Jack - That's Classified (feat. Pete Strzok)

Episode Date: February 13, 2022

This week: Erik Prince’s involvement in an effort to infiltrate progressive groups, Democratic campaigns, and other opponents of is exposed; an appeals court tells the New York Times it does not have to return Project Veritas memos; one of Steve Bannon’s financier’s, Guo Wengui, gets hit with $134 million in contempt of court fines; plus the Fantasy Indictment League, and a conversation with Peter Strzok.Pete Strzok:https://twitter.com/petestrzokFollow AG on Twitter:Dr. Allison Gill https://twitter.com/allisongillhttps://twitter.com/MuellerSheWrotehttps://twitter.com/dailybeanspodWant to support the show and get it ad-free and early?https://dailybeans.supercast.tech/Orhttps://patreon.com/thedailybeansPromo CodesSubscribe to SpyTalk: https://link.chtbl.com/SpyTalk

Hi, I'm Harry Lickman, host of Talking Feds. Around table, the brings together prominent figures from government law and journalism for a dynamic discussion of the most important topics of the day. Each Monday, I'm joined by a slate of Feds favorites at new voices to break down the headlines and give the insider's view of what's going on in Washington and beyond. Plus, side bars explaining important legal concepts read by your favorite celebrities. Find Talking Feds where ever you get your podcasts. Hey all, this is Glenn Kirschner and you're listening to Muller She wrote.

So to be clear, Mr. Trump has no financial relationships with any Russian oligarchs. That's what he said. That's what I think. That's obviously what our position is. I'm not aware of all of those activities. I have been called a surrogate at a time of truth in that campaign, and I didn't have, not have communications with the Russians. What do I have to get involved with Putin

for having 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 profession I'm a capitalist. Hello and welcome to Muller She Wrote. I'm your host, A.G. Alison Gill. We have a lot of news today, including reporting on Eric Prince, Guo Wangwei, and information on the Mueller obstruction of justice incidents. Later, I'll be speaking with Pete Struck about the handling of classified documents in light of the flurry

of reporting on the defeated former guy stealing, ripping up, eating, and flushing documents, and we are on the precipice of a Russian invasion of Ukraine, so we're keeping an eye on that. And of course, we will have the fantasy and diamond league, but before we get there, let's jump in with just the facts. First up from Mazzetti and Goldman at the Times, during the summer of 2018, as Richard Sedden, a former British spy, was trying to launch a new venture to use undercover agents to infiltrate progressive groups, democratic campaigns, and other opponents of Trump. He turned for help to a longtime friend and former colleague, Eric Prince, the private military contractor, Blackwater guy.

We know him. He was the Seychelles dude, right? Now, Prince took on the role of celebrity pitchman, according to interviews and documents, raising money for Sedan's spying operation, which was aimed at gathering dirt that could discredit politicians and activists in several states. After Prince and Sedan met in August 2018 with Susan Gore, a Wyoming aress to the Gore-Tex fortune, Ms. Gore became part of the project's main benefactor. Now, Mr. Prince's role in the effort, which has not been previously disclosed, sheds further light on how the group of ultra-conservative Republicans employed spycraft to manipulate the American political landscape. Eric Prince, former CIA contractor, who's best known as the founder of the private military

firm Blackwater, and of course, we know his sister, Betsy DeVos, was Trump's education secretary. He has drawn scrutiny over the years for Blackwater's record of violence around the world and his subsequent ventures of training and arming foreign forces. And we can't forget to keep in the back of our minds that Trump pardoned some of these Blackwater guys for a massacre that happened where women and children were slaughtered. Now, Prince is willingness to support Seddon's operation as fresh evidence of his engagement in political espionage projects. Now, Sedan's recruitment of Prince to help him secure funding is just one of the new details

about Mr. Sedan's operation revealed in documents obtained by the New York Times and interviews with people familiar with his plans. They provide additional insight to the ambition of the operation to use undercover operatives to target Republicans seen as insufficiently conservative, as well as to, as one document describes it, research, penetrate, and infiltrate the radical left networks. So, member Trump, they're spying on me, they're spying on my campaign. Yeah, that cues others of that, which you are guilty. The Times previously reported in 2016 and 2017,

