictment of Donald Trump has started to look like an inevitability, as cable news—and Trump himself—speculate that charges could drop any hour now. But a lawyer who’s played a bit part in a number of MAGA scandals has now come out of nowhere to try to derail the entire case.
On Monday, the grand jury heard shocking testimony from Rudy Giuliani lawyer Bob Costello, who once again tried to pin the blame for Trump’s hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels on a familiar fall guy: Michael Cohen.
For years, Costello has been a low-key yet crucial background character in Trumpworld. He investigated crimes at the Southern District of New York—the same legendary federal prosecutor’s office once led by Giuliani—and in the decades since, Costello has stood by the former mayor’s side as Giuliani became a MAGA movement celebrity, with Costello also becoming a sort of Forrest Gump for many of the biggest scandals in that world.
But Costello also briefly interacted with Cohen, the one-time Trump fixer who took the blame for the Stormy Daniels payment and who has now become the Manhattan District Attorney’s star witness against Trump.
It’s that relationship with Cohen and Giuliani that placed Costello at the Manhattan DA’s offices for three hours on Monday afternoon.
So what happened?
Costello indicated Monday that he was there to explain why a half-dozen damning emails seem to indicate a wide-ranging conspiracy reaching deep into the Trump White House in early 2018—emails that appear to show the American president using Giuliani to keep Cohen from cooperating with the feds.
But instead of playing along, two dozen grand jurors heard Costello tear apart Cohen by portraying him as a former client and a desperate liar willing to do anything to avoid prison.
Costello, who spoke to reporters on a Manhattan sidewalk after his testimony, described how he hijacked the closed-door grand jury proceedings on Monday. The ex-prosecutor said he refused to answer a Manhattan prosecutor’s narrow questions and used them as an opportunity to flip the script, telling grand jurors there was a ton of evidence they weren’t being shown by the Manhattan DA.
“They’d ask me a limited question based on these six emails, and I would volunteer information that I thought the grand jury needed to hear,” he said. “My only mission there today was to tell the truth about what Michael Cohen was saying during any point in time when I was representing him in April 2018.”
“I told the grand jury that this guy couldn’t tell the truth if you put a gun to his head,” he added.
There’s much more about Costello at the link. The DA had Cohen there to give rebuttal testimony if necessary, but he wasn’t called. It appears that the grand jurors weren’t impressed with what Costello told them. He complained that none of them requested a copy of a packet of “evidence” he brought with him.
Watergate prosecutor reveals how Robert Costello just opened Trump up to even more charges – Raw Story – Celebrating 19 Years of Independent Journalism https://t.co/ufWwPL1ULO
Former Watergate prosecutor Nick Akerman joined Michel Cohen on MSNBC Monday following a press conference by Donald Trump ally Bob Costello who appeared before a Manhattan grand jury.
As a possible indictment hangs over Trump, the district attorney’s office asked the former president if he wanted to speak out in his defense to the grand jury. He declined but he sent Costello instead. Costello then said that he provided stacks of “evidence” about Cohen that show he was desperate and willing to do anything to get out of potential prison.
But the reality is a different matter, according to Cohen. Speaking to Ari Melber, he and Akerman explained that the special counsel’s report on the Russia investigation revealed a lot of information about the exchanges between Cohen and Costello, including the attempt by Trump allies to keep him from flipping.
“I start with the Mueller report because the Mueller report laid out a witness-tampering plot by Donald Trump, basically to keep Michael in line with Donald Trump,” said Akerman, saying that it went through Rudy Giuliani and Bob Costello….
Melber put up a headline saying Costello contacted one of Trump’s lawyers to see, allegedly, if he could arrange for a pardon for Cohen. He asked why something like that matters.
“Well, that’s all part of the story,” Akerman explained. “It really starts on April 9th when the search warrant is executed and only a few days after that Donald Trump calls him according to the Mueller Report and he can confirm this and told him that, you know, he was just checking in to see if he was okay and he encouraged Michael to hang in there. Then he got calls from other people, friends of Donald Trump, who called up and basically told him to keep in line, including Allen Weisselberg who I believe also called him during that period of time. One of the people that was involved in cooking the books.”
Akerman continued: “What’s wrong with it is it comes to a point when Michael meets with Costello, who is talking to Rudy Giuliani, who is talking to Donald Trump, and it all comes back to Donald Trump that Michael is on board and that he’s staying with the team. And the next day, the day after that meeting occurs on April 17th, Donald Trump starts tweeting out that Michael’s not going to flip. That he’s with the team, that he’s on board.”
Melber categorized it as “an effort then to abuse government power to thwart a probe.”
This story gets really complicated! I had forgotten all that because Trump has committed so many crimes, its hard to keep track. Read more details at Raw Story.
Andrew Weissman: Make No Mistake, the Investigation of Donald Trump and the Stormy Daniels Scheme Is Serious. GIFT ARTICLE https://t.co/0ehc8NrgNU
Though it may be tempting to do so, it is a mistake to assess the Manhattan district attorney’s investigation of Donald Trump by comparing its relative severity with those of myriad other crimes possibly committed by him. That is not how state and federal prosecutors will — or should — be thinking about the issue of charging Mr. Trump, or for that matter, any other defendant….
Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, would be well within his discretion in determining that the answer to those questions is yes and therefore supports charging Mr. Trump in connection with any crimes arising from an effort to keep Stormy Daniels from disclosing an alleged affair to the electorate before the 2016 election.
This case is just one of a few ongoing criminal investigations into Mr. Trump’s conduct — including potentially a much larger financial investigation by the Manhattan district attorney — and the hush money scheme is no doubt the least serious of the crimes. It does not involve insurrection and undermining the peaceful transfer of power fundamental to our democracy, nor the retention of highly classified documents and obstruction of a national security investigation.
But does that mean the Manhattan criminal case is an example of selective prosecution — in other words, going after a political enemy for a crime that no one else would be charged with? Not by a long shot. To begin with, Mr. Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen, who was instrumental in the scheme, has already pleaded guilty to a federal crime emanating from this conduct and served time for it and other crimes. Federal prosecutors told the court that Mr. Cohen “acted in coordination with and at the direction of” Mr. Trump (identified as “Individual 1”). It would be anathema to the rule of law not to prosecute the principal for the crime when a lower-level conspirator has been prosecuted.
Mr. Bragg, however, has had to pick up the slack, since federal prosecutors have not pursued such charges, for reasons that were clear under the corrupt influence of William Barr. Barr is reported to have shut down any follow-up investigation of Mr. Trump, but it remains murky as to why a criminal investigation or indictment of Mr. Trump has not been pursued under the current administration (Attorney General Merrick Garland has not explained publicly any reason for not pursuing this investigation).
As a state prosecutor, Mr. Bragg cannot bring the same federal campaign finance charge to which Mr. Cohen pleaded guilty. He has various options nonetheless. New York district attorney offices have often charged a crime of filing a false business record, both as a felony and as a misdemeanor. The crime is a clear felony if it is done with intent to aid or cover up another crime and otherwise is a misdemeanor.
Many folks have forgotten that it was Bill Barr who shut down the investigation of Trump for the crimes that Michael Cohen went to prison for. Read the rest at the NYT link.
