Media Today

[Rick Plant]

LOL not mentioning Sussman I see.

 

Another right wing scam goes down in flames. 3 years of right wing propaganda and wasting $2.3 million dollars of tax payers money and they got nothin'.

How does it feel?


Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann found not guilty of lying to FBI, in blow to Durham investigation

CNN — Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann was acquitted Tuesday of lying to the FBI, in the first trial of special counsel John Durham’s investigation.

The verdict is a major defeat for Durham and his Justice Department prosecutors, who have spent three years looking for wrongdoing in the Trump-Russia probe. He claimed Sussmann lied during a 2016 meeting in which he passed a tip to the FBI about Donald Trump and Russia.

The Washington, DC, federal jury deliberated for six hours over two days before reaching its verdict.

The Sussmann case revolved around his September 2016 meeting with James Baker, a friend who was the FBI’s general counsel. Sussmann passed along a tip that led to a four-month FBI inquiry into a possible internet backchannel between the Trump Organization and Kremlin-linked Alfa Bank. Both companies denied the claim, and the FBI didn’t find any improper cyber links.

Prosecutors argued that Sussmann intentionally lied to Baker by saying he came only as a concerned citizen, and not on behalf of any clients, saying Sussmann hid his ties to Democrats to “manipulate the FBI” and gin up an “October surprise” to help Clinton win.

In Sussmann’s telling, at the peak of Russia’s attack on the 2016 election, he went to the FBI with a good-faith tip, which originated from reputable cyber experts that he represented. He separately worked on Clinton’s behalf to peddle that unverified tip to the press, generating some coverage. He didn’t try to dupe Baker or hide his political ties, which were well-known at the FBI.

Durham is a Trump-era holdover who was appointed by then-Attorney General Bill Barr in 2019 to review the Russia probe. Barr and Durham have publicly questioned the legitimacy of the Russia probe, but Durham hasn’t yet backed up those assertions with criminal convictions.

One juror told CNN that the jury didn’t initially agree on a verdict when they got the case on Friday afternoon. But over the course of deliberations, the juror said, all 12 jurors agreed that Durham’s team did not meet the five legal requirements needed to find Sussmann guilty.

Sussmann’s lawyers repeatedly harped on the “materiality” element, which required prosecutors to prove that Sussmann’s alleged lie was relevant enough to potentially impact the FBI’s work.

Four additional jurors declined to comment about the verdict.

There was an audible sigh of relief from Sussmann’s family after the jury foreperson announced the not-guilty verdict. After exiting the courtroom, Sussmann’s wife, Dr. Apple Sussmann, said, “holy cow, that was nerve racking.” Durham lingered in the courtroom for a few minutes after it was mostly emptied out.

At closing arguments last week, Sussmann’s lawyers derided Durham’s case as one big “political conspiracy theory.” They went farther Tuesday, accusing Durham of playing politics with the legal system.

“This is a case of extraordinary prosecutorial overreach,” defense attorneys Sean Berkowitz and Michael Bosworth said in a statement. “And we believe that today’s verdict sends an unmistakable message to anyone who cares to listen: politics is no substitute for evidence, and politics has no place in our system of justice.”

Sussmann spoke to the press outside the courthouse and thanked the jury, and said he was eager to move on from this ordeal and return to his work as a cybersecurity lawyer.

“I told the truth to the FBI, and the jury clearly recognized that with their unanimous verdict today,” Sussmann said. “…Despite being falsely accused, I am relieved that justice ultimately prevailed in my case.”

Durham said in a statement that he was “disappointed” with the verdict.

“While we are disappointed in the outcome, we respect the jury’s decision and thank them for their service,” Durham said in a statement. “I also want to recognize and thank the investigators and the prosecution team for their dedicated efforts in seeking truth and justice in this case.”

Durham investigation takes a hit

So far, Durham’s work has only led to one conviction: the guilty plea of a junior FBI lawyer who was involved in a wiretapping warrant for a former Trump 2016 campaign adviser. Durham also charged a Russian expat tied to the infamous Steele dossier, whose trial is slated for October.

The Sussmann case was the first major courtroom test for Durham, and the acquittal may bolster Durham’s critics, who believe he’s running a politicized probe into flimsy theories.

“Today’s acquittal signals the total collapse of the 3-year charade to manufacture a scandal where there wasn’t one,” Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill told CNN in a statement. “A prosecutor appointed by Trump’s attorney general tried to advance the right wing’s conspiratorial agenda, but the justice system wouldn’t fall for their lies.”

A few times during the trial, the judge chided prosecutors for asking politically tinged question of witnesses. And Sussmann’s lawyers complained on several occasions that prosecutors were going beyond the pre-trial “guardrails” that the judge set up to keep politics out of proceedings.