Prince recruited Seton to join a conservative group called Project Veritas to teach espionage skills to its operatives and manage its undercover operations. Prince also allowed Project Veritas to use his family's Wyoming ranch for training. Seton launched his privately funded spying effort after leaving Project Veritas in 2018. Now it's unclear, according to the Times, how many potential donors prints might have

approached for money for Seddon's venture besides Ms. Gore. Separately, Ms. Gore unsuccessfully tried to raise money for the project from Foster Freese, a billionaire Wyoming businessman during a January 2019 meeting. That's according to three people. During the 2018 meeting with Ms. Gore, according to one person familiar with it, Mr. Prince and Mr. Sedan said the goal of the private spying operation

was to gather dirt both on Democrats and rhinos, Republicans and name only. And the plan was to begin in Wyoming and expand operations from there. Over two years, Sedan's undercover operatives, the spies also developed networks in Colorado and Arizona, and made thousands of dollars in campaign donations posing as Democrats, both to the Democratic National Committee and individual campaigns.

Funnalling money syrup ticiously to campaigns through other donors, known as strawman donations, would violate federal campaign finance laws. Huh! Strawman, straw man donations. Now Mr. Prince is separately under investigation by the Justice Department on unrelated matters and that's according to people familiar with the case. Repeat, Prince is separately under investigation by the DOJ and the scope of that investigation is unclear. Prince declined to comment, said and and gore also did not respond to messages. Now these documents give new details about efforts to manipulate the politics of Wyoming. While the state is currently solidly Republican,

very Republican, Sedden and Ms. Gore believed it was in danger of turning to turning blue, like Colorado has. One target in particular was Governor Mark Gordon, who was viewed as a rhino in some Wyoming conservative circles. After Gordon won a close Republican primary battle against frees, the billionaire in August 2018, frees blamed his loss on Democrats switching parties on election day to vote for Gordon. So if he's accusing Democrats of doing that, then that's what the Republicans are doing. Just remember that. Now, according to the documents, Seton's operatives also aimed to dig up information on Steve Harshman, the Republican speaker of the House in Wyoming at the time, who was also seen by some conservatives as not sufficiently supportive of Trump.

One February 2019 report said that new undercover will be joining the team, quote-unquote, and tasked with targeting Harshmund. Months later, in June 2019, reports said we're expecting a big hall, including new lines of intelligence on the Republican side of the House. The documents also show that beyond Ms. Gore, other prominent Republicans in Wyoming were involved in Mr. Sedans' spying operation. One of the documents indicates that Marty Halverson, former Wyoming state lawmaker, provided a list of people for the operatives to target. The list included John Cox, then director of the Wyoming Department of Workforce Services,

and Scott Talbot, then director of the Wyoming Game and Fish Department. They were going after the Game and Fish Department. A document is dated December 18 and said that Talbot was another one of the names of corrupt individuals. When reached by phone, Halvorson said, frankly, I have nothing to say on the subject, and then she hung up. Sedan, who used other former Project Veritas employees to help with the Wyoming operation, and those employees include James Arthurton, a British operative, James Arthurton, code named Kim Chi, who was involved in the Project Veritas plan, targeting an editor for the New York Times of London in 2017. Now, Prince has previously been involved in trying to find dirt on democratic politicians.

As we know, in 2016, Republican operatives believe they had obtained deleted Hillary emails from the dark web. An episode investigated by Bob Mueller. And the special counsel's reports said, Prince provided funding to hire a tech advisor to ascertain the authenticity of the emails. According to Prince, the tech advisor determined the emails were not authentic. And later that year, Prince turned to Mr. Sedan to help train the project Veritas operatives. That's Prince, training project Veritas operatives. The two men had known each other since Prince's days running black water and shared an affinity for guns in the American West. Sedan owns a cabin that he

keeps stocked with guns, food, and other supplies, as preparation for a cataclysmic event in the United States. And speaking of Project Veritas, a New York appeals court has decided, in order preventing the times from publishing documents related to Project Veritas, would not be enforced before a formal appeal for the case was heard. The decision, which was made available to the public on Thursday, means that the times will be allowed to publish parts of the documents and will not need to turn over or destroy copies of the documents in the newspaper's possession.

An appeal in December determined that the times would not need to turn over or destroy documents, but there were still not permitted to publish them. However, the newspaper said at the time it had not immediately sought to get that part of the order lifted and said it instead asked for an expedited hearing. Project Veritas sued the Times for defamation following a September 2020 article about alleged voter fraud. Project Veritas, which is led by James O'Keefe, attempts to expose what it considers to be liberal media bias through undercover tactics.

