BREAKING: THREAD: Trump holdovers at FBI & DoJ and Senator Ron Johnson delayed 1/6 investigation into Trump in 2021. 1/
According to sources, JP Cooney, who is now on Jack Smith’s team, wanted to investigate Trump’s orbit including Roger Stone as early as February 2021, but D’antuono at the FBI (a Jim Jordan ally & the guy who delayed the Mar a Lago search warrant) blocked it. 2/
D’antuono called Mike Sherwin to warn him about Cooney. Sherwin is the guy who let Barr shorten Roger Stone’s sentencing recommendation (coincidentally written by Cooney) & let Barr drop the Flynn case. Sherwin and D’Antuono agreed to shut down Cooney’s top-down approach. 3/
Cooney wanted a task force to get the phone records of folks like Stone & Ali Alexander. He wanted to follow the money & investigate the funding of the big lie. He also wanted to subpoena the Willard. Sherwin and D’Antuono shut it down. 4/
Sherwin’s replacement was appointed by Biden, but the 50/50 senate power sharing agreement allowed the GOP to delay that appointment until November. Don’t forget, Trump also delayed the Biden transition team. 5/
Keep in mind, there are some republicans in the senate who participated in the coup & are probably not too excited to get the Biden DoJ team in place. The DC US Atty was delayed by RON JOHNSON, who actively participated in the coup. 6/
Sherwin resigned before he was sanctioned for his appearance on 60 minutes during which he violated DoJ policy. Trump is now using that appearance as a defense in the DC Jack smith indictment. 7/
Garland got there in March. D’Antuono ensured he was not made aware of Cooney’s task force idea. Lisa Monaco replaced Axelrod in April. Monaco was put in charge of politically charged 1/6 investigations and began probing the funding of 1/6. 8/
Then in September- before Sherwin’s replacement got there, she subpoenaed Sidney Powell and others. It makes sense she would have needed a few months to investigate before the first round of subpoenas went out. 9/
Sherwin’s replacement arrived in November thanks to Ron Johnson, and immediately appointed Windom to oversee the trump coup probe. Windom wanted all kinds of search warrants, but guess who told him no.
D’Antuono. 10/
Windom, undeterred, went to the Postal Inspector to get his warrants & subpoenas based on all the work Garland had done prior to Windom’s arrival. After enough pressure, and who knows, maybe it came from Garland, the FBI stopped blocking DoJ prosecutors in April of 2022. 11/
Two months after the FBI relented to DoJ prosecutors, the 1/6 hearings would begin. Yet somehow, people think the 1/6 hearings shamed the DoJ into action. 12/
Also, none of this is breaking. The newest part of this thread is six months old. I’m just tired of people blaming Biden & Garland for the bad acts of Trump, Barr, & their allies at the FBI. 13/
Did you know Trump is now using as a DEFENSE that his pals in the FBI delayed opening the probe? He’s using his own allies’ delays as a defense AGAINST the DoJ.
Blame the right people for the delays. END/
PS: Headlines matter.
The FBI is part of the DoJ, so people went with “DOJ DELAYS OPENING PROBE” instead of my headline: TRUMP ALLIES IN DOJ AND FBI, SENATOR RON JOHNSON DELAY OPENING PROBE.
Both are true but one is more accurate.
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THREAD: THE JURY: I’m really optimistic about the election interference case based on the notes from the jury today. First, the four pieces of testimony they asked for were specifically mentioned by the prosecution in closing arguments. 1/
Two of the four excerpts of testimony are from Pecker and Cohen about the meeting where they devised the conspiracy to alter the outcome of the election. Pecker corroborates Cohen on that agreement. 2/
Another bit of testimony is about Pecker telling Trump he should buy the story, and Trump “deputizing” Cohen. Trump told Pecker that whatever Cohen approves is good with Trump. Pecker testified Trump said “I’ll speak to Cohen and he’ll get back to you.” 3/
BREAKING: Cannon has DENIED Jack Smith’s motion to modify Trump’s bail conditions (for saying the FBI and Biden wanted to assassinate him. She denied WITHOUT prejudice because Smith failed to meet and confer with Trump on the motion. 1/
Cannon says Smith’s failure to meet and confer “lacks professional courtesy” - even though Smith did confer and Trump’s lawyers asked for a couple more days. Will DoJ go to the 11th, or try again? I think they’ll try again first. END/
Learning that this is not an appealable order. Smith will have to re-file after a meet and confer.
THREAD: A couple of observations on the eve of closing arguments in the first ever criminal trial of a former president, and on the night trump’s lawyers tried to blame the DoJ for their own misrepresentations in a filing in the first ever espionage/obstruction case against a former president. 1/
First, on the summations: to his own detriment, Donald Trump will underestimate the intelligence of the jury. He’s going to assume they’re too stupid to know who weisselberg is, where he is, and why he’s there. 2/
His ego will be his downfall, and he’ll push his lawyers in a bad direction just as he did when he (probably) insisted on having Bob Costello testify, or when he insisted his defense is that he never slept with Stormy Daniels. His legal team will underestimate the jury at their own peril. 3/
THREAD: First, people were mad that Trump wasn’t being investigated. When we learned he was being investigated, people became angry that he wasn’t being indicted. 1/
When he got indicted, people were angry that he wasn’t on trial. Now that he’s in trial, people are angry that he’s not been convicted yet. 2/
If he’s convicted, people will be mad that his sentencing is taking too long. Once he’s sentenced, people will be mad that he’s not in jail yet. 3/
THREAD: Here's what the Mueller Report has to say about Cohen: "After the FBI searched Cohen’s home and office in April 2018, the President publicly asserted that Cohen would not “flip,” contacted him directly to tell him to “stay strong,” and privately passed messages of support to him." 1/
"Cohen also discussed pardons with the President’s personal counsel and believed that if he stayed on message he would be taken care of. But after Cohen began cooperating with the government in the summer of 2018, the President publicly criticized him, called him a “rat,” and suggested that his family members had committed crimes." 2/
This is from Volume II - the Obstruction of Justice Volume. The treatment of Cohen was part of a larger pattern of obstructive behavior by Donald Trump. Eventually, Bill Bar would write a memo declining to charge Trump for Obstruction even if he weren't the president. 3/
THREAD: all in all a great summary here, but I take issue with some of the language. First, none of these electors are being treated as “dangerous criminals”. None are in pretrial detention. Several have been given leeway on violating bail conditions. And none are charged with violent crimes. 1/
The reason some have been charged and others haven’t is because some broke the law and others didn’t. It’s not because prosecutors have special feelings about whether they’re “dupes” or “dangerous criminals”. I don’t see any “dupes” being charged in any state. In PA and NM, the electors said “we will not sign something that says we are the official electors. Put some contingency langue in here” and in AZ and MI they said “fuck yeah we’re the real electors even tho we know we aren’t. Keep this quiet.” The rest took plea deals. None of that is weird or inconsistent. 2/
Also, to say Chesebro is getting off with a slap on the wrist while others aren’t doesn’t make any sense. None have gone to trial, been convicted, or received a sentence. It’s weird to compare their punishments when they haven’t been doled out. Plus, chesebro is cooperating. Generally speaking, cooperators get less jail time than non-cooperators. Third, MI just issued new search warrants for Cheaebro because his cooperation might not have been truthful, so his investigation isn’t even over. 3/