Jack - Mueller Report Pt. 16

Episode Date: September 6, 2019

In part 16 of our in-depth coverage of the Mueller Report, we are covering volume 2, section 2, subsections G and H - including Trumps efforts to prevent the disclosure of emails about the June 2106 Trump Tower meeting and Trumps further efforts to have Jeff Sessions un-recuse himself. We’ll be going over pages 98 through 113. Thanks for supporting Mueller She Wrote! Become a Patron for as little as $3 per month at Patreon.com/muellershewrote

Season 4 of How We Win Is Here For the past four years, we've been making history in critical elections all over the country. And last year, we made history again by expanding our majority in the Senate, eating election denying Republicans and crucial state house races, and fighting back a non-existent red wave. But the Maga Republicans who plotted and pardoned the attempted overthrow of our government now control the house. Thanks to gerrymandered maps and repressive anti-voter laws. And the chaotic spectacle we've already seen shows us just how far they will go to

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So to be clear, Mr. Trump has no financial relationships with any Russian oligarchs. That's what he said. That's what I said. That's obviously what our position is. That's what I said, that's obviously what our position is. I'm not aware of any of those activities. I have been called a surrogate at a time, a tree, and that campaign, and I didn't have, not have communications with the Russians. What do I have to get involved with Putin for? I have nothing to do with Putin. I've never spoken to him. I don't know anything about a mother than he will respect me. Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing.

So it is political. You're a communist! No, Mr. Green. Communism is just a red herring. Like all members of the oldest professional capitalist. Hello and welcome to Muller She Wrote and our ongoing special coverage of the Redacted Muller Report. I'm your host, A.G. and with me as always, Archie Lisa Johnson. Hello. And Jordan Coburn. Hello. How are you guys?

Hey, good. Good. Yeah. Well, yes. I just found out that there's a doctor of political science at San Francisco State University, I think it's SFSU, who has assigned this series to his students or her students, I don't know, it seems like a male energy, but I don't know wherever you are on the spectrum.

They're students probably safe to say, yeah. And yeah, we're now being taught in universities. That is amazing. I know, all of a sudden I was like, oh, I feel really responsible for a lot of things now. And I think they tweeted, the professor tweeted back, like, I can't wait until we get the big, dick toilet wine essays. I love it. I love it. Alright, cool. So now I don't feel so.

Yeah, I don't know why, because I only briefly saw the tweet and I thought that was so cool, but I got female energy. I don't know which way is more or less offensive. But yeah, my brain just went straight to like, oh, female professor, but there's no, there was no tell. There was a, remember, they're being Italian. And I think for me, it's because when I was younger, most of our professors were men. Oh, and I just think about what the future should be, is that what it was? Yeah.

Nice, we're all on the same page though. Yes. So we got to do more dick jokes and keep these kids entertained. Yeah, absolutely. Yes, yes, jokes coming. Get it. Okay. Nice. So how are you guys start? Yeah, well great. Yeah, no, you're great. Like we're in college now. Sweet. It does feel like a crash course. Yeah. Yeah it really is. And I hope that in the future, these, like, this will be taught as a class just on its own because there's so much to it. Seth, they could teach a whole class on this stuff.

Totally. He could write books forever. Yeah, and he could be like, and you'd remember how you'd have to go to college and the professor would make you buy their book for the class? He would write it in different editions. Like, yeah, last year's edition. Third edition. Third edition. Third edition.

Suddenly, valueless, yeah. Because so much has changed since then. It's a strange system. Yeah. Well, today's students, we are covering volume two, section two, subsections G and H, and they include Trump's efforts to prevent the disclosure of emails about the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting, and Trump's further efforts to have sessions on recuse himself. In my notes here, I have the June 2106 Trump Tower meeting,

and that's funny because that's way in the future. But although I mean, Trump did try to get Lewandowski and Dearborn to tell sessions that he could only look at future elections. So the 2106 Trump Tower meeting could fall into play. Right, when Trump refuses to leave office, as we've talked about, or still president,

one of his many crotch fruit down the line. Wow. We have to vote. Just come on guys. Vote. Anyway, we'll be going over pages 90 through 113 today. So if you want to pause now, read it. Or we'll read it for you. You don't even have to just follow along. But let's start with the evidence. Because as I've always said, every, every episode, the overview is just a, you know, a brief outline of the evidence. So let's just start with the evidence. And this is the obstructive act of trying to prevent the disclosure of the emails regarding the U-2016 Trump Tower meeting in June 9th.