Intelligence sources told CBS News that there’s been a “significant increase” in threats and violent rhetoric online from domestic violent extremists as former President Donald Trump claimed he will be indicted by a Manhattan grand jury.
But the sources said they have not identified any credible or direct threats to a person or property and they are continuing to monitor for credible specific threats.
Domestic violent extremists in online postings have warned that prosecutors from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office would cross a red line if Trump is indicted and it would be met with more violence than the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, the sources said. There have also been postings calling for civil war.
Sources said the threats are mostly aimed at law enforcement, judges and government officials in New York and elsewhere that domestic violent extremists perceive as participants in what they see as a political persecution of Trump.
A law enforcement source said they are seeing chatter online, with Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg being mentioned in a lot of it, but not much mobilization toward violence or protests at this point. But law enforcement sources said the situation could change quickly….
The New York Police Department and other federal, state and local agencies are prepping security plans in and around the Manhattan criminal courthouse where Trump is likely to appear if he is charged.
Dismal Crowd At NYC Trump Rally Despite Ex-Prez’s Call For Action As Arrest Looms | HuffPost Latest News https://t.co/JkmJmUnBNs
— Billy Jack Liberal 💪🏽 (@TheBillyJackLib) March 21, 2023
The leadership of the New York Young Republican Club, a far-right group, wants to be very clear: It’s actually a good thing that only a handful of Donald Trump supporters showed up to the pro-Trump rally held Monday outside the Manhattan district attorney’s office.
“We purposefully kept it small,” the club’s president, Gavin Wax, told HuffPost.
“I think there’s more cameras here than people,” observed Vish Burra, the club’s executive secretary and a staffer for Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.).
“I would prefer a lower turnout,” said Troy Olson, sergeant-at-arms.
Turnout couldn’t have gotten much lower. Despite Trump’s call just a few days prior to “PROTEST, TAKE OUR NATION BACK” in anticipation that he would be charged criminally for years-old hush money payments to adult actor Stormy Daniels, members of the media vastly outnumbered Trump supporters at the rally.
The event on Monday, as a result, turned into a sort of media petting zoo for the endangered Republicans, some of whom sought out interview requests while others hid their faces out of fear of identification.
“I had like 50 cameras on me!” exclaimed one man, whose face was covered by an American flag mask, before sounding secretly thrilled that he’d likely be in the paper tomorrow.
LOL
Column: It is past time to give up the idea that stoking the anger of Trump’s diehard fans is a victory unto itself.
If each scandal binds 99% of Trump's base closer to him and unsettles 1%, that's still a losing formula, writes Alexander Burns. https://t.co/s4PEli8E7Y
The widely expected indictment of Donald Trump in Manhattan has all the makings of a political disaster for him. It should be the climactic event in a yearslong saga involving marital infidelity, sleazy financial dealings and now the first-ever criminal charge against a former American president.
Naturally, the question arises: Could this actually be good for Trump? [….]
It is not irrational speculation. Americans have a history of sticking with flamboyant politicians with more than a passing relationship with the criminal justice system, from Marion Barry in Washington, D.C., to Edwin Edwards in Louisiana. Trump is a character from a similar mold, with an even tighter grip on his followers that verges at times on the quasi-mystical. At another point in his political life, perhaps Trump might have turned this case into rich fodder for a comeback.
Not now. For all his unusual strengths, Trump is defined these days more by his weaknesses — personal and political deficiencies that have grown with time and now figure to undermine any attempt to exploit the criminal case against him.
His base of support is too small, his political imagination too depleted and his instinct for self-absorption too overwhelming for him to marshal a broad, lasting backlash. His determination to look inward and backward has been a problem for his campaign even without the indictment. It will be a bigger one if and when he’s indicted.
Read the rest at Politico.
So that’s what’s happening with the expected Trump indictment as of now. It should be an exciting week ahead. I’ll add a few more important stories in the comment thread. Have a great Tuesday, Sky Dancers!
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“The American people have a constitutional right to peacefully assemble,” Pence said, adding, “The frustration the American people feel about what they sense is a two-tiered justice system in this country, I think is well founded. But I believe that people understand that if they give voice to this – if this occurs on Tuesday, that they need to do so peaceful and in a lawful manner.”
We’re about to see a big test of is it really liberty and justice for all? If you talk to Black Americans, women with functional reproductive systems, poor people, religious minorities, and the GLBTQ+ Community, we have one justice system, and rich old white men have another. Ours treats us like property with a lower value than actual physical junk.
Is Tuesday really the day, and will Trumpsters strumpet themselves into an insurrectional frenzy again?
Over the weekend, Trump declared on social media that he expected to be indicted this week by a grand jury empaneled by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. He’s been attacking Bragg for some time now, but the idea that things were coming to a head triggered a new round of scattershot protests from the former president.
At the platform he helped launch, Trump posted a lengthy, all-caps attack on Bragg, accusing the D.A. of letting murderers “walk free” and insisting that Bragg had “presided over the biggest violent crime wave” in the city’s history, which is not even close to true. But he led with his core frustration: that Bragg is a “racist, [George] Soros backed D.A.”
This “Soros-backed” claim is not a new one from Trump or others on the right. Soros, a left-wing philanthropist, is a frequent target of the right in part because of his willingness to spend to influence politics and, in some quarters, because he is Jewish. The link to Bragg is by no means direct: Soros has backed a nonprofit called Color of Change that includes a political action committee committed to electing Black candidates. Bragg, who is Black, received the group’s backing.
Bragg being Black is also why Trump accuses him of being “racist.” Trump has done this before; he has accused New York Attorney General Letitia James of being racist, as well as Fulton County, Ga., District Attorney Fani Willis. The two characteristics all of those prosecutors have in common are that they are Black and are involved in investigations into Trump.
Now we lumber into familiar territory when we’re talking about Trump. Does he actually think they are racist against him, echoing concerns about discrimination against Whites that is common among White Republicans, or is he simply being opportunistic? The answer, as it usually is, is that it’s probably a mix of both. Trump is both a driver and consumer of right-wing rhetoric, and it’s hard to disentangle what he believes from what he believes to be useful.
The effect is the same. Trump is not simply hoping that his supporters view him as a victim of an overzealous prosecutorial effort, as he hoped they might during the Russia travails. He is, instead, amplifying the idea that these Black prosecutors are coming after him because he’s White. While most Trump supporters were not likely to face a probe by the FBI’s counterintelligence infrastructure, most are White. And many of them think that Whites are targets of discrimination as often as Black or Hispanic Americans.
Trump has weaponized the notion of “reverse racism.” Dean Obeidallah argues that “Trump is preparing his base for violence if he’s arrested–and over 50% of them are ready. Today’s GOP is what FASCISM looks like.” We’re on indictment and insurrection (once again) watch, and law enforcement around the country knows it. Check out the poll cited in this think piece.
… Trump and a majority of the GOP base see violence as an acceptable tool to acquire and retain political power. That is the essence of fascism. As Madeline Albright stated when discussing her book “Fascism: A Warning,” “Whatever else it is, fascism involves the endorsement and use of violence to achieve political goals and stay in power.”
This also means Trump’s efforts calls to his base to commit violence if he’s arrested will alarmingly find traction in an already radicalized GOP base. And Trump knows this. Indeed, no one knows Trump’s base better than him.
