There are a couple of very interesting articles in the NY Times today. The first one is titled Trump Abruptly Orders 46 Obama-Era Prosecutors to Resign, but appears to be more about Preet Bharara, who is…or was until today, anyway…the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York. (That includes NYC, don’t forget. You know…where President Trump does his business? Where the Trump Tower was (or was not) surveilled by U.S. agencies so far unknown? Yup.) Bharara has been credited with the scalps of a number of highly-placed, totally corrupt NY State congressmen, and appears to have been an equal opportunity prosecutor. Bharara is mentioned 16 times in the article and his prime supporter, Charles Schumer, is mentioned 8 times.
That’s a lotta times!!!
Here are a few things regarding Bharara that are mentioned in that article:
1st paragraph: “The Trump administration moved on Friday to sweep away most of the remaining vestiges of Obama administration prosecutors at the Justice Department, ordering 46 holdover United States attorneys to tender their resignations immediately — including Preet Bharara, the United States attorney in Manhattan.”
2nd paragraph: “The firings were a surprise — especially for Mr. Bharara, who has a reputation for prosecuting public corruption cases and for investigating insider trading. In November, Mr. Bharara met with then President-elect Donald J. Trump at Trump Tower in Manhattan and told reporters afterward that both Mr. Trump and Jeff Sessions, who is now the attorney general, had asked him about staying on, which the prosecutor said he expected to do.”
3rd paragraph…and here’s where it gets interesting: “But on Friday, Mr. Bharara was among federal prosecutors who received a call from Dana Boente, the acting deputy attorney general, instructing him to resign, according to a person familiar with the matter. As of Friday evening, though some of the prosecutors had publicly announced their resignations, Mr. Bharara had not. A spokesman for Mr. Bharara declined to comment.
I repeat:
“Mr. Bharara had not [publicly announced his resignation]. A spokesman for Mr. Bharara declined to comment.”
HMMMmmmm…
<img src="https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/3071112/Verry%20interesting.jpg"
Yes indeed!!!
Read on.
More from the article:
…the calls [for immediate resignation] from the acting deputy attorney general arose a day after Sean Hannity, the Fox News commentator who is a strong supporter of President Trump, said on his evening show that Mr. Trump needed to “purge” Obama holdovers from the federal government. Mr. Hannity portrayed them as “saboteurs” from the “deep state” who were leaking secrets to hurt Mr. Trump. It also came the same week that government watchdogs wrote to Mr. Bharara and urged him to investigate whether Mr. Trump had violated the emoluments clause of the Constitution, which bars federal officials from taking payments from foreign governments.
Once again, I repeat:
“It…came the same week that government watchdogs wrote to Mr. Bharara and urged him to investigate whether Mr. Trump had violated the emoluments clause of the Constitution, which bars federal officials from taking payments from foreign governments.”
Even more interesting!!!
And just who are these “government watchdogs?” No mention. Round up the usual leaker suspects. Bring pails. Lots of pails. There are rumors of a likely flood.
More:
Several Democratic members of Congress said they only heard that the United States attorneys from their states were being immediately let go shortly before the Friday afternoon statement from the Justice Department. One senator, speaking on the condition of anonymity to protect the identity of the United States attorney in that state, said that an Obama-appointed prosecutor had been instructed to vacate the office by the end of the day.
Although it was not clear whether all were given the same instructions, that United States attorney was not the only one told to clear out by the close of business. The abrupt nature of the dismissals distinguished Mr. Trump’s mass firing…
Michael D. McKay, who was the United States attorney in Seattle under the George Bush administration, recalled …at least one colleague who was in the midst of a major investigation and was kept on to finish it.
“I’m confident it wasn’t on the same day,” he said, adding: “While there was a wholesale `Good to see you, thanks for your service, and now please leave,’ people were kept on on a case-by-case basis depending on the situation.”
–snip–
The abrupt mass firing appeared to be a change in plans for the administration, according to a statement by Senator Dianne Feinstein of California, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee.
“In January, I met with Vice President Pence and White House Counsel Donald McGahn and asked specifically whether all U.S. attorneys would be fired at once,” she said. “Mr. McGahn told me that the transition would be done in an orderly fashion to preserve continuity. Clearly this is not the case. I’m very concerned about the effect of this sudden and unexpected decision on federal law enforcement.”
And more:
Mr. Bharara has been among the highest-profile United States attorneys, with a purview that includes Wall Street and public corruption prosecutions, including of both Democratic and Republican officials and other influential figures.
His office, for example, has prosecuted top police officials in New York and the powerful leader of the city correction officers’ union; they have pleaded not guilty. It is preparing to try a major public corruption case involving former aides and associates of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and is looking into allegations of pay-for-play around Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York.
But Mr. Bharara is also closely associated with the Senate minority leader, Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York. Mr. Bharara was formerly a counsel to Mr. Schumer, who pushed Mr. Obama to nominate Mr. Bharara to be the top federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York.
At the time of the November meeting at Trump Tower, Mr. Schumer was saying publicly that Democrats should try to find common ground and work with the president-elect. But relations between Mr. Trump and Mr. Schumer have since soured.
–snip–
…Mr. Schumer has called for an independent investigation into contacts between the Trump campaign and the Russian government, and demanded that Mr. Sessions resign for having testified that he had no contacts with Russians even though he had met with the Russian ambassador.
This is classic drip, drip, drip leak stuff.
Here’s a little more pro-Bharara Times work from today:
With Preet Bharara’s Dismissal, Storied Office Loses Its Top Fighter
For more than seven years, Preet Bharara, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, made a name for himself as one of the nation’s most aggressive and outspoken prosecutors of public corruption and Wall Street crime.
With Mr. Bharara, 48, being told on Friday to step down from his post, it was unclear what effect his expected departure might have on the office’s current investigations.
–snip–
Mr. Bharara had not issued a statement as of Friday evening, when his office was uncertain whether the resignation request applied to him. The announcement that he had been told to resign along with 45 other United States attorneys around the country comes little more than three months after he met with Donald J. Trump, then president-elect, at Trump Tower, and announced afterward that Mr. Trump had asked him to stay on as the United States attorney.
Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Mr. Bharara said that Mr. Trump had asked to see him to discuss “whether or not I’d be prepared to stay on as the United States attorney to do the work as we have done it, independently, without fear or favor for the last seven years.”
“We had a good meeting,” Mr. Bharara said. “I said I would absolutely consider staying on. I agreed to stay on.”Mr. Bharara also said at the time that he had already spoken with then-Senator Jeff Sessions, the Republican of Alabama who Mr. Trump appointed attorney general. “He also asked that I stay on, and so I expect that I will be continuing,” Mr. Bharara said.
Among the names of lawyers mentioned as a possible United States attorney in Manhattan in the Trump administration is Marc L. Mukasey, a former Southern District prosecutor and the son of Michael B. Mukasey, the former attorney general in the Bush administration. The younger Mr. Mukasey is now a lawyer at Greenberg Traurig, a law firm in New York where Rudolph W. Giuliani, a close associate of Mr. Trump, also works. Mr. Mukasey declined to comment on Friday.
Watch for more drips tomorrow.
Watch.
I personally think that this sudden offing of 48 U.S. attorneys is most likely a smokescreen being used to get rid of Bharara.
It won’t go unchallenged.
Spy vs. spy.
More tomorrow, or maybe next week.
Sometime soon.
Drip, drip, drip.
The water torture continues.
Watch.
AG