First, Trump learned about the existence of the emails in mid-June 2017, a year later, which was the same week that Trump asked Lewandowski to tell sessions to limit the investigation to future election interference. For these emails, we reached back into volume one section for A, and a senior administration official becoming aware of the emails in mid-June. The emails stated that Veselnut Skyoffer to provide the campaign with some info that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia as part of the Russian government's support for Trump. And Junior responded, if it's what you say, I

love it, especially later in the summer. And then of course, Junior Cushion Manafort met with Veselnut's sky at several other Russians, Rob Goldstone, you know, in Trump Tower, one floor below Donald Trump's office. And according to the written answers provided by Trump to the special counsel, because he wouldn't interview him, because he's such a manly man, he was not aware of the meeting or the emails at any time prior to the election. So the Senate select committee on intelligence, Senate letter to the administration asking about all meetings between June 15, 2015 and January 2017, but the Trump org attorneys didn't become aware of the meeting until the

first week of June 2017, when they began interviewing the meeting participants. And the Trump org attorneys didn't become aware of the meeting until the first week of June 2017 when they began interviewing the meeting participants and the Trump organization provided the emails that you know that set up the meeting They provided those emails to Mueller at that time and around June of 2017 It's about a month after Mueller was appointed and Mark Corallo who was the spokesperson for Trump's legal, said that he learned about the meeting in June of 2017, too. And that's weird, because he was on the plane when they drafted the statement about the meeting. But that was, I think, later. So anyway, a previous recall of learning about the meeting from Sean Hannity around the

same time. So that's kind of when everybody learned about the meeting a year after it happened, those who weren't there. Interesting. I like that Donald Trump had this office literally right above the room that happened in. I know. That's like there's a special little hole in the ground.

Yeah, exactly. I was thinking, I imagine he has cut out. You know that chair that you can like hook yourself to on the side of the stairs and it just slowly kind of brings you down. Oh, yeah. It's more from the ceiling. Yeah. That's what he has.

It just goes over his wheelchair to walk. Like the flexant for the other. For the other. Yeah. He slides down into the evil air. Nice. Now you get a parody of Donald Trump singing the Fresh Prince of El Air.

Oh. I could live without it, but you know. I bet we could make it happen. The Fresh Prince of my lair. Ooh. That was a little fast. With a naked cat. I think I've ever, yeah. He's grabbing somebody by the pussy, but no, it. With a naked cat. I think I've ever, yeah.

He's grabbing somebody by the pussy, but no, it's just a naked cat. It is. See now we're thinking Austin Powers. Yeah, we are. We're mixing it all together. And this leaves out that whole idea that, you know, first of all, that Junior didn't go up and tell his dad

about the meeting. Wrong. But that's not in here. And then also remember the phone calls, the three block calls. That doesn't, I guess not be him. Yeah. Yeah, but it was a NASCAR guy and Howard Lorber, Lorber. Why was he belonged? That's just weird. I guess it happened. They were like really good real estate friends of Trump's money friends. Trump doesn't

have any other kind of friends. I don't think. Yeah, you know what's funny is that sometimes my phone says scam likely when it's like a random number. Or even someone I know, I wonder when Trump gets that He's like is it an actual it always just But you know we had positive that perhaps Lorber and the NASCAR guy could have been in the room and had him on speaker phone But anyway, that's not in here and that could be part of a wider counterintelligence investigation showing that Trump is a Russian asset, but I don't know, none of us know what's in the counterintelligence stuff.

It's so huge and giant. And of course, now under Billion, Billion Bar. That'd be a cooler name. Yeah, I'm gonna call you Billion. Billion Bar. Billion, from now. Billion, and don't be so serious. I think I've done this before.

I was gonna say we've had them this day. They might have been it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, and Billiam. Then on to page 100 with Trump directing his communication staff, not to publicly disclose information about the meeting. And this is where Josh Rafale, the Wrangler of the Trump Children, and Hope Hicks recall speaking

with Kush and Ivanka about the emails and that they would inevitably be leaked. And on or about June 22nd, Hicks attended a meeting in the White House with Trump, Kush and Ivanka. And according to Hope Hicks, Kush said he wanted to provide Congress info about the meeting and Kush brought documents to this White House meeting, but Trump told him, I don't wanna know, don't show me,

and he shut the conversation down. Yeah, he brought receipts there. Yeah, or basically this sort of shows, the Trump didn't really know about the meeting and people were trying to tell him about the meeting a year later and he was like, I don't wanna know, I don't even wanna know. Yeah, he's smart enough to know that he doesn't wanna know.

But this is what Hope Hicks says. And so, yeah. Can we trust him? We're gonna take that with a great name. She's mysterious. Home Hicks, that's not. She kind of reminds me of the Milocio Rolego. But like like she's not like that just to see it. It's like very confusing. She just looks like it like her silhouette can easily be. Yeah yeah yeah. I guess

a more like very physical optic level. Yeah yeah. She does something nice with her. Yeah yeah. But morally to be determined. So after this meeting on June 28th Hicks viewed the emails she saw them and she recalls being shocked because they looked really bad. And she told Trump about them and he seemed upset too because so many people knew about them already and that could lead to them being leaked. But later that day, Hicks, Kush and Ivanka met with Trump and Kush told Trump that the June 9th meeting wasn't a big deal. It was about adoptions.

But there were these emails and they looked really bad. So Hicks told Trump she thought Juniors should release the emails to get out ahead of the story and warned Trump that the emails were really bad. Trump insisted he did not want to know about them, he didn't want the details, and shut that down again and then Trump told the group not to be proactive in disclosing the emails because he believed they would not leak. So now we've got people saying, oh, they'll definitely leak.

