Thread by @SethAbramson

BREAKING: Sessions aide Gordon has AGAIN changed his story on the GOP platform change. First he said Trump ordered the change; then he said he was guided by things Trump said at a NatSec meeting; now he says it was what Trump said "on the campaign trail." npr.org/2017/12/04/568…

2/ Gordon to CNN: "[The change] was in line with Trump's views, expressed at a March NatSec meeting at the unfinished Trump hotel." Gordon to Business Insider: "[I] never left my assigned side table [to try to change the platform]." And now, a third story. businessinsider.com/jd-gordon-trum…

3/ Gordon has now taken something Trump said in March at a NatSec meeting Papadopoulos attended—at which meeting Papadopoulos revealed himself, directly to Trump, as a Kremlin agent—and has removed it to "the campaign trail."

That's a lie—or else the other statements were lies.

4/ Here's his new claim: "Trump wasn't involved in the GOP Platform details. That was my job. Individual delegates didn't have the authority to force their positions on the campaign. I am not getting into a 'he said, she said' with the media about Diana Denman or anyone else...

5/ "...Trump said on the campaign trail he didn't want WW3 over Ukraine. And he wanted better relations with Russia. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that arming Ukraine isn't consistent with those two positions."

The "WW3" comment was *from the NatSec meeting*.

6/ This matters because if Trump instructed Gordon to change the GOP platform to benefit Putin at the same NatSec meeting at which Papadopoulos outed himself as a Kremlin agent and told Trump Putin wanted to meet with him, that platform change looks *exactly* like a quid pro quo.

7/ Denman—the RNC delegate who says Trump was behind the GOP platform change—is *very* specific about what Gordon did and said at that delegate meeting at the RNC. Meanwhile, Gordon's story is vague and has changed several times—*each time* to become *more exculpatory* for Trump.

8/ Investigators are trained to look at specificity, consistency, compatibility with known facts, motive to lie, diction, and demeanor. Gordon fails on all these measures.

It seems clear to this former criminal investigator and attorney his lies cover for Trump or someone else.

9/ Here's the thing: there's no evidence Gordon committed a crime here. He could easily say he was merely following the policy directive Trump gave him—without knowing that that directive was potentially part of a clandestine plot to collude with the Russians.

Why not say that?

10/ Note: a) Gordon worked for Sessions, who's repeatedly lied about his contacts with Russians; b) Gordon ran the NatSec team day-to-day, but was somehow never named to it by Trump; c) Gordon met Kislyak; d) Gordon might've been in Sessions' office with Kislyak in September '16.

11/ I don't mention these things to imply Gordon committed a crime—unless he told the same lies to the FBI that he's now told at least two of the three media outlets he's spoken to—but simply to note that he may have info that we don't know that would explain his changing story.

12/ Whatever the explanation for all this, it's bad. It's *very* bad. That March 31, 2016 NatSec meeting at the Trump International Hotel has been lied about—and I mean *aggressively* lied about—by *everyone* who was there and who's spoken about it (see my prior threads on this).

13/ Now we have ABC reporting Trump told Flynn to negotiate with Russia. Now we have NPR reporting that Trump told Gordon to change the GOP platform to benefit Russia. Now we have Don Jr. claiming he met with Kremlin agents in his dad's house in June 2016 and never told his dad.

14/ We have *always* been told that Trump Sr. made all the key decisions in his campaign and makes all the key decisions in his administration. It would be *consistent* with his management style to have his minions be *afraid* to leave him out of the loop on *anything* important.

15/ So the claim being made by Kushner, by Flynn, by Pence, by Trump Jr., by many others, and now by J.D. Gordon that Trump was *out of the loop entirely* on major decisions being made by his campaign *won't* be credited by Mueller.

It's just *not* consistent with the evidence.

PS/ NOTE: these are bad, stupid criminals (in the case of Trump, Pence, Flynn &c) working with bad, stupid lackeys (in the case of Gordon, Page &c).

Far from this being some kind of *intricate plot*, I actually feel *insulted* to have to apply my investigatory analyses to this.