Durham’s team used the trial to spotlight what it characterized as the Clinton campaign’s dirty tactics, and to pull back the curtain on Democrats’ well-funded opposition research efforts against Trump in 2016.

Seizing on these revelations, Trump has treated Durham’s probe as a political weapon, stoking excitement in the right-wing ecosystem that Durham will deliver Watergate-caliber indictments against Clinton loyalists and the “deep state” government agents who supposedly conspired against him. He has even suggested that Sussmann’s and other Democrats’ conduct should be “punishable by death.”

Durham’s efforts to “investigate the investigators” are ongoing, and have outlasted the Russia probe itself, which was taken over by special counsel Robert Mueller and convicted six Trump associates, including his lawyer, his 2016 campaign chair, and a senior White House official.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/31/politics/sussmann-verdict/index.html

[Rick Plant]

John Durham 'made a fool of himself' with investigation that was 'asinine from the beginning': Morning Joe

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough ripped special counsel John Durham after the first trial from his investigation ended in an acquittal.

Durham was appointed by former attorney general William Barr to investigate the origins of the probe seeking links between Donald Trump's campaign and Russia, but the first trial from his prosecution ended in an acquittal for Democratic lawyer Michael Sussman, who was charged with lying to FBI agents.

"It's just asinine," Scarborough said. "It's been asinine from the start. This started in March 2017 when Donald Trump said that Barack Obama was tapping his phones, and it continued, one lie after another lie after another lie, which was picked up by all of those news outlets that you just quoted, and then Barr lets Durham start investigating, supposedly investigating the investigators."

"But there's been absolutely nothing there from the beginning," the "Morning Joe" host continued, "and this pleading that everybody jumped on in February, we did an entire segment. I mean, I read it, tried to figure it out for 24 hours. I talked to legal scholars, I said, 'I don't understand this pleading, it looks like it was written by a seventh grader,' and sure enough, it basically was, and then you see, at the end of the day, that this investigation of the 'deep state,' this investigation of the investigators, is much ado about nothing. It's more weirdos, more conspiracy theorists, more freaks, actually getting an attorney general to allow Durham go out and make a fool of himself, to drag this out years to make the investigation of the investigators longer than the original investigation."

"It cost millions and millions of taxpayers' dollars and have absolutely nothing to show about it in the end," he concluded. "But yet, you have people being slandered throughout the entire process, and let's start with the FBI. Let's start with Donald Trump. Let's start with those right-wing dominant media people who can continue to slander the FBI. Let's talk about House Republican leaders who slander the FBI day in and day out, and have been slandering the FBI day in and day out because they dare to investigate a politician, a failed game show host, who did one thing after another that raised legitimate suspicions."

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Uvalde police, school district no longer cooperating with Texas probe of shooting: Sources
Texas officials are probing law enforcement's response to last week's massacre.

The Uvalde Police Department and the Uvalde Independent School District police force are no longer cooperating with the Texas Department of Public Safety's investigation into the massacre at Robb Elementary School and the state's review of the law enforcement response, multiple law enforcement sources tell ABC News.

The Uvalde police chief and a spokesperson for the Uvalde Independent School District did not immediately respond to requests for comment from ABC News.

According to sources, the decision to stop cooperating occurred soon after the director of DPS, Col. Steven McCraw, held a news conference Friday during which he said the delayed police entry into the classroom was "the wrong decision" and contrary to protocol.

Reached by ABC News, a spokesperson for the Texas Department of Public Safety said, "The Uvalde Police Department and Uvalde CISD Police have been cooperating with investigators. The chief of the Uvalde CISD Police provided an initial interview but has not responded to a request for a follow-up interview with the Texas Rangers that was made two days ago."

Last Tuesday's attack, one of the worst school shootings in U.S. history, left 19 children and two adults dead.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/uvalde-police-school-district-longer-cooperating-texas-probe/story?id=85093405

[Rick Plant]

Pro-Stacey Abrams group comes out swinging against Brian Kemp in first campaign ad

Gov. Brian Kemp made it through a Republican primary, despite efforts by former President Donald Trump to replace him with a more loyal, GOP candidate.

In the week since the primary election, Democratic challenger Stacey Abrams has gone full force into the general election.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Wednesday that the "One Georgia" campaign committee is airing its first ad against Kemp, attacking him on his support for "criminal carry" gun laws and his anti-abortion stance.

“He rolled back women’s rights, vowing to make abortion a crime with 10 years in prison,” the ad's narrator says. "Just when we need to move forward, Brian Kemp keeps taking us back."

The reference is to the 2019 "trigger" law that would ban abortion in Georgia if the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. While some states are staying away from targeting pregnant women directly, Kemp at one point indicated support for laws that could throw women in prison if they seek to terminate a pregnancy.