And now we've got some testimony saying that they won't leak, right? And then on to page 101, subsection three, that's about Trump then directing Junior's response to the press about the meeting. And this is what we were all like, whoa, that's so obstructiony. And this is the meeting that took place on the plane back from the G20 summit, while Trump

was overseas with Hicks, Reffel, Kush, and Ivanka. Hicks and Reffel learned that the New York Times was working on a story about the June 9th, 2016 meeting. And the next day, Hicks told Trump about the story, and he told her not to comment, because responding to the press was the ultimate sin. That's the ultimate sin. Wow. Explains a lot.

Yes, you're nuts. Respect. Not shooting someone on Fifth Avenue. Right, right. Responding to the press. But on the flight home, Hicks showed a draft statement to the press that junior wrote to Trump. But Trump told her it revealed too much information,

and he told Hicks to revise the statement to say that junior took a brief meeting about the Russian adoptions and to leave out the other stuff about the emails. So he revised it. Hicks sent the revised statement via text to junior, which read, it was a short meeting, I asked Jared and Paul to stop by. We discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children that was active and popular with American families years ago and was since ended by the Russian government, but it was not a campaign issue at the time and there was no follow-up. So that was the message Trump wanted Jr. to deliver.

Hicks text concluded, are you okay with this, attributed to you, meaning this is what your dad wants you to say, you cool with this. Jr. wanted to add a few words. He wanted to indicate that primarily they discussed adoptions, not just that they only discussed adoptions. Hicks said she was fine with it, but the boss man was worried it would invite more questions.

So she, that verbatim boss man. Yep, that's come up before, right? Boss man. Yeah, interesting. And yeah, it's super mobby. But she ultimately deferred to Junior and his lawyer. And the full statement that eventually was given to the Times read as follows. It was a short introductory meeting. I asked Jared and Paul to stop by.

We primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children that was active and popular with American families years ago and was since ended by the Russian government, but it was not a campaign issue at the time, so there was no follow-up. I was asked to attend the meeting by an acquaintance but was not told the name of the person that I would be meeting beforehand. So here is Junior adding in that they primarily discussed adoptions, not only, and that he was asked to attend the meeting that way he's not leaving out the emails. So he's going against dad, he's going against the boss man. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Nothing like, oh, we discussed dirt on Hillary about the Ziff Brothers and she didn't really have anything immediately and, you know, whatever, that was totally left out.

Exactly. So, Mueller is clear to point out that the statement did not include the offer of Dirt on Hillary by the Russians. Oh, look what I just said. Or any discussion of the Magnitsky Act for that matter. Hicks recalled pre-bist, then learned of the statement and wanted more information because he was sure that emails would leak. And Trump said, no, we gave our statement, we're done here.

And later on that same... Why can he follow that with Sharpie Gate? I know. I don't understand. No, we gave the statement, we're done here. No, yeah, no, not when it's this. Later, not when it's something as important as Sharpie Gate. Exactly.

And later on, oh, by the way, if you're listening to this 20 years from now, Sharpie gate is when Trump, Hurricane Dorian is approaching. It's here now in the Carolinas, but when it was approaching Florida, he saw a spaghetti map and he decided that the hurricane was going to hit Alabama, but the map he was showing because he said that in a tweet, it could hit Alabama. And then Alabama was like, nah, it's not coming anywhere near here. Don't be a dick. It's shut up.

And so then he got mad and he got caught in a lie or some, or just being wrong. And so he took a map of the hurricane's path and took a sharpie and drew a little end on it to include the little bottom of Alabama so that he wouldn't be wrong. And now he's in trouble for that too, because apparently that's a felony falsifying weather

documents from NOAA or the National Weather Service. And so anyway, super fun. Good time. And now they're putting out more official statements on the matter. Yeah, yet they came out and said one of his counterterrorism guys said, oh I did it, I showed him the wrong map and that's why he did that. Or he didn't even say that he did it. It's just that's why he thought it was gonna hit Alabama it's so dumb so dumb

and it's it's going on and it keeps going on and he keeps quadrupling and quintupling and sex tough sex tumbling down gross I don't know about that we'll just skip sex and go right to the 7 but it's like 13 yeah that sounds so romantic we'll skip sex and go right to the 7. So anyway, he keeps doing this. And meanwhile, that is something really cool, guys. I would say, yeah. I don't know what 7 is.

I'm excited. It's the 7th of Roger the Stone from Friends. Remember the episode of Friends, 1, 2, 4, 2, 4, 2, 4, 8, 2, 4, 5, 2, 4, 5, 6, 6, 6, 6, 6. No, okay. Just me. Nice. Monica. Okay. Sorry, I'm till the end of you.

That's all right. What was I talking about? Oh, Sharpie Gate. Because he did it with a Sharpie. So that's why it's called Sharpie Gate. But anyway, he's not letting that go, because now the hurricane is in the Carolinas, and it's actually really extremely dangerous.

It devastated the Bahamas. And Heria is just like, no, Alabama was really, it's just so dumb. So when he said here, no, we gave our statement, we're done here. That's why Jordan was like, why can't he do that with Sharpie Gate? So later on, the same flight, same flight. Hick says Trump was on the phone with his personal attorneys and handed the phone to Hope Hick. The attorney told her they were working with Circa News on a separate story, and she should not speak to the New York Times anymore.