That is why Trump has been preparing his base to commit violence to avenge him if he’s charged with a crime for well over a year. In psychological terms, what Trump has been doing is called “priming,” which is defined as exposing a person to a stimulus—like words, images, etc.–that influences their behavior at a later date. In general, the person is unaware that have been guided or primed to this point. As experts note, “Priming can be used maliciously or to be manipulative.”
Trump began priming his base for such violence back in January 2022 when he told his supporters to take to the streets if any prosecutor, anywhere charges with him with a crime—not just the Manhattan District Attorney. That is when Trump told his fans at a rally in Texas: “If these radical, vicious, racist prosecutors do anything wrong or illegal, I hope we are going to have in this country the biggest protests we have ever had in Washington, D.C., in New York, in Atlanta and elsewhere.”
In September, Trump was on Hugh Hewitt’s radio show where he again repeated this message—but even more ominously. He told Hewitt that if he’s charged with crimes, “I think you’d have problems in this country the likes of which perhaps we’ve never seen before.” When asked by Hewitt what he meant by “problems,” Trump responded, “I think they’d have big problems. Big problems.”
Part of Trump’s “priming” of his base to commit violence when called upon was made more persuasive by Trump’s repeated promise to pardon the Jan 6 terrorists. It’s not a coincidence that the first time Trump publicly floated the idea of pardoning these traitors was in the same speech in January 2022 where he called on supporters to engage in massive protests. That is when Trump stated, “If I run and I win, we will treat those people from January 6 fairly — we will treat them fairly.” He added, “And if it requires pardons, then we will give them pardons because they are being treated so unfairly.”
I want to remind you that Republicans have been doing this since the Southern Strategy. I’d also like to remind everyone that Ronald Reagan’s justice department routinely used fascist pogroms and memes. It’s the master class in what’s going on now. Here’s a clip, and more if you follow the thread, from Frank Zappa on Cross-Fire in 1986 talking about the same playbook Republicans follow today. Donald Trump has just up-armored it. They bring military-style weapons to “peaceful demonstrations” now, which likely would include their MAGA congress goose-steppers too.
This is Frank Zappa on Crossfire in 1986. What he said then was true. It’s still true.
Look at what we face today. It’s coming from the same source, attempting to do the same thing with our books, schools, and people they don’t like. And their vehicle is the government. pic.twitter.com/Bgu6pL2JxY
— Christopher Tackett (cjtackett on 🧵) (@cjtackett) March 19, 2023
As far as we know, the Grand Jury in The Stormy Daniels Hush Money Case still hears from witnesses today. This is from the New York Times. “Trump Grand Jury Could Hear From Critic of Prosecution’s Star Witness. The grand jury considering the hush-money case against Mr. Trump might hear the testimony of lawyer Robert J. Costello, a critic of the ex-president’s fixer.”
A Manhattan grand jury that is expected to vote soon on whether to indict Donald J. Trump may hear testimony Monday attacking the prosecution’s star witness, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
The testimony would come from a lawyer, Robert J. Costello, who would appear at the request of Mr. Trump’s lawyers, the people said. Mr. Costello was once a legal adviser to Michael D. Cohen, Mr. Trump’s former fixer, who has been a key witness for the Manhattan district attorney’s office.
Mr. Costello and Mr. Cohen had a falling out, and Mr. Costello would appear solely to undermine Mr. Cohen’s credibility, the people said.
Under New York law, a person who is expected to be indicted can request that a witness appear on his or her behalf. Mr. Trump’s lawyers have asked that Mr. Costello testify, but the final decision rests with the grand jury; it is unclear whether they have made a decision. The grand jury has been hearing evidence about the former president’s involvement in a hush money payment to a porn star.
Mr. Costello’s appearance would come soon after Mr. Cohen concluded his own grand jury testimony. If Mr. Costello testifies, there is also a chance that Mr. Cohen will be asked to return to rebut some of Mr. Costello’s assertions.
A spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office declined to comment, as did Mr. Costello. A lawyer for Mr. Cohen, Lanny J. Davis, declined to comment.
The district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, a Democrat, is expected to seek an indictment of Mr. Trump as soon as this week. There have been several signals that charges may be imminent: The prosecutors gave Mr. Trump an opportunity to testify, a right given to people who will soon face indictment. They have now questioned nearly every major player in the hush money saga in front of the grand jury.
Still, Trump is worried. This is from The Guardian. It was written by Hugo Lowell. “Trump in panic mode as he braces for likely charges in Stormy Daniels case. Manhattan district attorney expected to file criminal charges against ex-president for payment to adult film star in 2016.”
Donald Trump is bracing for his most legally perilous week since he left the White House, with the Manhattan district attorney likely to bring criminal charges against him over his role in paying hush money to adult film star Stormy Daniels, as he huddled this weekend to strategize his legal and political responses.
The former US president has posted in all-caps on his Truth Social platform that he expected to be “ARRESTED ON TUESDAY OF NEXT WEEK” and called for his supporters to engage in protests – an ominous echo of his tweets urging protests in the lead-up to the January 6 US Capitol attack.
Trump’s post was nothing more than guesswork about when Alvin Bragg might bring charges, sources close to Trump said, after he saw media reporting that the district attorney’s office had contacted the US Secret Service about security in the event of an indictment.
The grand jury in New York hearing evidence in the resurrected 2016 hush money case is now expected to hear from one more witness on Monday, making it unlikely that an arrest would come the following day because it could take additional hours to draft charging papers.
Former President Donald Trump’s calls for protests ahead of his anticipated indictment in New York have generated mostly muted reactions from supporters, with even some of his most ardent loyalists dismissing the idea as a waste of time or a law enforcement trap.
The ambivalence raises questions about whether Trump, though a leading Republican contender in the 2024 presidential race who retains a devoted following, still has the power to mobilize far-right supporters the way he did more than two years ago before the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. It also suggests that the hundreds of arrests that followed the Capitol riot, not to mention the convictions and long prison sentences, may have dampened the desire for repeat mass unrest.
Still, law enforcement in New York is continuing to closely monitor online chatter warning of protests and violence if Trump is arrested, with threats varying in specificity and credibility, four officials told The Associated Press. Mainly posted online and in chat groups, the messages have included calls for armed protesters to block law enforcement officers and attempt to stop any potential arrest, the officials said.
Around the time the Manhattan courthouse complex opened Monday morning, a New York Police Department truck began dropping off dozens of portable metal barricades that could be used to block off streets or sidewalks.
Meanwhile, down in Georgia …
Trump attorneys move to quash Fulton Co., GA Special Grand Jury report https://t.co/Q9h8CJkqLy
Lawyers for former President Donald Trump on Monday moved to quash the final report of the special purpose grand jury that is recommending indictments for those who meddled with Georgia’s 2020 presidential election.
The court filing also seeks to prevent the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office from using any evidence derived from the special grand jury investigation, and it seeks to recuse the DA’s office from further pursuing the case.
“The whole world has watched the process of the (special purpose grand jury) unfold and what they have witnessed was a process that was confusing, flawed and, at times, unconstitutional,” said the 51-page filing, which includes 433 more pages of exhibits. “Given the scrutiny and gravity of the investigation and those individuals involved — namely, the movant President Donald J. Trump, this process should have been handled correctly, fairly and with deference to the law and the highest ethical standards.”