These are the fuckers training in Wyoming as spies with Eric Prince. But Democrats and liberal media bias through undercover tactics, whatever. However, some critics say the group's work is misleading and its videos are deceptively edited. No. And in Steve Bannon land, the finance year, famed for bankrolling some of Bannon's best-known ventures, as well as the far-right strategist jet-setting lifestyle, is in deep shit, steering a $28 million yacht, the same boat, by the way,

where the post office cops arrested Bannon in 2020. A New York judge slapped Guo Wangwei, who also uses the alias as Kwok Ho-Wan and Miles Guo, with a $134 million contempt of court fine on Wednesday for violating multiple restraining orders, barring him from selling or relocating the boat to any other property he controls. The high-price tag results from nearly a year of the fugitive Chinese national defying the court's order that he returned the craft to a US port, an order that carried a daily

forfeiture of half a million dollars. He racked up $134 million in contempt fines for that. Court documents on late January show that 151-footlong pleasure vessel, politely plying the Western Mediterranean. I love daily beasts writing. Now, Guo Wangwei, who has only until Monday to come up with the funds, seems like he's in a lot of trouble. His attorneys, at Barker Haustetler,

affirm with close ties to the RNC, declined to comment. However, in an appeal of the decision filed late Thursday, Guos Lawyers lambasted the charges, levied as disproportionate, excessive, unauthorized by law and abuse of discretion and violation of the defendant's appellance constitutional rights, whatever. You knew you were being charged 500 grand a day to bring your boat back to port and pieces. Shit. The punishing penalties result from a case unrelated to band-ins maritime arrest last year,

a year and a half ago allegedly looting a nonprofit, a charge for which he never faced prosecution thanks to a last minute pardon from Trump. What they failed to mention here is that the Manhattan District Attorney is investigating that. You can't be pardoned for state crimes. Rather, these fines are connected to a separate fight over Guo's enigmatic yet ostentatious wealth. Nearly five years ago, an affiliate of the Hong Kong-based

investment firm Pacific Alliance Group brought suit against Guo, alleging his companies had failed to repay tens of millions of dollars in loans, made in 2008 and 2009, or deliver unpromised property transactions. Oh, real estate fraud. Weird. The opulent boat has emerged as a key asset in that fight over the allegedly unpaid tab. So it's like asset forfeiture, Sorda. Guo, who was a Shang-Dong-born construction magnate,

absconded from the Chinese mainland in 2014, fleeing charges. He was running from the government for corruption and money laundering and rape, by the way, all of which he's denied. And since 2017, he has lived in luxury, setting up residents in a $68 million Central Park Penthouse and underwriting numerous right wing projects from nonprofits with Bannon to dodgy media operations to bogus COVID-19 studies to would be Twitter competitor Getter and all the while he has sought refugee status and attacked figures in both the communist Chinese regime and the dissident diaspora online The yacht in Brolio is hardly the first time. Go as activities have run a foul of US authorities in September

2021 his companies agreed to pay $500 million in security and exchange commission fines for running a cryptocurrency scheme in violation of federal regulations. Cryptocurrency, real estate fraud, money laundering, hmm, it's surely not no. And if you follow me on Twitter, you know that every week I tweeted the U.S. Attorney on D.C. to please consider volume two of the Mueller report and either charge Donald with obstruction or please explain your declination to do so. I personally believe these are chargeable offenses based on four of the overt acts meeting all three elements of criminal obstruction.

But I've also been trying to explain that the statutes of limitations and the ability of DOJ to bring these charges is unclear. At best. Now, my call is for it to be considered. I'm not demanding an indictment. I'm demanding consideration. And again, if they don't bring charges, I would like for them to explain why not. They do not have to by policy. Marcy Wheeler is written a post on emptywheel.net, on quote, unrealistic expectations for Mueller report obstruction charges that I encourage everyone to read because it's important that we temper our expectations for what main justice or the DC US attorney are even able or capable of doing. Marcy says quote first the belief that Garland could have come into office 11 months ago rolled out obstruction charges misunderstands the Mueller

report. Many, if not most people, believe the report includes the entirety of what Mueller found, describes declination decisions on every crime considered, and also includes a volume entirely dedicated to Trump's criminal obstruction, a charging decision for which Mueller could not reach because of the OLC memo prohibiting it. And she says none of that is true. Marcy points out many of the threads Mueller was investigating were handed off to be continued and still under investigation, including Roger Stone's stuff and the millions of dollars coming to Trump from Egypt.