And this is funny, because when you hear the story, you're gonna laugh. I don't think I knew about this. I might, but I don't think so. Until I read this in the Mueller report. And what seems to be missing here is a corralo being uncomfortable with the whole thing because he thought it amounted to obstruction of justice

and eventually resigned because of it. As did Josh Reffel and Hope Hicks left on the same day too. I don't think it was because of this. G-2-1, the Air Force 1 press release, Doctering, but Corralo did though. He was spokesperson for the legal team and I remember him saying there was public reporting that he was like, this is obstruction of justice. I don't want to have anything to do with this, but wait it gets weird, right? On page 103 and the section about the media reports on the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting, the Times ran the story before the Trumps plane landed. In addition to the statement from

junior, the Times published a quote they got from Corralo. On behalf of the president's legal team, suggesting the meeting might have been set up by the same firm that produced the steel dossier. The name of the firm isn't mentioned, but we know it to be Fusion GPS. Corallo also worked with Circa News on a story published an hour later that questioned whether the Democrats arranged the Trump Tower meeting to frame the Republicans. Hicks was upset about Corallo's public statement and called him up to called up Trump to tell him and then you know because Trump didn't approve any of this and so I think this might be why Carolho actually left.

Okay. Because he got in trouble for this shit. And the next day Hicks and Trump called Carolho to yell at him for his statements. Carolho told Trump the statement had been authorized and further observed that junior statement was inaccurate and a document existed that would contradict it and he was referring to the emails. Hicks responded saying that only a few people knew about the emails and they'll never get out.

And I remember that quote. Do you remember that? No, but the yanks. Yeah. So Corrala took contemporaneous notes of that call documenting that that's what Hicks had said to him. But Hicks told Mueller she didn't recall making those comments and always believed the emails would be leaked So there's this whole back and forth between people who thought

Well like I'm one camp that thought for sure these are gonna get leaked and one camp that thought these will never get leaked But you have Rob Porter and Prebus on your team did two giant giant moles ever in the history of mold them You all have to understand that these are gonna get leaked. But two days later, junior tweeted out the emails, redacted emails after being told the New York Times was gonna publish them, so they were leaked. And later that day, the media reported that Trump

had been personally involved in crafting junior statement to the Times. Moller then says over the next several days that the president's personal counsel repeatedly and inaccurately denied the president played any role in drafting Trump's statement. Sarah Sanders repeated that sentiment to the public. But several months later the president's personal counsel told Mueller that the president dictated a short but accurate response

on behalf of his son. Trump then changed his story saying it was a relevant whether he dictated the statement because basically it's not a crime to lie to the press. He said that. Interesting redaction here on page 105. It says on July 12, 2017, the special counsel office redacted, Trump Jr. redacted related to the June 9th meeting and those who attended the meeting. Those redactions are for grand jury secrecy, so I can only assume they have to do with that junior probably testified. We've seen clues throughout the Mueller report that maybe junior testified to the grand jury, and I think that might be what's under there. Finally, Mueller says a week later, Trump met with Lewandowski and reporters from the New

York Times and told them he didn't know anything about the meeting at the time, but thought that most politicians would take that meeting. I would take that meeting. Would you take that meeting? I would take that meeting. You did take that meeting. Fuck, you're going to shut up. So, but, I mean, there's a lot of evidence in here that Trump knew about the meeting. It's not in here at all, as a matter of fact. So, but I mean, there's a lot of evidence in here that Trump knew about the meeting. It's not in here at all as a matter of fact. So I think when we get to the analysis, we're gonna find that this doesn't amount

to obstruction of justice. Although it is weird to me that he would help draft and craft the statement on Air Force One and that have that not be obstruction of justice. Yeah, admittedly, we were so sure that he was more involved. Yeah, totally. We did.

He technically could be, I guess, but legally speaking, he's probably clever enough to get away with it. Like, he is an idiot in a lot of ways, but he could have known exactly what to do, and that would make a lot of sense. But also, if he didn't do it, he didn't do it. But I wouldn't rule out that just because he's getting away with it, that he's totally innocent.

Yeah, but it's also none of its mentioned in here. And what Mueller generally does is Unless he was good enough to to keep everything away from Mueller, which he hasn't been successful at so far because usually what Mueller will do is he'll say These are kind of weird and we looked at this and maybe we looked at the phone calls from junior to you know to those Black numbers but there wasn't sufficient evidence to show like usually he'll bring it up and say, it amounts to nothing, or we didn't have sufficient evidence to charge at a criminal level. It's not even mentioned in here. So I think that's really interesting.

So that would be interesting, right? I said what you were thinking, George? Yeah, that makes sense. Which makes me think it's in the counterintelligence investigation folder. Oh. Yeah. That would also explain it.

