Thread by @SusanKBradford

Wow, y’all watching #inners ? FFS! #TraitorTrump is THE most corrupt politician EVER! Trump plotted w the head of the Civil division at DOJ Clark, concocted a plan to oust Acting AG Rosen in order to FORCE the GA DA to void the election & say Trump won! JFC! This was on Jan 3

Link

#inners

lenexweb.com/trump-and-just…

3/Jeffrey Clark, had been devising ways to cast doubt on the election results & to bolster Trump’s continuing legal battles & the pressure on GA politicians. Bec Rosen had refused the president’s entreaties to carry out those plans, Trump was abt to decide whether to fire Rosen

4/& replace him with Mr. Clark. The department officials, convened on a conference call, then asked each other: What will you do if Mr. Rosen is dismissed?

The answer was unanimous. They would resign.

5/Their informal pact ultimately helped persuade Trump to keep Rosen in place, calculating that a furor over mass resignations at the top of the DOJ wld eclipse any attn on his baseless accusations of voter fraud. Trump’s decision came only aft Rosen & Clark made their competing

6/cases to him in a bizarre WH mtg that 2 officials compared with an episode of Trump’s reality show “The Apprentice,” albeit one that could prompt a constitutional crisis. The previously unknown chapter was the culmination of the president’s long-running effort to batter the DOJ

7/into advancing his personal agenda. He also pressed Rosen to appoint special counsels, incl 1 who would look into Dominion Voting Systems, a maker of election equip that Trump’s allies had falsely said was working w Venezuela to flip votes from Trump to Pres Biden.

8/This account of the department’s final days under Trump’s leadership is based on interviews with 4 former Trump admin officials who asked not to be named bec of fear of retaliation.
Clark said that this acct contained inaccuracies but did not specify...

9/adding that he could not discuss any conversations w Trump or DOJ lawyers. “Senior DOJ lawyers, not uncommonly, provide legal advice to the WH as part of our duties,” he said. “All my official communications were consistent with law.”

10/Clark also noted that he was the lead signatory on DOJ request last month asking a fed judge to reject a lawsuit that sought to pressure VP Pence to overturn the results of the election. An adviser said that Trump has consistently argued that the justice system shld...

11/investigate “rampant election fraud that has plagued our system for years.”

The adviser added that “any assertion to the contrary is false & being driven by those who wish to keep the system broken.”
A DOJ spokesman declined to comment, as did Rosen.

12/When Trump said on Dec 14 that AG Barr was leaving the DOJ, some officials thought that he might allow Rosen a short reprieve bef pressing him abt voter fraud. After all, Barr would be around for another wk. Instead, Trump summoned Rosen to the Oval the next day.

13/He wanted the DOJ to file legal briefs supporting his allies’ lawsuits seeking to overturn his election loss. And he urged Rosen to appoint special counsels to investigate not only unfounded accusations of widespread voter fraud, but also Dominion, the voting machines firm.

14/(Dominion has sued the pro-Trump lawyer Sidney Powell, who inserted those accusations into four federal lawsuits about voter irregularities that were all dismissed.)

Rosen refused. He maintained that he wld make decisions based on the facts & the law & he reiterated what Barr

15/had privately told Trump: DOJ had investigated voting irregularities & found no evidence of widespread fraud.
But Trump continued to press Rosen aft the mtg — in phone calls & in person. He repeatedly said that he didnt understand why the DOJ had not found evidence...

16/that supported conspiracy theories abt the election that some of his personal lawyers had espoused. He declared that the dept was not fighting hard enuf for him. As Rosen & deputy AG Donoghue, pushed back, they were unaware that Clark had been introduced to Trump

17/by a PA politician & had told the president that he agreed that fraud had affected the election.

Trump quickly embraced Clark, who had been appointed the acting head of the civil division in Sept & was also the head of the department’s environmental & natural resources div.

17/SIDE NOTE:
AND this Clark guy is such a fucking idiot he let his OWN Bar License expire!! Hes the fucking head of the Civil Division of the DOJ!

law.com/nationallawjou…

18/As December wore on, Clark mentioned to Rosen & Donoghue that he spent a lot of time reading on the internet — a comment that alarmed them bec they inferred that he believed the unfounded conspiracy theory that Trump had won the election.

19/Clark also told them that he wanted the dept to hold a news conference announcing that it was investigating serious accusations of election fraud. Mr. Rosen and Mr. Donoghue rejected the proposal.

As Trump focused increasingly on GA, a state he lost narrowly to Pres Biden

20/he complained to DOJ leaders that the US atty in Atlanta, Byung J. Pak, was not trying to find evidence for false election claims pushed by Trump’s lawyer #Rudycolludy & others. Donoghue warned Pak that the pres was now fixated on his office, & that it might not be tenable ...

21/for him to continue to lead it, according to 2 ppl familiar w the conversation. That conversation & Trump’s efforts to pressure GA’s Republican SOS to “find” him votes compelled Pak to abruptly resign this month.

Mr. Clark was also focused on GA.

22/He drafted a letter that he wanted Rosen to send to GA state legislators that wrongly said that the DOJ was investigating accusations of voter fraud in their state, & that they should move to void Mr. Biden’s win there.

Rosen & Donoghue again rejected Clark’s proposal.

23/On New Year’s Eve, the trio met to discuss Clark’s refusal to hew to the DOJ’s conclusion that the election results were valid. Donoghue flatly told Clark that what he was doing was wrong. The next day, Clark told Rosen — who had mentored him while they worked together #inners

24/2/at the law firm Kirkland & Ellis — that he was going to discuss his strategy to the president early the next wk, just bef Congress was set to certify Pres Biden’s electoral victory.