The motion requests that any evidence derived from the special grand jury report be “suppressed as unconstitutionally derived and any prosecuting body be prevented from its use.”
Trump’s lawyers are also asking for a hearing on the motion and that it be heard by Chief Superior Court Judge Ural Glanville or another Superior Court judge, not Judge Robert McBurney who presided over the special grand jury probe. McBurney, the filing argued, violated the rights of parties impacted by the investigation.
The motion takes aim at public comments made by special grand jury forewoman Emily Kohrs as well as five other grand jurors who recently sat down for an interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.The five jurors spoke on the condition of not being named because of concerns about their safety and privacy.
Well, they certainly can try. It’s such a Trump stall tactic that you’d think any judge would just snort and say “move along, nothing to see here.”
So, stay tuned. It should be an exciting week!
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
It seems there’s a Warren Zevon song for everything!
An icy wind burns and scars Rushes in like a fallen star Through the narrow space between these bars Looking down on Prison Grove
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Psyche, after John William Waterhouse, by Susan Herbert. Courtesy of Thames & Hudson.
Happy Caturday!!
After a packed news day yesterday, it looks like this weekend will be even busier for the media. As I’m sure you’ve heard, Trump is trying to incite violence in advance of his possible arrest by the Manhattan District Attorney’s office in the Stormy Daniels payoff case. Trump is predicting he will be arrested on Tuesday.
Trump can’t possibly know what the New York grand jury is going to do on Monday, but he wants to get his cult followers worked up to cause trouble if it happens. It’s another iteration of his “stand back and stand by” message to the Proud Boys in a 2020 presidential debate. In his statement on Truth Social, Trump called for protests, and notably didn’t specify that they be peaceful. Sadly, much of the media is spreading his insane posts far and wide without adding any context.
Former President Donald Trump said Saturday that “illegal leaks” have indicated that he will be arrested Tuesday and called on supporters to protest.
Trump, in posts on his social media platform Truth Social, referenced reports that he could soon face possible criminal charges in New York relating to a hush money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels.
Trump did not say whether he had been informed by law enforcement of a coming indictment. A spokesperson for Trump later clarified in a statement that there “has been no notification, other than illegal leaks from the Justice Dept. and the DA’s office, to NBC” and other news outlets.
The spokesperson added, “President Trump is rightfully highlighting his innocence and the weaponization of our injustice system. He will be in Texas next weekend for a giant rally. Make America Great Again!”
NBC News reported Friday that law enforcement agencies are prepping for a possible Trump indictment as early as next week.
Trump, a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, decried “illegal leaks” that “indicate” he would be arrested on Tuesday.
“PROTEST, TAKE OUR NATION BACK!” Trump wrote.
No one in the media is reporting “leaks” from the Manhattan DA’s office. It’s possible Trump’s attorneys were warned to be prepared if the grand jury does vote on an indictment on Monday. It’s Trump who is spreading rumors.
Musica (Melody), after Kate Elizabeth Bunce, by Susan Herbert. Courtesy of Thames & Hudson.
With former President Donald J. Trump facing indictment by a Manhattan grand jury but the timing of the charges uncertain, he declared on his social media site that he would be arrested on Tuesday and demanded that his supporters protest on his behalf.
Mr. Trump made the declaration on his site, Truth Social, at 7:26. a.m. on Saturday in a post that ended with, “THE FAR & AWAY LEADING REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE AND FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, WILL BE ARRESTED ON TUESDAY OF NEXT WEEK. PROTEST, TAKE OUR NATION BACK!”
Two hours later, a spokesman issued a statement clarifying that Mr. Trump had not written his post with direct knowledge of the timing of any arrest.
“President Trump is rightfully highlighting his innocence and the weaponization of our injustice system,” the statement said.
A lawyer for Mr. Trump, Susan R. Necheles, said that his post had been based on news reports, and accused the Manhattan district attorney’s office of conducting a “political prosecution.”
A spokeswoman for the Manhattan district attorney’s office declined to comment.
Prosecutors working for the district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, have signaled that an indictment of Mr. Trump could be imminent. But they have not told Mr. Trump’s lawyers when the charges — expected to stem from a 2016 hush money payment to a porn star — would be sought or when an arrest would be made, people with knowledge of the matter said. At least one more witness is expected to testify in front of the grand jury, which could delay an indictment, the people said.
One of the people said that even if the grand jury were to vote to indict the former president on Monday, a Tuesday surrender was unlikely given the need to arrange timing, travel and other logistics.
The statement from Mr. Trump’s spokesman did not explain how he landed on Tuesday as an arrest date. One person with knowledge of the matter said that Mr. Trump’s advisers had guessed that it could happen around then, and that someone might have relayed that to the former president.
So Trump is just trying to rile up his supporters in advance. At least he didn’t add “will be wild.”
"I would slap a government exhibit sticker on this post and introduce it at his criminal trial." @glennkirschner2 reacts to the breaking news of President Trump's Truth Social post indicating that he expects to be arrested Tuesday #KatiePhangShowpic.twitter.com/UfDUEA73Yl
It was just weeks into Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s time in office, and he was being assailed on multiple fronts.
A memo he had released outlining his strategy for prosecuting crimes in New York City was being vilified by critics, including the mayor and police commissioner. Bragg became a punching bag across cable news and on tabloid covers. Then two prosecutors from his office quit in protest over what they called Bragg’s decision not to prosecute former president Donald Trump. People who know Bragg say he was deeply stung by the criticism.
The district attorney soon issued an unusual public statement — emphasizing that the investigation into Trump and his business was far from over and that a team of investigators was “exploring evidence not previously explored.”
The message he wanted conveyed, it seemed, was simple: I’m still on this.
A grand jury in Manhattan looking at the case could be on the precipice of charging Trump with a crime, though no decision has been announced and it remains unclear whether the group will issue an indictment or when that could happen.
Trump has lumped this case in with others, including the ongoing investigations into his handling of highly classified material and his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, denying wrongdoing and denouncingtheprobes as part of a system that’s out to get him.
For Bragg, meanwhile, the case is a high-wire balancing act for an official who has navigated controversies before but could find himself both being praised and pilloriedif he becomes the first prosecutor to criminally charge a former president.
Bragg has been circumspect in his public remarks about the Trump probe, sayingmainlythat investigators were continuing their work. After his office won a conviction of Trump’s namesake business for tax crimes last year, Bragg noted in one interview: “We’re going to do our talking in the courtroom.”
Meanwhile, back in Washington DC, there were developments in the Special Counsel’s investigation of Trump’s theft of government documents.
In a monumental ruling Friday, a federal judge ordered Donald Trump attorney Evan Corcoran to provide additional testimony as part of an investigation into the former president’s handling of classified documents, a source familiar with the matter told CNN.
Corcoran has the potential to become one of the most crucial witnesses in special counsel Jack Smith’s criminal investigation into possible mishandling of classified records after the Trump presidency and obstruction of justice.
District Judge Beryl Howell said in an order under seal that Justice Department prosecutors have met the threshold for the crime-fraud exception for Corcoran, the source said.
The scope of what DOJ will be allowed to ask, however, was not immediately clear. Trump’s team is expected to appeal and ask for the judge’s order to be stayed while legal proceedings play out.