Yeah, I did feel a bit of a sense of, we're not through with this yet. One way or another, yeah. But I don't know. was it could just trying to be like a good little, you know, Don Jr. and impress his dad if his dad didn't know this was going on? Was he just trying? Oh, it's father. Sorry. Yeah. Don Jr. not could. Oh, I think of them in the same way. I had some times, but yeah, was Don Jr. just trying to like suck up to his dad? Maybe. Yeah. And then of course, we know in volume one, when he, you know,

when Mueller said he didn't, you know, indict juniors because he's just a little suck up who didn't know that this was illegal, which I can't buy. It still blows my mind. Yeah. But because I mean, you could argue that none of these guys can have intent because they all think that they're above the law. But that doesn't, I guess that's not a, but. It's almost presidential in American history, because it reminds me of George Bush, like, just trying to impress his dad. They're all just like, weirdly trying to impress their fathers and making very bad decisions

in the White House. And I mean, yeah, if Don Junior becomes president, I'll just laugh, because, you know, not to cry, but it just seems like they might. I'll just move. Yeah, that's you, that's always an option. That's how it's like going with C, yeah. I just think. That's what's happening with these feet. Yeah, that's you. That's always an option. That's how it's happening with C. Yeah, I just think that's what's happening with these feet.

Yeah, they're in their own little world and it seems like they actually, you know, are effective, unfortunately. Yeah, who knows? It might, you know, sometimes it pays off to be stupid. Yeah, they're getting away with a lot. They seem to be. And like I said, this could all be under the counterintelligence umbrella. And we know McCabe said a couple months ago that, it's possible that Trump is an asset and this would have something

to do with that would be so cool yeah so guys we'll be right back with the analysis on the three criteria for obstruction of justice for this particular act. This episode of Muller She Wrote Special Edition coverage of the Muller Report is brought to you by Third Love and I am totally obsessed with Third Love. Every single bra I get net from now on and I've replaced all my bras with third love bras. It's women run, they're disrupting the male dominated bra industry which I don't understand why I was ever dominated by men. But they use real women's bodies and their ads which I love. So you get roles and wrinkles and tattoos and piercings and they use real women's measurements to find the

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our listeners 15% off your first order. So go to thirdlove.com slash AG now to find your perfect fitting bra and get 15% off your first purchase. That's thirdlove.com slash AG now to find your perfect fitting bra and get 15% off your first purchase. That's thirdlove.com slash AG for 15% off today. You'll be glad you did. Okay, welcome back. We're on to page 105 and the analysis of the evidence we just went over. So first, the obstructive act. On at least three occasions between June 29th, 2017 and July 9th, 2017,

the president directed Hope Hicks and others not to publicly disclose information about the June 9th 2016 meeting between senior campaign officials and Vesselnaud Skaia. On June 29th, Hicks warned the president that the emails setting up the June 9th meeting were, quote, really bad, and the story would be, quote, massive when it broke. But the president told her and Kushner to leave it alone. And early on July 8th, after Hicks told the president the New York Times was working on a story about the meeting, the president directed her not to comment, even though Hicks

said that the president usually considered not responding to the press to be the ultimate sin. Later that day, the president rejected Trump Jr.'s draft statement that would have acknowledged the meeting with, was with an individual who I was told might have information helpful to the campaign. The president then dictated a statement to Hicks that said the meeting was with an individual who I was told might have information helpful to the campaign. The president then dictated a statement to Hicks that said the meeting was about Russian adoptions, which the president had twice been told was discussed at the meeting. The statement dictated by the president did not mention the offer of derogatory information about Clinton.

In each of these efforts by the president involved his communications team, which was directed at the press. And they would amount to obstructive acts only of the president by taking these actions sought to withhold information from or mislead congressional investigators or the special counsel. On May 17, 2017, the president's campaign received a document request from the select committee on intelligence that the Senate select committee on intelligence that clearly covered the June 9th meeting

and underlying emails. And those documents also plainly would have been relevant to the Special Counsel's investigation. But the evidence does not establish that the president took steps to prevent the emails or other information about the June 9th meeting from being provided to Congress or the Special Counsel. That's the difference here, right?

It's not the public. It's Congress or Special Counsel. And a series of discussions in which the president sought to limit access to the emails and prevent their public release occurred in the context of developing a press strategy. The only evidence we have of the president sought to limit access to the emails and prevent their public release occurred in the context of developing a press strategy. The only evidence we have of the president discussing the production of documents to Congress or special counsel is the conversation on June 29, 2017, when Hicks recalled the president acknowledging that Kushner's attorney should provide the emails to whom ever needed to

he needed to give them to. So we have no evidence of what the president discussed with his own lawyers at the time. So basically what they're saying here is that it only obstructs justice if you prevent it from going to law enforcement officials or Congress, which he didn't do. He just prevented it from going to the public. So he obstructed justice to the public, but not criminally to a law enforcement agency. So nexus to an official proceeding as described above by the time the president's attempts to prevent the public release of the emails regarding the meeting,

the existence of a grand jury investigation supervised by special counsel was public knowledge, and the president had been told the emails were responsive to congressional inquiries to satisfy the Nexus requirement, however, it would be necessary to show that preventing the release of these emails to the public would have the natural and probable effect of impeding the grand jury proceeding. As noted above, the evidence does not establish the president sought to prevent disclosure of the emails through those official proceedings. So nope, nope. And then on to intent, it's almost doesn't matter.