If you remember that, that secret team five we didn't know about are four, I can't remember four. And there are other things that the Mueller report doesn't address, including pardon discussions with a sange, et cetera. And therefore, Marcy concludes that volume two doesn't address the totality of Trump's criminal exposure because of all these ongoing appendix D, handed off things. So that comes into play with statutes of limitations, right? She goes on to say, we should look at volume two as a referral for Congress to impeach and not for DOJ to indict. She also points out, now I do disagree with that

a little bit, but I understand the point here. And the reason I say that is because when when Ken Buck asked Mueller in his July 2019 deposition testimony before Congress, can you indict a president once he leaves office? Yes, although that could be separate, he might not have been referring to these specifically, although Ken Buck did say obstruction. Now, she also points out the damage bill bar did to the obstruction charges could make them impossible to prosecute. That effort started with bars declination to prosecute obstruction. And further, that was laid out, what was laid out in volume two did not amount to obstruction. He said that right or wrong. He brought that hammer down, whether he was corrupt or not. That's what his decision was. And we saw that when the DOJ under Garland released the first

half of the March 2019 bill bar memo, outlining the alleged deliberative process, we saw that he, you know, Callahan and Angle made a declination. They said, quote, for these reasons, data below, we conclude the evidence described in volume two of the report is not in our judgment sufficient to support a conclusion based beyond a reasonable doubt that the president violated the obstruction of justice statutes. In addition, we believe certain conduct we've at certain of the conduct examined by special counsel could not as a matter of law support an obstruction charge under the circumstances. Accordingly, were there no constitutional barrier, we would recommend under the principles of federal prosecution that you decline to commence such a prosecution. So they said they decided and wrote in a memo deliberately process, process privilege

thing. You know, the reason that half that memo was held back by the DOJ by Garland, they said, even if there weren't any constitutional barrios or OLC memo, we still don't think this is obstruction of justice, the end. And to overturn that is, which is, by the way, an incredibly corrupt conclusion, to overturn that DOJ would have to disavow the decision made by the department and prove that the process was corrupt, which would probably require some sort of nonpartisan and like an inspector general analysis, not just their own. Anything short of that would render

an obstruction prosecution vulnerable to strong appeal on pre-trial or a pre-trial motion to dismiss by Trump who could simply cite this memo. She goes on to cite several other ways in which Barr made it near impossible to bring obstruction charges and encourage you to read her post and follow her on social media for this kind of information, empty wheel. Additional reasons to ignore the statutes of limitations, assertions being made on social media is that many of these crimes of obstruction have continued and they're currently being

investigated by the Department of Justice like Stone,, Sydney, pal, Rudy, banan. And as we all know, the statute of limitations clock doesn't start ticking until you stop crime. And with all that in mind, best to ignore the statute of limitations, see what DOJ comes up with. And that's why I'm still going to continue to ask for consideration of the charges. And I'm going to continue to push for declinations. I want to know why should they decide not to prosecute.

And in light of recent news regarding the mishandling of potentially classified or even top secret documents by the former guy, I'd like to welcome the author of Compromised, who is appearing now in a long form interview with MSNBC's Nicole Wallace on Peacock, Pete's struck welcome. Thank you. It's good to see you, my friend. It's first person I wanted to reach out to when there were documents being flushed down the toilet

and eaten, and we've known this since 2018 that he tears stuff up and eats notes and things like that. But now with the National Archives talking to Department of Justice and saying that the FBI hasn't looked at these boxes of documents they recovered from Mar-a-Lago yet or at least that's the alleged reporting, I wanted to ask you specifically to tell us a little bit about the national security implications of taking home classified documents, especially in light of the Honolulu, a Wahoo woman who was just, I think she was already arrested and died and pled guilty or is going to jail or something.

Something's going on with it. That was an interesting announcement today, the timing. So tell us a little bit about the importance of classified documents. Yeah, that's a great question because I think a lot of the reporting is not that it's missing the mark, but I think they're highlighting or focusing on the wrong things people are looking saying well these are presidential records And you know whether or not this is behavior that you know Mike and Cohen said that he always had about ripping things up. I yes the presidential records Yes, they should be maintained for the purpose of good government

But at the end of the day there is no enforcement mechanism really for the presidential records act that came up during Clinton during the investigation of the use of the private server for emails. And the Bureau doesn't, the Bureau has never investigated the presidential records act. They would not do it. And so a lot of people are focusing on that and saying, oh, this would be problematic if there were an investigation to bring charges. But I think that misses two big points. One is how radically the landscape changed when it sounds like TSSCI material was found and by that I mean top secret, since it has compartment and information.