The decision hands Trump yet another loss under seal in court as his team and allies have tried to hold off Smith’s investigators from learning about direct conversations the former president had with some of his closest advisers.
The development is particularly notable because of accusations prosecutors would have made about Trump as they argued to the judge for the grand jury testimony….
Corcoran, an attorney-turned-witness, had previously testified to the grand jury but declined to answer some questions, citing attorney-client privilege. The department argued to the judge he should not be able to avoid answering, because his discussions with the former president may have been part of an attempt to plan a crime.
Susan Herbert, Princes in the Tower, After after Sir John Everett Millais, by Susan Herbert. Courtesy of Thames & Hudson.
On her final day as the top judge in the District of Columbia on Friday afternoon—in her final act—Chief Judge Beryl A. Howell did more than grant the Justice Department permission to question former President Donald Trump’s personal attorney. She actually took the rare step of handing over the lawyer’s notes to federal prosecutors, according to a person familiar with the arrangement.
In doing so, Howell may have planted the seeds for a future constitutional challenge. But in the immediate term, she’s handed Justice Department Special Prosecutor Jack Smith a parting gift: what she deemed evidence of a crime involving the former president improperly hoarding classified documents after he left office.
M. Evan Corcoran, a former federal prosecutor, has represented Trump in that classified documents scandal. And while Corcoran already has his hands full as Trump’s lawyer, the probe now appears to have put Corcoran in legal jeopardy himself.
According to a source, Corcoran’s professional notes about private communications with his client were turned over to Judge Howell, who was conducting an “in camera review”—a carefully controlled screening of confidential records that typically takes place in a judge’s chambers.
Judges who come to the conclusion that some legally protected and sensitive material must be turned over to an opposing side normally issue an order directing one side to do it, along with a deadline. Doing so gives the losing side the ability to appeal to a higher court—and prevent irreversible damage that could forever taint a case, according to two lawyers not involved in the case who spoke to The Daily Beast but asked not to be identified.
But Howell appears to have skipped that careful yet tedious approach—and just handed Smith a batch of documents that may show Trump and one of his lawyers planning a crime.
Either way, Trump’s legal team is left without recourse, and federal prosecutors have more evidence to bolster the next steps in their ballooning investigation.
There’s more at the link.
So Trump could be indicted soon, and he will use that to inflame his followers in hopes of winning back into the White House in 2024. Even though he expects to be indicted soon, Trump is planning to hold a campaign rally in a very provocative place–Waco, Texas. He’s claiming this is his first official rally, even though he held a rally in Iowa recently.
Texas is the first stop on the 2024 presidential campaign trail for Donald Trump, the former president’s team announced Friday. In this third consecutive bid for the White House, Trump will hold a rally March 25 at the Waco Regional Airport.
While facing criminal charges and less vocal support from Texas GOP leaders, Trump hopes to lock in the loyalty of Lone Star State voters before more Republicans join the primary race.
The Light of the Worlds, after William Holman Hunt, by Susan Herbert. Courtesy of Thames & Hudson.
“It is undisputed that Texas is Trump Country after electing 37 Trump Endorsed Candidates and recent polling among Texas primary voters,” his campaign staff wrote in a news release announcing the event. Trump’s campaign cited a tweet from Interactive Polls, a conservative media company, as evidence that in polls Texans favor Trump over Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a potential Republican nominee.
According to February polling from the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin, 56% of Republicans surveyed said the former president should run again.
While Trump was at one point a political force of nature in the state, his sway may have waned given how few prominent Texas Republicans have endorsed the former president for 2024. On Wednesday, U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, R-Austin, gave DeSantis his endorsement, calling the Florida governor “a man of conviction.”
While Trump and Nikki Haley, Trump’s pick for United Nations ambassador and the former South Carolina governor, are the only Republican candidates who have formally declared they are running for president, it’s expected DeSantis will also join the race.
Gov. Greg Abbott, a potential 2024 candidate himself, got Trump’s endorsement in his primary last year but kept his distance during the general election, skipping an October rally in Texas.
Why not Oklahoma City next? That would be another signal that he wants his followers to be violent.
John Constable, Seascape Study with Rain Cloud (c.1824-1828)
Good Day Sky Dancers!
Wow, is it hard to keep up with the headlines this week! Just this morning, we learned that the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin. This is from NBC News. “International Criminal Court issues arrest warrant for Putin over alleged Ukraine war crimes. The court said Friday that the Russian leader is responsible for overseeing the forced deportation of children. The Kremlin has previously denied the accusation.” It’s reported by Henry Austin.
Putin committed the “war crime” of overseeing the unlawful abduction and deportation of childrenfrom Ukraine to Russia, the court said in a news release.
“There are reasonable grounds to believe that Putin bears individual criminal responsibility for the aforementioned crimes,” the court, based in The Hague, Netherlands, said its pre-trial judges had assessed.
It added that Putin had failed to “exercise control properly over civilian and military subordinates who committed the acts, or allowed for their commission, and who were under his effective authority and control.”
Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova, Putin’s presidential commissioner for children’s rights, is also alleged to have committed similar crimes, the ICC said.
While warrants are often issued in secret “to protect victims and witnesses and also to safeguard the investigation,” the release said that the court was “mindful that the conduct addressed in the present situation is allegedly ongoing, and that the public awareness of the warrants may contribute to the prevention of the further commission of crimes.”
From the early days of the invasion last February, Kyiv has accused Russia of forcibly transferring children and adults.
Franz Marc-In the Rain(Im Regen) (1912)
Turkey is backing Finland’s entrance into NATO. The NATO expansion may also give the Russian people some reason to feel less safe with Putin in charge. Hungary has also agreed to the deal. This is from Bloomberg News.
Turkey and Hungary both signaled they plan to ratify Finland’s entry into NATO, bringing the military alliance a step closer to welcoming its 31st member as the ripples from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine spread across the European security landscape.
“We’ve decided to start the process for the approval of Finland’s membership in our parliament,” President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said at a news conference Friday together with his Finnish counterpart Sauli Niinisto in Ankara. He added he hoped to complete the approval process for Finland by May 14 elections due in Turkey.
Meanwhile, Hungary plans to approve the Finnish entry March 27, Fidesz parliamentary leader Mate Kocsis said in a Facebook post. Prime Minister Viktor Orban has continually delayed a parliamentary vote in contrast with his statements of support for NATO’s enlargement.
The stance taken by Turkey and Hungary decouples the Nordic countries’ bids to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, filed in May to deter any Russian aggression following its invasion of Ukraine. The comments cast further doubt on the timeline for Sweden’s accession.
“Progress on Sweden’s bid depends on steps it will take,” Erdogan said. Hungary also said it will decide on Sweden’s membership at a later date.
In The Rain, 1882, Vincent van Gogh
I vividly remember someone trying to leave with the Abraham Lincoln bust during Trump’s removal from the White House. It seems more stuff went missing. This is from the Washington Post. “Two gifts to Trump family from foreign nations are missing, report says. More than 100 gifts worth nearly $300,000 were not properly reported to the government, a new report finds.”
Federal officials cannot find two gifts received by President Donald Trump and his family from foreign nations, including a life-size painting of Trump from the president of El Salvador and golf clubs from the Japanese prime minister, according to a new report from House Democrats.