You need all three. And we just don't have the first two. But the evidence establishes the president's substantial involvement in the communication strategy related to information about his campaign's connections to Russia and his desire to minimize public disclosure. The president became aware of the emails no later than June 29th 2017 when he discussed them with Hicks and Kush and he could have been aware of them as early as June 2nd 2017 when lawyers for the Trump org began interviewing witnesses who participated in the meeting.

The president thereafter repeatedly rejected the advice of Hicks and other staffers to publicly release the information about the meeting and the president expressed concern that multiple people had access to the emails and instructed Hicks that only one lawyer should deal with the matter. The president dictated a statement to be released by Trump Jr. and in response to the first press accounts of the June 9th meeting that said the meeting was about adoption. So here we have the same information over again.

He lied to the public not to Congress or law enforcement officials. But as described above, the evidence does not establish that the president intended to prevent the special counsel's office or Congress from obtaining the emails, etc., etc. The statement recorded by Carallo that the emails will never get out can be explained as reflecting a belief that emails would not be made public if the president's press strategy were followed. Even if the emails were provided to Congress and the special counsel. So nope, nope, nope. It means none of the criteria. Yeah. Fair enough, I guess. Yeah, it's kind of like was of the voice or no X factor, right?

Where they just do the X's that they make. Yeah, makes me think of that. No golden ticket. Bummer. Yeah, but I mean, it's real though. I mean, you can't be criminal obstruction of justice unless you're preventing law enforcement or Congress. And this just doesn't include that.

It's just the people. And his followers, his Trump supporters are fine with it. We're not. That's kind of what it boils down to. If you're fine with the president lying to you, minimizing things because it would look bad. There you go. Yeah, exactly.

That does get left out of these conversations a lot too, because it's so much of a focus of, well, he didn't find anything that was juicy enough to indict, and that's all they focus on. Not to mention the fact, you know, you can point to Adam Schiff's amazing monologues when he's like, it might be okay with you, if whatever his format was, because there's so many things that are just as all right. But I know, you might think this is all right, but I don't.

Awful, but lawful. Right. Not whole thing. All right, on to part H. This one's pretty quick, and Trump furthers his efforts to have sessions on recuse himself. Again, page 107, subsection 1, he again, Trump again seeks to have sessions reverse his recusal. So rewind a little bit back to May 2017, when Trump finally returned Sessions resignation

letter with not accepted written on it in Sharpie, by the way. This is before Trump bashed sessions for recusing when the New York Times reported Trump helped draft junior statement to the press about the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting. So during that time, at the end of May, Trump took additional steps to have sessions reverse his recusal by calling him at home

and asking him to unrecuse himself. According to sessions, Trump asked him to unrecuse so he could direct the Department of Justice to investigate and prosecute Hillary. So this wasn't just about unrecuse so that you can shut down the Mueller investigation. This was also about unrecuse so that you can start an investigation into Hillary. And Sessions heard him but didn't respond. So we heard but didn't listen. And he didn't reverse his recuse, or nor did he order an investigation into Clinton. In early July, Trump asked Rob Porter what he thought of associate attorney general Rachel

Brand, and if he thought she was on the team, and Trump asked if Porter thought Brand was interested in being responsible for the Mueller probe, and whether or not she'd want to be attorney general one day. Porter told Mueller, that sound good to you? Yeah, sound good, sound good, buddy. So Porter told Mueller that Trump asked him about brand because Porter knew brand, they were friends, and Trump asked him to feel her out and keep in touch with her. And Trump later asked Porter a couple of times in passing, hey, he spoke to her yet, talked

to Rachel Brand, but he didn't because he was uncomfortable with the whole task. Porter told Mueller he understood the reason he was uncomfortable with it is because he was sure that Trump wanted to find someone to fire the special counsel or and the Russian investigation. Did he told Trump to fill her out? No, Trump told Porter to fill her out. Okay, still weird. I'm like, wow to anyone. And so you're like, your friends, your friends, go talk to her.

Do she want to be attorney general? Yeah. She's on our team, right? Yeah. I just think of him like, you know, actually kind of filling her up. I imagine, yeah, they're not a great group. Oh, you're looking for a second-based joke. I was, I imagine, yeah, they're not a great group. But we're looking for a second-based joke. I was, but it only works with Trump because Porter's the domestic violence time.

Yeah, he's the user. Yeah, different jokes there. But actually, no jokes there sometimes. Sometimes it's just crimes. And additionally, McGann recalled that he and Trump discussed the fact that if sessions were no longer AG, the special counsel would report directly to a non-reqused attorney general. Oh, Trump learned how the government works. Both Hicks and McGann also, we're sitting there posing like, oh my god, if he gets rid

of sessions, we're in trouble because he's going to put a new AG in there that's going to do his bidding and no, no, no, no, he's not going to recuse himself. And here we are with Billion Barr. So anyway, both Hicks and McGann also recalled that Trump brought up Sessions disloyalty repeatedly at that time. And in addition to criticizing his recusal, he raised other concerns about his job performance

with McGann and Hicks. So that's kind of what's going on. And he also brought up Kennedy and Holder and Roy Cohn. He'll come up later. But it's just this whole pattern of trying to get sessions to recuse himself and just bashing him and bashing him and bashing him and bashing him until finally, we know what happens, but we'll get to it

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See why clutter is better. You'll be glad you did. Hey everybody, welcome back. We are on page 109 and we're gonna talk about Trump's additional efforts to have sessions on recuse or direct investigations covered by his recusal. In the fall, Trump continued to urge sessions to reverse his recusal, kept doing it, considered replacing sessions with an attorney general who would not recuse.