Unbeknown to the acting AG, Clark’s timeline moved up. He met w Trump over the weekend,

25/then informed Rosen midday on Sunday that POUTS intended to replace him w Clark, who could then try to stop Congress from certifying the Electoral College results. He said that Rosen could stay on as his deputy AG leaving Rosen speechless. 😶 #ETTD

26/Unwilling to step down without a fight, Rosen said that he needed to hear straight from Trump & worked w the WH counsel, Cipollone, to convene a mtg for early that evening.

Even as Clark’s pronouncement was sinking in, stunning news broke out of GA:

27/State officials had recorded an hourlong ☎️, published by The WP, during which Trump pressured them to manufacture enuf votes to declare him the victor. As fallout from the recording ricocheted thru DC, trump’s desperate bid to change the outcome in GA came into sharp focus

27/SIDE NOTE:

This is the same day the GA SOS released the tape of the THIRD call w Trump where he tried to intimidate him to “find” him more votes! This is fucking insane!

nytimes.com/2021/01/09/us/…

28/Rosen & Donoghue pressed ahead, informing Steven Engel, the head of the DOJ’s office of legal counsel, abt Clark’s latest maneuver. Donoghue convened a late-afternoon call w DOJ’s remaining senior leaders, laying out Clark’s efforts to replace Rosen.

29/Rosen planned to soon head to the WH to discuss his fate, Donoghue told the group. Should Rosen be fired, they all agreed to resign en masse. For some, the plan brought to mind the so-called #SaturdayNightMassacre of the Nixon era, where AG Richardson & his deputy resigned...

30/rather than carry out the Trump’s order to fire the special prosecutor investigating him.

The Clark plan, the officials concluded, would seriously harm DOJ, the gov & the rule of law. For hours, they anxiously messaged & called one another as they awaited Rosen’s fate.

31/Around 6 pm, Rosen, Donoghue & Clark met at the WH w Trump, Cipollone, his deputy Philbin & other lawyers. Trump had Rosen & Clark present their arguments to him. Cipollone advised Trump not to fire Rosen & he reiterated, as he had for days, that he did not recommend sending

32/the ltr to GA lawmakers. Engel advised Trump that he & the DOJ’s remaining top officials would resign if he fired Rosen, leaving Clark alone at the dept. Trump seemed somewhat swayed by the idea that firing Rosen would trigger not only chaos at the DOJ, but also congressional

33/investigations & possibly recriminations from other Republicans = distract attention from his efforts to overturn the election results. After nearly 3 hours, Trump ultimately decided that Clark’s plan would fail, & he allowed Rosen to stay.

34/Rosen & his deputies concluded they had weathered the turmoil. Once Congress certified Pres Biden’s victory, there wld be little for them to do until they left along w Trump n 2 wks. They began to exhale days later as the EC certification at the Capitol got underway.

35/

And then they received word: The building had been breached.

36/thats the end of the article. Please read for yourself. I abbreviated ltrs to fit character spacing, and any name calling is ALL ME!

FYI while I give Rosen credit for doing the right thing THIS time, & he did send a clear message to any1 contemplating violence...

37/threats of violence or other criminal conduct: “We will have no tolerance whatsoever for any attempts to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power on Jan. 20 that our Constitution calls for,” Rosen said.

38/“We will have no tolerance for any attempts to forcefully occupy government buildings. There will be no excuse for violence, vandalism or any other form of lawlessness.”

39/we’re actually talking abt the guy who did most of the behind the scenes work for the #trumpcriminaladministration & is an atty w Kirkland. While at the DOT, Rosen undid prior regs established during Pres Obama’s admin & helped roll back rules on fuel efficiency.

40/Rosen wouldn’t commit to sharing the entire #MuellerReport during his confirmation, tho he did say he would support federal investigations that may be generated from it to continue.

He was involved in litigation against former Trump NSA Bolton over his tell-all book.

41/Bush tried to appoint him as a fed judge, but he couldn’t get confirmed! He has never worked on criminal cases, yet he’s put in chrg of day to day — a man who doesn’t like to make decisions— over cases in every division at DOJ & along w Barr never had prosecutorial experience!

42/then there’s also the role Rosen played in minimizing the criminal referral of Trump's Ukraine scheme for which he was impeached, and other times Rosen helped Trump and his friends.

#maddow did a segment on him when he was installed after Barr’s resignation.

43/and Rosen worked 30 yrs w Kirkland & Ellis: The Law Firm Behind the Trump-Barr Power Grab at the DOJ.

news.littlesis.org/2020/10/30/kir…

44/Kirkland & Ellis has many high-powered corporate clients with interests bef the DOJ as well.: Kirkland represented Goldman Sachs in the massive 1MDB corruption case, which culminated in a DOJ settlement in Oct 2020. Tho the 🏦 pd a $2.9B fine & admitted wrongdoing,

45/it escaped more serious penalties, such as a guilty plea in the US & an independent monitor — official who oversaw it, Benczkowski, was a partner at the firm prior to joined DOJ as asst AG in charge of the criminal div, subsequently counsel on at least 3 high-profile DOJ cases

46/representing BP in the Deepwater Horizon oil spill case (which Barr also worked on for Kirkland), Volkswagen in its emissions scandal, & Abbott Laboratories in the misbranding of an epilepsy drug. Benczkowski & Barr received an ethics waiver to work on the case.

47/anyway ive digressed. Rosen did the right thing THIS time and maybe that’s what is important right now? Idk. Happy reading!

#maddow