The gifts are among more than 100 foreign gifts — with a total value of nearly $300,000 — that Trump and his family failed to report to the State Department in violation of federal law, according to the report, which cites government records and emails.
The 15-page report, a result of ayear-long investigation by the House Oversight Committeeinto Trump’s failure to disclose gifts from foreign government officials while in office, revealed that the Trump family did not disclose dozens of gifts from countries that are not U.S. allies or have a complicated relationship with Washington. That includes 16 gifts from Saudi Arabia worth more than $48,000, 17 gifts from India worth over $17,000, and at least 5 gifts from China. Trump reported zero gifts entirely the final year of his presidency, according to the report, while he reported some of the gifts received in previous years.
Trump repeatedly told advisers that gifts given to him during the presidency were hisand did not belong to the federal government, former chief of staff John F. Kelly and other aides have previously told The Washington Post.
Investigators are continuing to search for the large portrait of Trump gifted to him ahead of the 2020 election by Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele and the golf clubs worth more than $7,000 thatTrump received from Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe during visits to the Trump International Golf Club and Kasumigaeski Country Club in 2017 and 2018, the report says.
Vasily Kandinsky Landscape with rain Guggenheim, c 1944
Count the silverware before and after anywhere this family travels. They’ll take anything! Meanwhile, court watch continues, and bets on Trump’s indictment are that both Manhattan and Georgia will come for him next week. Lock him up!
Because on Earth 2.0, this would be the stuff of endless news cycles and nightmares.
Here is Donald Trump channeling Kremlin propaganda, siding with Russia, even as he declares that our real enemy is . . . other Americans.
Despite the wishcasting punditry, the magical thinking of his rivals, and the fervent hopes of the Hollow Men of the GOP, this man is the presumptive nominee of the Republican party, and therefore possibly the next president of the United States. (The DeSantis bubble hasn’t burst. But it’s leaking.)
I don’t mean to alarm you. You should be alarmed.
Trump says Russia is not a threat, our greatest threat is our American representatives, we need to reevaluate the purpose of NATO, and most of the people in the State Dept, DOD and Intel Services need to be fired so he can put the right people in. pic.twitter.com/9PC6PrONM9
TRUMP: The State Department, the defense bureaucracy, the intelligence services, and all of the rest need to be completely overhauled and reconstituted to fire the Deep Staters and put America first.
We have to put America first.
At a time of growing international tension, the former president is threatening a massive purge of the nation’s defense infrastructure. He proposes dismantling — and completely overhauling — the Defense Department, the nation’s intelligence agencies (our eyes and ears), and the country’s foreign policy capabilities.
Mass firings, the loss of centuries of experience. A purge of independent, adult voices, and anyone else who might tell the new president “no.”
More important though, after the purge of the “Deep Staters,” he would “reconstitute” the country’s destroyed defenses, presumably by stacking the agencies with his own loyalists.
All while Russia advances, China rattles sabers, and the Middle East boils.
You can read the rundown that includes dumping NATO. We just found out Hungary and Turkey aren’t even up for that.
Nixen (Silberfische). Nymphs, Gustav Klimt, cc 1899,
When Donald Trump called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger on Jan. 2, 2021, in a now-infamous bid to overturn the 2020 election, he alleged that thousands of dead people had voted in the state.
“So dead people voted, and I think the number is close to 5,000 people. And they went to obituaries. They went to all sorts of methods to come up with an accurate number, and a minimum is close to about 5,000 voters,” he said, without citing his study.
But a report commissioned by his own campaign dated one day prior told a different story: Researchers paid by Trump’s team had “high confidence” of only nine dead voters in Fulton County, defined as ballots that may have been cast by someone else in the name of a deceased person. They believed there was a “potential statewide exposure” of 23 such votes across the Peach State — or 4,977 fewer than the “minimum” Trump claimed.
In a separate failed bid to overturn the results in Nevada, Trump’s lawyers said in a court filing that 1,506 ballots were cast in the names of dead people and 42,284 voted twice. Trump lost the Silver State by about 33,000 votes.
The researchers paid by Trump’s team had “high confidence” that 12 ballots were cast in the names of deceased people in Clark County, Nev., and believed the “high end potential exposure” was 20 voters statewide — some 1,486 fewer than Trump’s lawyers said.
According to their research, the “low end potential exposure” of double voters was 45, while the “high end potential exposure” was 9,063. The judge tossed the Nevada case even as Trump continued to claim he won the state.
The “Project 2020” report conducted by the Berkeley Research Group has now been obtained by prosecutors investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. A copy was reviewed by The Washington Post, and it shows that Trump’s own campaign paid more than $600,000 for research that undercut many of his most explosive claims. The research was never made public.
The Justice Department has sought and obtained multiple reports, emails and interviews from witnesses that show campaign officials analyzing, and often discrediting, claims that Trump was making publicly, according to several people involved in the investigation, who like some others spoke on the condition of anonymity to disclose internal details. The Berkeley report was provided to the Justice Department earlier this month, one of the people said, after some people involved in its crafting received a subpoena.
Why do people believe this idiot? Nothing he says is true.
Anyway, I’m cold and achy. It’s raining like crazy and has gone into the 40s. It’s the second coming of Winter. I have to dig out clothes I just boxed up, and I’m ready to sleep for some time. Between this and the time change, I feel like a slug.
There’s still no word on the crazy judge in Texas who could block access to the abortion pill mifepristone nationwide. Reuters has a good article summarizing the yesterday’s hearing.
AMARILLO, Texas, March 15 (Reuters) – A U.S. judge on Wednesday questioned lawyers for President Joe Biden’s administration on whether the federal regulatory approval given to the abortion pill mifepristone 22 years ago was proper as he considered a request by anti-abortion groups to ban sales of the drug nationwide.
U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk during a hearing in Amarillo also pressed the groups, led by the Texas-based Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, to explain how he could reverse approval of a long-established drug.
The judge raised the possibility of a more limited ruling, keeping the drug on the market but re-imposing some restrictions lifted by Biden’s administration, including requiring it to be dispensed in person rather than by mail. Kacsmaryk, appointed to the bench by former President Donald Trump, said he would rule “as soon as possible.”
It is shaping up as the most consequential abortion case since the U.S. Supreme Court, powered by its conservative majority, last year overturned its landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that had recognized a constitutional right to terminate a pregnancy.
The anti-abortion groups sued the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in November, contending the agency used an improper process when it approved mifepristone in 2000 and did not adequately consider the drug’s safety when used by girls under age 18.
The plaintiffs are asking Kacsmaryk for a preliminary order halting sales of mifepristone nationwide – even in states where abortion is legal – while their lawsuit proceeds.
On yesterday’s arguments:
Erik Baptist, a lawyer with the conservative legal group Alliance Defending Freedom representing the plaintiffs, said the scope of the judge’s ruling should be “universal and nationwide.”
Woman Reading, Albert Reuss, 1889-1975
The judge questioned lawyers for Biden’s administration on how the FDA accelerated its approval for mifepristone under a process typically used for drugs to treat HIV infection and other life-threatening illnesses. The administration has said that the drug’s approval was well supported by science, and that the challenge comes much too late.
Lawyers for the U.S. Justice Department and an attorney for mifepristone’s manufacturer, Danco Laboratories, argued that the plaintiffs had no standing to bring the case, and said mifepristone has an impressive safety and efficacy record.