There are classified information comes in three flavors by law, by executive order. There's confidential, there's secret and there's top secret. And what differentiates them is the reasonable damage they might be expected to cause to national security confidential is would cause damage, secret is defined as serious damage and top secret is to find as exceptionally grave damage and what that those terms mean kind of get into a term of art rather than a specific definition but at the end of the day what really so top secrets the most sensitive of that and that's usually reserved for when I say the term is of that, and that's usually reserved for

when I say the term is sources and methods, and what that means for folks who are outside of the intel community, things that the government does to clandestinely collect information. So it might be a person they've recruited in Moscow. It might be some super high speed sensor on a satellite that NRO is running in place on a geosynchronous orbit. It could be a cable under the ocean somewhere that NSA has tapped into with the help of DOD. It could be information that we're getting from a foreign ally who's doing something else.

So usually when you get to the top of that chain, it is the type of information that if you're seeing it as an adversary, it would allow you potentially to quickly say, oh, okay, the US has this information, and there's only one place they could have gotten it, and I'm going to go arrest and kill that human who gave it to him.

I'm going to go lay a new undersea cable that they can't tap. I'm going to shield from this collection device that's overhead, but you want to protect those things. And the higher the classification, a couple of things, those sources can be more delicate and more open to being defeated and are they can be giving you extraordinary information.

And within that, so that's the top secret realm. And you can do things to compartment it even further. So for really, really sensitive stuff, you get into the realm of what's called SCI, or sensitive compartment information. And that's of this body of TS information, which is already really sensitive. There's really, really super sensitive stuff. It'll get put into what are called compartments. And they get little code names. Typically, the code names may or may not be themselves classified, usually, only been classified if you associate it with what it is. So there is a human source in Moscow that we have a compartment called, you know, Byzantine arrow. And if you say Byzantine arrow or TS-B-A, that doesn't really mean anything that's not classified.

But if you associate Byzantine arrow with the fact that that is a human, that the CIA has recruited that works in SVR headquarters, then that suddenly all becomes classified. But the reason I get into this kind of long-winded sidetracked two-minute now answer to your very simple question is, from the media reporting, there's at least some information I think he came out of the Washington Post that the material Trump had was not only top secret, but that it was also not just highly sensitive, but restricted in a way that might only be targeted towards the president. So within this realm, SCI sounds really high speed and really not many people must know

but the reality is thousands and thousands and thousands of people in the OS government have TSSC, clearances. But when it comes to things, for instance, that go into the President's daily brief, typically the level and quality of information that goes in there is even more sensitive. So as the Washington Post described it, not only is it top secret information, but based on the sort of non-technical way they described it, it nevertheless made me think, hey, it sounds like it's SCI. And there's a good chance that not only is it SCI,

but it's SCI of the sort of quality and flavor that you get in something like the PDB, not just something that's sort of being blasted across the Intel community. Now, I think that answers half the question. The reason that's important is that isn't a question of whether or not something is a presidential record. Maybe it is, but what that also is now is potentially a trigger to a number of criminal

statutes because you might have there are a lot of laws that govern the handling and mishandling of classified information that are federal felonies that are the sort of thing that the FBI investigates day in day out. And then the other component to that, and this is, I hope, everybody listening to your podcast who are getting ready to go on the Sunday talk shows because you have an auspicious audience, understands as they go to talk about this, assuming Russia has an invaded Ukraine, that separate and distinct from whether or not there's a criminal investigation, there is a spill of classified information.

There is a loss of control of highly classified toxicant information that somehow got down to Mar-a-Lago. Now, why is that important? From a counterintelligence perspective, another thing that the FBI does every single day is understand that a place like Mar-a-Lago, much like Chapacua, much like Kenapa, or Port Main,

is a prime target for foreign intelligence services. The Russians, the Chinese, want to get access to not only somebody who's currently the president, but who is a previous president, because they maintain a lot of very valuable and important information. So I think you mentioned somebody just coming on the from Hawaii in a couple of years back,

there was I think a Chinese national who was arrested trying to get on to the Trump compounds. It is absolutely something that day and day at a minimum the Russians and Chinese are trying to get access to President Trump at Mar-Lago. And in doing that one would expect that they would do things like try and recruit one would expect that they would do things like try and recruit cleaning staff, maintenance staff, get people who are guests or members. And so the question becomes not only, okay, how did this material get introduced to Mar-a-Lago and what was the state of mind of the person who did it? It's much bigger than that.