On October 16, Trump met privately with sessions and said the DOJ was not investigating individuals and events. He thought they should be investigating. According to contemporaneous notes taken by Rob Porter, who was at all these sessions, Trump meetings. The president mentioned Clinton's emails and said, don't have to tell us, just take a look. Okay. Sessions didn't make any promises that the DOJ would comply. And two days later Trump started tweeting. Wow, FBI confirms reports that James Comey drafted letter exonerating Crooked Hillary Clinton

long before investigation was complete. Many people not interviewed, including Clinton herself. Go, okay. So now he's just watching Fox News listening to conspiracy theorists and he starts tweeting out shit that he thinks should be investigated by the Department of Justice. Basically, you know, poking at sessions like, oh, you're not hate you. I hate you. So, Komi said under oath that he didn't do this. It's obviously a fix and where is the justice department? Trump tweeted again October 29th. There wasn't,

there was anger and unity over a lack of investigation of Clinton and the Komi fix and concluded do something. Then again, December, five days after Flynn pleaded guilty to lying about his contacts with the Russians, Trump met with sessions in the Oval Office, guess who was there? Rob Porter. And the president again suggested sessions should unrecuse himself, which Porter linked to taking back oversight of the Russian investigation and directing an investigation of Hillary Clinton. According to Porter's notes from the meeting, Trump said, I don't know if you could unrequse yourself, you'd be a hero not telling you to do anything.

Dershewit says Potus can get involved, can order AG to investigate. I don't want to get involved, I'm not going to get involved. I'm not going to do anything or direct you to do anything. I just want to be treated fairly. That to me shows that you know that it's wrong to do that, but whatever. Sessions responded. We're taking steps, whole new leadership team, professionals that will operate according to the law. Sessions also said he didn't see anything improper, which Porter thought was noteworthy because it was in conflict with previous discussions about Clinton. Because Sessions said he didn't see anything improper with the Clinton stuff. That's not been his position before, but he took it to be, mean, Sessions was just reassuring to President that he was on his team.

At the end of December, Trump told reporters it was too bad. Sessions recused himself. Then in January, Trump brought up the idea of replacing Sessions and told Porter he wanted a clean house at the Department of Justice. Porter also recalled Trump saying during a meeting that one of his biggest failings was that he had not surrounded himself with good attorneys like Roy Cohn and Jake Goldberg and criticized sessions and the special counsel investigation. And then throughout the whole rest of 2018, the next year, Trump continued to criticize sessions through tweets and interviews, Mueller outlines a whole bunch of tweets and statements criticizing sessions in his recusal

and that he's not investigating Clinton urging sessions to investigate, not just Clinton, but McCabe, Struck, Page, or FISA abuse, the Steel dossier, Fusion GPS, the Clinton Foundation, and the illegal surveillance of the Trump campaign and Russian collusions by the Democrats. And he says, come on Jeff, you can do it. The country is waiting. This is all going on. And finally in November, November 7th of 2018, Trump replaced sessions with Matthew

Fucking Whittaker. That's big, Dick Toilet wine. And that's where the section ends. So yeah, so it was a relentless onslaught of just anger and making shit up and trying to get Hillary investigated after going after sessions. And so then finally, and Matthew Fuckin-Wittaker was Jeff Sessions chief of staff. And remember, we found out recently that his financial disclosure forms were never vetted properly, and they found that.

They called it an administrative error. It's just a mess. So let's go over the analysis really quick. It's on page 111. For an obstructive act, a determined of the Trump's efforts to have the Attorney General unreqused could qualify as an obstructive act, it would be necessary to assess evidence on whether those actions would naturally impede the Russian investigation. That inquiry would take into account the supervisory role that the Attorney General, if unrecused,

would play in the Russian investigation. It would also have to take into account the Attorney General's recusal covered other campaign-related matters. The inquiry would not turn on what Attorney General sessions would do if unrecused, but whether the efforts to reverse his recusal would naturally have had the effective in peeding the Russian investigation. On multiple occasions, in 2017, President spoke

with sessions about reversing his recusal so that he could take over the Russian investigation and begin investigating and prosecuting Hillary Clinton. For example, in early summer 2017, sessions recalled the President asking him to unrecuse, but sessions did not take his directive. When the president raised the issue again in December of 2017, the president said, according to a porter,

not telling you to do anything, I'm not going to get involved, I'm not going to do anything or direct you to do anything, I just wanted to be treated fairly. The duration of the president's efforts, which span from March 2017 to August 2018, and the fact that the president repeatedly criticized sessions in public and in private for failing to tell the president that he would have to recuse is relevant to assessing whether the president's efforts to have sessions unrecuse could qualify as obstructive acts. He doesn't say anything else besides that, so it doesn't seem like he's coming to a conclusion. It's up in the air. For an access to an official proceeding is described above by mid June 2017, the existence of a grand jury investigation supervised by Mueller was public knowledge. In addition, in July 2017, a different grand jury supervised by the special counsel was in paneled in the district of Columbia