“An injunction here would upend the status quo. An injunction would cause significant public harm,” Justice Department attorney Julie Straus Harris told the judge.
Harris also argued that a ruling in favor of the plaintiffs would undercut trust in the FDA, the agency charged with signing off on the safety of food products and drugs in the United States. Harris said such a ruling would also increase the burden on surgical abortion clinics, already overcrowded as they admit patients from states where clinics have closed in the wake of last year’s Supreme Court decision.
Read the rest at Reuters
Some breaking news on that U.S. drone that collided with a Russian fighter plane:
The U.S. European Command has declassified footage showing the moments when two Russian fighter jets flew very close to a U.S. drone over the Black Sea, dumping fuel on it — and, the Pentagon says, eventually flying into the drone. The video footage appears to show the U.S. craft was damaged by a collision.
The release of the video comes two days after the Pentagon said a Russian Su-27 fighter clipped the propeller of an uncrewed MQ-9 Reaper drone that was operating in international airspace, forcing it down into the water. The Kremlin says its jets did not make contact with the drone.
The footage gives brief glimpses of the encounter, which U.S. officials say lasted for at least a half hour. The Pentagon says the video depicts events in the order they happened, although it was edited to condense the action.
In the 42-second video, a Russian Su-27 aircraft is seen approaching from the drone’s rear quarter, releasing a plume of fuel as it pulls upward and over the drone, causing the footage to partially pixelate. The camera recovers as the fighter jet pulls away, showing the drone’s rear-mounted propeller in normal working condition.
The footage then shows what the Pentagon says is an “even closer” pass from a Russian jet.
Approaching from what looks to be a lower angle, the Su-27 releases more fuel and its fuselage is seen coming extremely close to the drone before the video cuts out entirely. The Pentagon says the camera feed was lost for around 60 seconds.
When the feed returns, the camera, which is mounted beneath the MQ-9, pivots to show the drone’s propeller has been partially mangled.
Shortly afterward, the aircraft crashed into the Black Sea off the southern coast of Ukraine — a country that the U.S. and dozens of other countries are supporting in its war against Russia. The U.S. has been monitoring movements by Russian troops and warships in the area.
The U.S. European Command described the encounter as “an unsafe and unprofessional intercept.”
Three U.S. officials familiar with the intelligence said the highest levels of the Kremlin approved the aggressive actions of Russian military fighter jets against a U.S. military drone over the Black Sea on Tuesday.
The Russian jets dropped jet fuel on the MQ-9 Reaper, an unprecedented action, and two of the officials said the intelligence suggests the intent seemed to be to throw the drone off course or disable its surveillance capabilities.
Lucie Belin Smiling (1915). by Jean-Édouard Vuillard (French, 1868-1940).
It was “Russian leadership’s intention to be aggressive in the intercept,” said one of the officials.
One official said he had not gotten indications that the signoff went all the way up to Putin. Other officials declined to provide specifics beyond “highest levels.”
The Russian jet actually clipping the propeller of the drone — which the U.S. says occurred and Russia denies — was likely not intentional, said the officials, who believe it was pilot error, based on U.S. video of the incident.
Three defense officials and one Biden administration official also said the Russians have already reached the area where the MQ-9 Reaper crashed. The Russians are actively looking for the debris with ships and aircraft, but the U.S. hasn’t seen any indication that they’ve been able to recover any of it, officials said. One official said much of the debris sank into the Black Sea.
The U.S. is unlikely to try to recover the remnants of the crashed drone, according to the three U.S. officials familiar with the intelligence.
Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a news conference on Wednesday that there’s probably not a lot of debris to recover and noted the part of the Black Sea where the drone landed is as much as 5,000-feet deep.
News on the Georgia election interference case:
If you watched TV last night, you probably heard about this story by Tamar Hallerman and Bill Rankin at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, but it’s well worth reading the whole article; I can only excerpt a small part of it. The article is a detailed description of what happened in the grand jury, based on interviews with several jurors: EXCLUSIVE: Behind the scenes of Trump grand jury; jurors hear 3rd leaked Trump call.
A number of the jurors criticized Emily Khors, the jury foreperson, who previously spoke to media outlets.
Several jurors said they decided to speak out for the first time in responseto criticism leveled at the probe after Kohrs spoke to multiple media outlets last month. Some detractors, including Trump’s Georgia-based legal team, said that Kohrs’ remarks showcased an unprofessional, politically tainted criminal investigation.
The jurors, who stressed their aim was not to drag down Kohrs, underscored that they understood the gravity of their assignment and took care to be active participants and attend as many sessions as possible. They said the investigation was somber and thorough.
“I just felt like we, as a group, were portrayed as not serious,” one of the jurors said. “That really bothered me because that’s not how I felt. I took it very seriously. I showed up, did what I was supposed to do, did not do what I was asked not to do, you know?” [….]
They also divulged details from the investigation that had yet to become public.
Piero di Cosimo, 1462-1522, Magdalen Reading
One was that they had heard a recording of a phone call Trump placed to late Georgia House Speaker David Ralstonin which the president asked the fellow Republican to convene a special session of the Legislature to overturn Democrat JoeBiden’s narrow victory in Georgia.
One juror said Ralston proved to be “an amazing politician.”
The speaker “basically cut the president off. He said, ‘I will do everything in my power that I think is appropriate.’ … He just basically took the wind out of the sails,” the juror said. “‘Well, thank you,’ you know, is all the president could say.”
Ralston and other legislative leaders did not call a special session. A former Ralston aide declined to comment for this story, and a Trump campaign spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.
There was a tidbit about Lindsey Graham’s testimony:
One grand juror recalled U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham’s testimony about Trump’s state of mind in the months after the 2020 election.
“He said that during that time, if somebody had told Trump that aliens came down and stole Trump ballots, that Trump would’ve believed it,” the juror said.
Just one more excerpt:
The group said they had no idea what Willis planned to do in response to their recommendations. But many described an increased regard for the elections system and the people who run it.
“I can honestly give a damn of whoever goes to jail, you know, like personally,” one juror said. “I care more about there being more respect in the system for the work that people do to make sure elections are free and fair.”
Said another juror: “I tell my wife if every person in America knew every single word of information we knew, this country would not be divided as it is right now.”
The grand jurors said they understand why the public release of their full final report needs to wait until Willis makes indictment decisions.
“A lot’s gonna come out sooner or later,” one of the jurors said. “And it’s gonna be massive. It’s gonna be massive.”
More than 1,000 additional people could still face charges in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol, according to a letter to the DC federal court from the US attorney in Washington.
The one-page letter, which was reviewed by Bloomberg News, was sent late last year to the chief judge and hasn’t been previously reported. It offers details on what Attorney General Merrick Garland has called “one of the largest, most complex, and most resource-intensive investigations in our history.”
berthe Morisot, Reading, 1873
The Oct. 28 letter from US Attorney Matthew Graves to Chief Judge Beryl Howell, which came as the department neared its 900th arrest, estimated an additional 700 to 1,200 defendants. That could roughly double the number of cases filed so far – with this month marking the 1,000th arrest, according to statistics from the US attorney’s office.