There's a whole, there's just separate and distinct from any law being broken. There's a huge counterintelligence question which more there is more than sufficient to predicate a case to go down there and say, where is this information? Who had access to it? What is, you know, are there badge access records into that room or is there CCTV coverage to that room? Who are all these people and what are their backgrounds? Is it somebody who just immigrated from Cuba? Is it somebody who just immigrated from Taiwan or Hong Kong? Is it, you know, what is the nature of the background of the people who might have had access because what you want to know at the end of the day is,

the subordinate distinct from Trump or whoever his personal staff or who had it, is there somebody else who might have gotten access to it who'd be placing that highly classified information, placing those sources and methods in jeopardy? So I get very frustrated, one that I don't see reporting really thinking about that. And two, in the context of to the extent there's any reluctance, any more in DOJ or the FBI to investigate, I don't see how that is reasonably possible anymore.

We don't know, right? And the only way you know is to go out and investigate. And that's why you open a case. And I just don't, if a case has not yet been opened, I think it's untenable that that would continue. Yeah, I agree, but especially in the counterintelligence realm. And back in the criminal realm, which is, you know, where most of the media is focused right now, we know the president can declassify pretty much whatever he wants. And I know there's a process for that.

I've dealt with classified top secret documents, I've dealt with SCI stuff. And you have to go through a process to get it stamped, unclassified or declassified. And we haven't really, we don't know if that process had been gone through with anything that was taken to Marlago, but could the president have just said into the air as he packed them up, these are declassified and taken them with him and then be free and clear. I think people are a little bit confused about that. And would that have an impact on what you're talking about, a counterintelligence investigation and who may have or may not have seen those documents because we don't generally get the

results of counterintelligence investigations. But I'm wondering how that sort of overall power that a president has to declassify documents impacts either of those. It certainly complicates it. I mean, yes, the president, while he is the president, has the broad ability to declassify information. As it goes to Trump, that gets particularly tricky because he, in a couple instances,

at least tweeted that he was going to declassify things. And then when things actually went into court, I think it was Mark Meadows, but it might have been somebody else. They actually filed the Adiós J statement saying, hey, look, a tweet doesn't declassify. Just because Trump said something in the spur of the moment on Twitter that doesn't serve as a mechanism to declassify something that it has to be in writing, you know, it could be simply him with his little dumb ass sharpie that he used on the NOAA map sitting there

crossing out the classification things, but it has to be more than just ID classified. He will certainly, if this ever got to the point where there were criminal charges envisioned, try and make this argument to the extent it could possibly be applied. But the observation about that point is, again, my frustration with some of the articles quoting all these prosecutors about all the difficulty, it's kind of putting the cart before the horse.

We don't know the facts. I am willing to bet that the government does not know the facts. So trying to render some sort of prosecutor on a judgment about whether or not this case has merit to prosecutor or not, to answer that question you have to have asked fundamental questions about the fact pattern, which is why you open a case. The FBI doesn't open a case because they know something has happened. They open a case to ask the questions to figure out if something has happened.

So, you know, I do take, I mean, again, and I know I saw Brandon Van Grack, who is a great attorney, was an amazing prosecutor for the government. I knew David Lawffman worked for him for a long time. They both know National Security Law and particularly law surrounding disclosure of classified information very, very well. But I think to the extent you're focusing on them and what they think the merits of a criminal

case are, you're you're looking at the in state. You're looking at the kind of like what player we going to run at the goal line, but the reality is the football because we're at Super Bowl Sunday coming up. The ball is at the 10 yard line on the other side of the field. So you got to run 90 yards before you get to the point where you need to start engaging in these attorneys about whether or not there's a criminal, viable criminal prosecution there. But again, because I'm talking too long, the answer with regards to Trump is he can and declassify things.

That stops, by the way, when he's no longer the president, he doesn't keep that authority, that ends. Like, literally, I think, when the transfer, when Joe Biden, whatever point, the transfer of power triggers Trump can no longer declassify things. I would expect he would argue very broadly that he did or could. But again, because of his shitty behavior on Twitter and all his wild statements,ically enough, he has sort of a little bit constrained his ability to say, oh yeah, I just say it and it's done because the government during the Trump administration argued to the contrary with regard to that. So how would you square the fact that we still have 90 yards to go before we even think about prosecutorial options?