After public outrage, Kemp decided he'd endorse laws that would only ban abortions once a "heartbeat" is heard. The so-called fetal heartbeat isn't actually detected until about eight weeks into a pregnancy, according to the Cleveland Clinic. Any flutter seen on ultrasounds is actually a small group of cells that will become the heartbeat. It isn't even an actual fetus at that stage, it's an embryo. Lawmakers have decided that these cells are a "heart" and falsely believe "life" is detected.

See the ad from One Georgia below:

https://twitter.com/i/status/1531960558727077889

[Rick Plant]

Uvalde school district police chief dodges CNN reporter's questions on when victims' families will get answers

While on the scene in Uvalde, Texas, a CNN's Shimon Prokupecz got a chance to question Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District Police chief Pete Arredondo, asking him about reports that say he's now refusing to cooperate with the state's investigation into the police response to the elementary school shooting which killed 19 students and two teachers.

During the exchange, Arredondo told Prokupecz that "we're obviously not going to release anything, we have people in our community being buried."

Prokupecz then asked Arredondo about accusations from his own department that say he was responsible for the police delay in breaching the classroom to eliminate the shooter, to which he replied that more information would be released "when the families stop grieving." Arredondo went on to claim that he's "been on the phone with" Texas Rangers "every day," and denied reports that he's stopped cooperating with the investigation.

Arredondo then left the interview and was scurried into a building, refusing to answer any more questions.

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Johnny Depp-Amber Heard verdict: Jury sides with Depp, awards $15 million
The jury of seven people reached a decision Wednesday in the defamation case brought by Johnny Depp against his ex-wife Amber Heard.

Johnny Depp won his defamation case against his ex-wife Amber Heard on Wednesday, and the jury awarded him $15 million in damages.

Depp was awarded $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages in his defamation suit. The jury also awarded Heard $2 million in compensatory damages.

The jury in Fairfax, Virginia, began deliberating Friday.

Depp sued Heard for $50 million after she wrote an op-ed for The Washington Post in 2018 in which she called herself a "public figure representing domestic abuse." Heard countersued Depp for $100 million.

Sources close to Amber Heard confirmed to NBC News reports that Heard plans to appeal Wednesday's verdict.

No additional details on the appeal were provided.

https://www.nbcnews.com/pop-culture/pop-culture-news/blog/-johnny-depp-amber-heard-verdict-live-updates-rcna31428


Amber Heard posts statement minutes after verdict announced in defamation case: "The disappointment I feel today is beyond words"



Minutes after a jury awarded Johnny Depp $15 million in damages and Amber Heard $2 million in their defamation lawsuits, Heard posted a statement on Instagram.

The jury decided Heard was liable for defaming Depp in a 2018 op-ed published in the Washington Post. They also decided Depp was liable for a statement his attorney made calling Heard's claims of domestic violence a hoax. While it was a mixed verdict, Depp was awarded more money, and Heard said she felt "disappointment" in the outcome.

"The disappointment I feel today is beyond words," Heard wrote in her statement. "I'm heartbroken that the mountain of evidence still was not enough to stand up to the disproportionate power, influence and sway of my ex husband."

The 36-year-old said she is even more disappointed in "what this verdict means for women," calling it a "setback."

"It sets back the clock to a time when a woman who spoke up and spoke up could be publicly shamed and humiliated," she said. "It sets back the idea that violence against women should be taken seriously."

"I believe Johnny's attorneys succeeded in getting the jury to overlook the key issue of Freedom of Speech and ignore evidence that was so conclusive that we won in the U.K.," Heard said. In 2020, Depp sued the Sun newspaper and its parent company in the U.K. after it published an article that called him a "wife beater," BBC News reports.

In that case, Heard gave evidence to the court and a judged ultimately ruled the article to be "substantially true," saying he found 12 of 14 alleged incidents of domestic violence occurred.

In her statement about the recent case, Heard said she was sad she lost. "But I am sadder still that I seemed to have lost a right I thought I had as an American — to speak freely and openly."

The dramatic trial began in Fairfax, Virginia in April. Depp sued his ex-wife for $50 million over the op-ed, published in The Washington Post in December 2018. In the op-ed, Heard described herself as "a public figure representing domestic abuse." Depp's lawyers say he was defamed by the article even though it never mentioned his name.

Both Depp and Heard alleged in their testimony the other had abused them.

Following the verdict, Depp also posted a statement on Instagram, writing, "The jury gave me my life back."

While the jury said Depp should receive $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages, the judge said state law caps punitive damages at $350,000, meaning Depp's award would total $10.35 million.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/johnny-depp-amber-heard-lawsuit-verdict-statement-minutes-after-announced-in-defamation-case-disappointed/

[Rick Plant]

Suspect dead after active shooter incident at Tulsa hospital: Police say multiple people shot by man with rifle
https://www.rawstory.com/tulsa-shooting/