The more than 1,000 people already charged have clogged the court’s docket over the past two years. And prosecutors continue to bring new cases as Special Counsel Jack Smith pursues a separate probe into efforts by former President Donald Trump and his allies to undermine the 2020 election results.
Graves warned Howell in the letter that it was “incredibly difficult” to predict future cases given the “nature and the complexity of the investigation.” He wrote that he didn’t know how many of the new cases would involve misdemeanor versus felony charges, but he expected a higher percentage of felonies.
“We expect the pace of bringing new cases will increase, in an orderly fashion, over the course of the next few months,” Graves wrote.
A new chief judge in the federal courthouse in Washington, DC, is poised to take over as that position has become one of the most influential in the nation’s capital, playing a key role in deciding issues that could factor into whether former President Donald Trump is indicted.
Chief Judge Beryl Howell, who has served in that role since 2016, has repeatedly green-lit Justice Department requests to pursue information about Trump’s actions, from his top advisers and lawyers and even inside the White House. She’ll be succeeded by James “Jeb” Boasberg, a fellow Barack Obama appointee and one-time Brett Kavanaugh law school roommate who’s well-known in Washington.
While presiding over the highly secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in 2020 and 2021, Boasberg encouraged the declassification of information so that the public could read proceedings related to the FBI’s probe into possible collusion between Trump and Russia.
If the Justice Department were to indict Trump, the case would be randomly assigned to one of the district court’s judges, meaning the chief could handle the case but may not. Still, the chief judge has unusual sway over the pace and scope of investigations as the Justice Department attempts to enforce its grand jury subpoenas, obtain warrants and access evidence it has collected by arguing to the chief judge in sealed proceedings.
“This court would be ready,” Howell said in a recent interview with CNN, when asked about the historic possibility of a Trump indictment. She added any judge on that court “would do it justice.”
Howell, who steps down from the position on Friday, may conclude her tenure by issuing decisions in sealed cases related to special counsel Jack Smith’s investigations into Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election and his handling of classified material at Mar-a-Lago. Already, she granted Kash Patel – a former administration official – immunity for testimony he provided the grand jury investigation. She also held off a Justice Department request to place Trump in contempt for his alleged failure to turn over subpoenaed classified documents.
Read more at CNN.
Ron DeSantis is getting plenty of media attention as he builds up to a presidential run.
An Axios reporter in Tampasaid he was fired this week after he responded to a Florida Department of Education email about an event featuring Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), calling the news release “propaganda.”
Ben Montgomery said he received a call on Monday evening from Jamie Stockwell, executive editor of Axios Local, who asked Montgomery to confirm he sent the email before saying the reporter’s “reputation in the Tampa Bay area” had been “irreparably tarnished.”
Leer para vivir, by Lucy McGowan Diecks (1907-1998)
The news release sent Monday afternoon said DeSantis, a potential 2024 GOP presidential candidate, had hosted a roundtable “exposing the diversity equity and inclusion scam in higher education.” It also called for prohibiting state funds from being used to support DEI efforts.
“We will expose the scams they are trying to push onto students across the country,” DeSantis said in the statement.
Montgomery, a Pulitzer Prize finalist, replied to the email three minutes after getting it. “This is propaganda, not a press release,” he wrote to the Department of Education press office.
About an hour after that, the Education Department’s communication officer, Alex Lanfranconi, shared Montgomery’s reply on Twitter, where it has since been viewed more than 1 million times.
Montgomery said the news release had “no substance,” adding that he “read the whole thing and it was just a series of quotes about how bad DEI was.”
Axios editor in chief Sara Kehaulani Goo confirmed Montgomery is no longer employed by Axios, but declined to comment further.
Just one more reason to dislike Axios beside their ridiculous bullet-point story style.
…[I]n Florida, textbooks have become hot politics, part of Gov. Ron DeSantis’s campaign against what he describes as “woke indoctrination” in public schools, particularly when it comes to race and gender. Last year, his administration made a splash when it rejected dozens of math textbooks, citing “prohibited topics.”
Now, the state is reviewing curriculum in what is perhaps the most contentious subject in education: social studies.
In the last few months, as part of the review process, a small army of state experts, teachers, parents and political activists have combed thousands of pages of text — not only evaluating academic content, but also flagging anything that could hint, for instance, at critical race theory.
A prominent conservative education group, whose members volunteered to review textbooks, objected to a slew of them, accusing publishers of “promoting their bias.” At least two publishers declined to participate altogether.
And in a sign of how fraught the political landscape has become, one publisher created multiple versions of its social studies material, softening or eliminating references to race — even in the story of Rosa Parks — as it sought to gain approval in Florida….
It is unclear which social studies textbooks will be approved in Florida, or how the chosen materials might address issues of race in history. The state is expected to announce its textbook decisions in the coming weeks.
At any given fundraiser or VIP room where he’s present, Ron DeSantis is usually easy to find—in the corner, keeping to himself.
Despite having a job that entails exchanging small talk and pleasantries on a daily basis, the Florida governor tends to brush off those obligations and struggles with basic social skills, according to a source close to DeSantis, several of his former staffers, and other GOP operatives who have worked with him and his team.
And even though he hasn’t announced a bid yet, DeSantis’ apparent desire to test the waters of a presidential campaign—while barely dipping a toe into the aspects he recoils from—is already being put to the test.
During his donor retreat in Palm Beach in late February, an attendee stood up and called him “DeSatan,” according to Republicans familiar with the outburst.
At his recent book tour stop in Davenport, Iowa, a volunteer English teacher and seasoned caucus enthusiast posed for a photo alongside the governor with the term “fascist” carved out within her design of a paper snowflake.
The governor’s aversion to pressing the flesh, and his concern over the risk of unexpected interactions with the public, is already so well-known that early primary state players are working to DeSantis-proof their events in order to attract the flinty would-be candidate and his tight-knit team.
The problem is, hosts often have no idea what the DeSantis team wants.
“Easily the least responsive campaign I’ve ever dealt with,” one veteran event host in an early primary state told The Daily Beast, requesting anonymity to avoid alienating the Florida governor.
There has been a lot of reporting on DeSantis’ nasty personality and lack of charisma. I hope it will keep him from the nomination.
That’s it for me today. I’m really late because I had quite a struggle with WordPress. I ended up having to completely redo the formatting–had to hunt down all the article links and redo the indentations. I hope I did it right.
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The Sky Dancing banner headline uses a snippet from a work by artist Tashi Mannox called 'Rainbow Study'. The work is described as a" study of typical Tibetan rainbow clouds, that feature in Thanka painting, temple decoration and silk brocades". dakinikat was immediately drawn to the image when trying to find stylized Tibetan Clouds to represent Sky Dancing. It is probably because Tashi's practice is similar to her own. His updated take on the clouds that fill the collection of traditional thankas is quite special.
You can find his work at his website by clicking on his logo below. He is also a calligraphy artist that uses important vajrayana syllables. We encourage you to visit his on line studio.
Good Day Sky Dancers!
Philip Bump of the Washington Post has this analysis. 
Trump has weaponized the notion of “reverse racism.” 
As far as we know, the Grand Jury in The Stormy Daniels Hush Money Case still hears from witnesses today. This is from the 
Still, Trump is worried. This is from 
Have Trumpsters responded to these invitations to an insurrection as much as the last one? 
One more from The Daily Beast: 
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