Thread by @DavidCornDC

1. With Trump pardoning Stone & Manafort tonight, here's a thread. Remember the GOP-led Senate intel comm report said Manafort was in cahoots with a Russian intelligence officer during the 2016 campaign—while Putin was attacking the election to help Trump.
motherjones.com/politics/2020/…

2. This finding and many others proved the Trump-Russia scandal was no hoax. US intelligence had real reasons to worry about the Trump campaign, its interactions with Russians, and its response to Moscow's attack on an American election.

3. The Senate intel comm report also stated plainly that Trump aided and abetted the Russian attack by denying it was happening—while Trump sought to exploit the attack. That is, Trump sided with a foreign adversary as it was assaulting the US and provided cover for it. Betrayal?

4. Back to Stone: the same report concluded that Trump and his campaign covertly used Stone, his longtime adviser, to try to get inside information on the Russia-WikiLeaks operation they could exploit during the 2016 campaign.

5. It gets worse for Trump. The report notes that Trump likely lied about using Stone to Mueller—which could be a crime. Reminder: the committee report, was approved by Republicans and Democrats. And it essentially accused Trump of criminal action to obstruct the investigation.

6. Stone lied to Congress about his attempts to communicate with WikiLeaks. That's what he was prosecuted for. He was trying to cover-up what had happened to protect Trump. Stone has said that he refused to roll over on Trump. And now he has his pardon. It's a corrupt pardon.

7. Manafort, too, did not fully cooperate with Mueller. He obviously hid information. Now he has also been rewarded by Trump. Don't let Trump's disinformation distract from this key fact: his campaign manager was secretly in league with a Russian intel officer. That's a scandal.

8. There's plenty more. These two men are only slices of Trump's very real Russia scandal. There's the Trump Tower meeting that Don Jr. lied about, Trump's secret Moscow deal that he hid from voters, and many other angles.

9. Here's one of those other pieces. George Papadopoulos, too, received a Trump pardon. In the summer of 2016—when the Russia attack was publicly known or suspected—he was trying to set up a back channel between the campaign & Putin's office. What signal did that send to Moscow?

10. Trump can try to blot out the Mueller probe. But there is overwhelming evidence of the Russian attack and Trump's own involvement and wrongdoing. The scoundrels may be getting off. But the record remains—and it will forever stain Trump's presidency.