and the press reported on the existence of this grand jury in early August 2017, whether the conduct towards the Attorney General would have foreseeable impact on those proceedings turns on much of the same evidence discussed above with respect to the obstructive act element. So, yeah, that's so interesting how, because it's obviously the implication of it is if he does unrecuse himself, he would then go on to serve Trump and his, you know, investigative desires, essentially. But they're only looking at the efforts to get him to unrecuse, and that's entirely different. You can't talk, you can't like, charge someone for what could have happened in the future, basically. Yeah. And it doesn't seem to me like he's saying

there's substantial evidence to indicate this, but he's also not saying there was insufficient evidence. He's just sort of like, here's the thing. That's interesting. But for intent, he says there is evidence that at least one purpose of the president's conduct towards sessions was to have sessions assume control over the Russian investigation and supervise it in a way that would restrict its scope. By the summer of 2017, the president was aware that Mueller was investigating impersonally for obstruction of justice, and in the wake of the

disclosures of the emails about the June 9th 2016 Trump Tower meeting, C-Vol.2 Section 2G, it was evident that the investigation into the campaign now included the president's son, son-in-law, and former campaign manager. The president has previously and unsuccessfully sought to have sessions publicly announced that the Special counsel investigation would be confined to future election interference. So I knew that that would come into play and intent later on. And shortly after Flynn pleaded guilty, well, sessions remained, but in December 2017, right after Flynn pleaded guilty, the president spoke to sessions in the oval with only Porter present and told sessions that he'd be a hero,

if he unrecused, Porter linked that request to the President's desire that Sessions take back the supervision of the Russian investigation and direct the investigation of Hillary Clinton. The President said in that meeting that he just wanted to be treated fairly, which could reflect his perception that it was unfair that he was being investigated while Hillary was not. But a principle effect of that act would be to restore supervision of the Russian investigation

of the attorney general, a position that the President frequently suggested should be occupied by someone like Eric Holder and Bobby Kennedy, who the President described as protecting their presidents. So his own words are as downfall in this particular element anyway. And a reasonable interference from those statements,

and the president's actions themselves is that the president believed that an unrecused attorney general would play a protective role and could shield the president from the ongoing Russian investigation. So it seems like we have in the first act of the whole, you know, hiding the emails and putting that false statement out to the New York Times.

None of that meets any of the three criteria for a criminal act of obstruction of justice because he lied and committed crimes against the public, not against Congress and law enforcement. And this seems like I don't feel like there's enough evidence for an obstructive act or nexus to a proceeding, but I think that there was intent here. So I agree. Yeah, I agree, the intent. But the intent is, it seems almost like easier to sort of lay out, right? Because it's only conceivable intent.

It's hard to like really, really prove. But he does. He proves it with evidence. And the fact that he does that is pretty solid. Yeah. So I think in this section for G andH we have a no no no and a no no yes. I think that's what we've ended up with and that's the sections. G&H and you can join us next week. We're going to cover sections I and J and this is about Trump ordering

him again to deny the president tried to fire Mueller and I think that this is going to be a yes yes yes uh... spoiler alert yeah like that destiny child song yes yes yeah and i would get impressed well i was actually doing uh... when harry met Sally nice nice um... get a cafe scene all have what she's having but

uh... this i think trump ordering began to falsify a document and and lie that he just did that's huge obstruction of justice. I think it's going to meet all three. We'll see. And then also Trump's conduct toward Flynn, Manafort, and a redacted harm to an ongoing matter person, probably Roger Stone. So put some beans on that.

That's going to be pages one 13 to 13. And we'll go over that next week, next Thursday. Yeah. Yeah. And then we'll be in Seattle. Oh, yeah, that's right. Yeah. We'll have to record it on Wednesday. Yeah. Um, real quick last stop for me before we sign off here. Uh, amending my last statement. And 10 is actually usually the hardest thing to prove. That's what I was thinking.

Because and I thought that that was what you were pointing out was that it's interesting here that they've he's got him on intent. Yeah, he made it seem really easy. And he's like, oh, it's the easiest thing to prove. When he doesn't have a substantial or sufficient evidence, or at least he doesn't say that for obstructive act and nexus to a proceeding, but here he's got this clear evidence laid out for intent. That's what you were getting at.

No, no, no, no. I was just getting so swept up and how blatantly clear it was for sure. I should have brought that up because I thought that I was agreeing with you that that's odd too, that he's got, he's clearly defining that intent is happened here, but doesn't have the obstructive act and nexus which are way easier to prove. It's interesting. It is. All right, well thank you so much for listening. Thank you students. I'm very excited to share with us. I'm a student. We're all students. Students of life.

Yeah. Hard knocks. Anyway, that was dumb. My name's A.G. And I'm Julie C. Johnson and I'm Jordan Coburn. And this is Mollarshi Road. Mollarshi Road is produced and engineered by AG with editing and logo designed by Jolissa Johnson. Our marketing consultant and social media manager is Sarah Lee Steiner and our subscriber

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