Thread by @EricLiptonNYT

THREAD: A moment from cutting room floor re our Turkey and Trump story: Here is a key meeting at DOJ in DC on June 11 2019 between AG Barr and Turkish Minister of Justice Abdulhamit Gül, where we were told the Halkbank sanctions evasion case came up, among other matters

What we also know is that DOJ, at this point, had evidence suggesting that key senior political allies of Erdogan (or former allies) had taken bribes as part of the Iran sanctions evasion scheme. DOJ acknowledged this in 2016. Here:

We also know that Erdogan had repeatedly told Trump that he wanted this case gone--the investigation into Halkbank and others potentially implicated in the sanctions evasion that sent billions to Iran. This is from Bolton's account of a Dec. 2018 meeting between Erdogan and Trump

DOJ policy from 2015 states that even if a corporate entity-the bank in this case--is charged, it doesn't absolve individuals. Prosecutors in Southern District of NY were still digging into potential crimes by individuals at time Barr met with Turkish Justice official in 2019

But in June 2019 abt 10 days after Barr meeting with Turkish Justice Minister, AG Barr was pushing US Attorney from Manhattan, Geoff Berman, to drop criminal investigations of individuals associated with possible wrongdoing, as Turkish government wanted as part of a settlement.

That's some added backstory. Here is the full story we published online Thursday and is on A1 of the print paper Friday. With @BenWeiserNYT nytimes.com/2020/10/29/us/…

Thanks to NYT readers for supporting this work. Buy a paper and read it in print. It got really good print treatment today. An A1 start and two inside pages. Here is one of them.