[h=1]Did Trump admit something he shouldn't have in his first tweet about Michael Flynn's guilty plea?[/h]
Keep on tweeting, asshole...
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/poli...-guilty-plea/ar-BBG3evk?li=BBnbcA1&srcref=rss
A little more than 24 hours after Michael Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI, President Trump finally took to Twitter to offer his thoughts. He may wish he hadn't.
In his first tweet on the subject since Flynn's plea, Trump argued that Flynn had no reason to lie about his actions because they weren't unlawful. But it's the first part of the tweet that caught plenty of people's attention.
“I had to fire General Flynn because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI,” Trump began.
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Except when Trump fired Flynn on Feb. 13, Flynn's contradictory comments to the FBI on his meeting with the Russian ambassador weren't public knowledge. And the current timeline as we understand it does not suggest the White House had direct knowledge of what Flynn said at the time.
Flynn's comments to the FBI didn't come into the public domain until three days after his dismissal, on Feb. 16, when The Washington Post's Sari Horwitz and Adam Entous reported that Flynn had wrongly denied discussing sanctions with the Russian ambassador:
The day after he fired Flynn, Feb. 14, Trump urged then-FBI Director James B. Comey to be lenient with Flynn, according to Comey's notes at the time, saying, "I hope you can let this go.” If Trump indeed knew at that time that Flynn had lied to the FBI and was under investigation, the argument goes, it may constitute an attempt to obstruct that investigation.
Walter Shaub, the former head of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, suggested the tweet could prove a major misstep for the president.
At the same time, it likely wasn't difficult for Trump and the White House to have surmised that Flynn was already under investigation. Acting Attorney General Sally Yates had told White House counsel Don McGahn on Jan. 26 — two days after Flynn's FBI interview — that Flynn had discussed sanctions on his phone calls with the Russian ambassador. This was contrary to what Flynn had told the White House and opened Flynn up to blackmail, Yates said.
“We also told the White House counsel that General Flynn had been interviewed by the FBI on [January] 24,” Yates said in congressional testimony on May 8. “Mr. McGahn asked me how he did, and I declined to give him an answer to that. And we then walked through with Mr. McGahn essentially why we were telling them about this and the first thing we did was to explain to Mr. McGahn that the underlying conduct that General Flynn had engaged in was problematic in and of itself. Secondly, we told him we felt like the vice president and others were entitled to know that the information that they were conveying to the American people wasn’t true.”
Though Yates didn't clearly state to McGahn that Flynn was under investigation, given the content of their conversation — including talking about Flynn's intercepted communications — it wouldn't have been difficult to come to that conclusion.
So as long as McGahn told Trump about McGahn's conversation with Yates, it's likely Trump knew Flynn was in legal jeopardy when he spoke to Comey on Feb. 14.
It's also possible Trump merely misremembered the timeline of what he knew when as he fired off his tweet on Saturday.
Either way, it doesn't change the fact that he just tweeted something he may regret.
![](http://www.therxforum.com/**"default":"//img-s-msn-com.akamaized.net/tenant/amp/entityid/BBG3smZ.img?h=75&w=100&m=6&q=60&u=t&o=t&l=f"})
Sweeping aside Russia probe, Trump says 'we're unbeatable'
Keep on tweeting, asshole...
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/poli...-guilty-plea/ar-BBG3evk?li=BBnbcA1&srcref=rss
A little more than 24 hours after Michael Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI, President Trump finally took to Twitter to offer his thoughts. He may wish he hadn't.
In his first tweet on the subject since Flynn's plea, Trump argued that Flynn had no reason to lie about his actions because they weren't unlawful. But it's the first part of the tweet that caught plenty of people's attention.
“I had to fire General Flynn because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI,” Trump began.
Subscribe to the Post Most newsletter: Today’s most popular stories on The Washington Post
Except when Trump fired Flynn on Feb. 13, Flynn's contradictory comments to the FBI on his meeting with the Russian ambassador weren't public knowledge. And the current timeline as we understand it does not suggest the White House had direct knowledge of what Flynn said at the time.
Flynn's comments to the FBI didn't come into the public domain until three days after his dismissal, on Feb. 16, when The Washington Post's Sari Horwitz and Adam Entous reported that Flynn had wrongly denied discussing sanctions with the Russian ambassador:
Former national security adviser Michael Flynn denied to FBI agents in an interview last month that he had discussed U.S. sanctions against Russia with that country’s ambassador to the United States before President Trump took office, contradicting the contents of intercepted communications collected by intelligence agencies, current and former U.S. officials said.
The Jan. 24 interview potentially puts Flynn in legal jeopardy. Lying to the FBI is a felony offense. But several officials said it is unclear whether prosecutors would attempt to bring a case, in part because Flynn may parse the definition of the word “sanctions.” He also followed his denial to the FBI by saying he couldn’t recall all of the conversation, officials said.
Any decision to prosecute would ultimately lie with the Justice Department.
Some see a problematic admission in Trump's tweet on Saturday; possibly even something that could be construed as an admission to obstruction of justice. Here's why:The day after he fired Flynn, Feb. 14, Trump urged then-FBI Director James B. Comey to be lenient with Flynn, according to Comey's notes at the time, saying, "I hope you can let this go.” If Trump indeed knew at that time that Flynn had lied to the FBI and was under investigation, the argument goes, it may constitute an attempt to obstruct that investigation.
Walter Shaub, the former head of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, suggested the tweet could prove a major misstep for the president.
At the same time, it likely wasn't difficult for Trump and the White House to have surmised that Flynn was already under investigation. Acting Attorney General Sally Yates had told White House counsel Don McGahn on Jan. 26 — two days after Flynn's FBI interview — that Flynn had discussed sanctions on his phone calls with the Russian ambassador. This was contrary to what Flynn had told the White House and opened Flynn up to blackmail, Yates said.
“We also told the White House counsel that General Flynn had been interviewed by the FBI on [January] 24,” Yates said in congressional testimony on May 8. “Mr. McGahn asked me how he did, and I declined to give him an answer to that. And we then walked through with Mr. McGahn essentially why we were telling them about this and the first thing we did was to explain to Mr. McGahn that the underlying conduct that General Flynn had engaged in was problematic in and of itself. Secondly, we told him we felt like the vice president and others were entitled to know that the information that they were conveying to the American people wasn’t true.”
Though Yates didn't clearly state to McGahn that Flynn was under investigation, given the content of their conversation — including talking about Flynn's intercepted communications — it wouldn't have been difficult to come to that conclusion.
So as long as McGahn told Trump about McGahn's conversation with Yates, it's likely Trump knew Flynn was in legal jeopardy when he spoke to Comey on Feb. 14.
It's also possible Trump merely misremembered the timeline of what he knew when as he fired off his tweet on Saturday.
Either way, it doesn't change the fact that he just tweeted something he may regret.
Sweeping aside Russia probe, Trump says 'we're unbeatable'
ointer:Shush()*
Donald J. Trump
Sarah Sanders
Lou Dobbs