How do you square that with the public who just sees this as a obvious crime on its face, et cetera, et cetera, and wants immediate attention? It's like, I think it is a microcosm of everything we're seeing going on with January 6th and Merrick Garland and the question of whether you want. I look, if you want answers fast, go to Congress in January 6th committee. If you want answers via prosecution, you're going to have to wait on DOJ. And those are going to give you different outcomes because they're focused on different things. DOJ is focused on the truth as it relates to violations of law, which is different from the January 6th committee, which is looking at everything that happened, whether or not it might

be a violation of law, that's a much broader set of things. And so, with regard to Trump, frankly, it's going to take time. And that's kind of a fine point. This isn't necessarily a case. This isn't the Bureau or somebody going and opening a case on Donald Trump. Anymore than it was a case that was opened on Hillary Clinton about the appearance of classified information on a server. It isn't a case on a person. In my mind, if I were somebody came up to me and I was still in the FBI and they said,

okay, go open a case, figure out what happened. You're opening a case on the appearance of this classified information in an unauthorized space. And you want to figure out what the classified is, how it came to be there, who put it there, what their understanding was, and then that whole counterintelligence angle, right? Like, did the Russians, the Chinese, some bad actor domestically get some other unauthorized person to get a hold of it, and what do we do to mitigate it? But it's going to take time. You don't in the best of cases with a cooperative subject that's going to take months and months and months, and this is not the best of circumstances, and Trump is

not going to be a cooperative subject. So, you know, folks, but just, it will come, but it is going to come slowly. Yeah, very good point. And, and PS, you can't talk too long, just so you know, not possible. Hang on on every word. Thank you so much Pete. Everybody check out. You can stream it now on peacock. It's a long form interview with Nicole Wallace from MSNBC.

We get really, really good interview. A lot of really just really poignant information from the last five or six years or so. And even beyond. So you can see that on peacock now and also pick up the book, Compromised, wherever you get your books. I really, really recommend it. Thank you so much, Pete Strack. Everybody stick around.

We'll be back with the fantasy indictment leak. Spy Talk, a podcast at the intersection of intelligence, foreign policy, national security, and military operations with Jeff Stein and Jean Miserve. That's former CIA director, Leon Penetta. Admiral Carl Schultz, Commodant of the US Coast Guard. We have you here, John Cyford.

Earl Sothers, Jefferson Morley. Admiral Mike Rogers, Chris Whipham, Anthony Clayton. John Mendez, you are a legend. That was the former Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogres Musin. Rightfully gluesy, welcome to spy talk. Long force races are like elementary schools.

This is an adapt or fail moment for the intelligence community. I think of these JFK records more as a mosaic. People turn away from the truth and they believe things that are completely rooted in falsehood. And for me, that is really dangerous. I'll load the money. The possibility that Al Qaeda had a stolen nuclear device in Manhattan. Probably some of the skills that make them good intelligence agents also make them fairly efficient as predators.

Somebody left active destructive pipe bombs outside Republican Democratic Party headquarters, and we don't know who it was. Join us every Thursday for a new episode of Spy Talk, available wherever you get your podcasts. All right, everybody, welcome back. It's time for the fantasy indictment league. And it's been a long time coming but Justice Grines slow.

But Damien Williams, the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced February 7th that Stephen M. Koch was sentenced to one year and one day of imprisonment for corruptly using his position as the head of a federally insured bank to issue millions of dollars in high risk loans to one-poll Manafort in exchange for personal benefit. Koch's placement on the Donald J. Trump 2016 presidential campaign and assistance for Manafort and trying to obtain a senior position with the incoming presidential administration. That was he wanted to be secretary of the army, right?

Or maybe ambassador to the Bahamas or some shit. Now, on July 13, 2021, Cox was found guilty of financial institution bribery and conspiracy to commit financial institution bribery following a three week trial before US district judge Lorna Schofield, who also imposed today's sentence. US Attorney Damien Williams says, quote, Stephen Cawke abused his position as a CEO of a federally insured bank to try to buy himself prestige and power by trading millions of dollars in high risk loans for influence with the presidential campaign and consideration for positions at the highest levels of the defense department. Today's sentence sends the message that those who corrupt federally regulated financial institutions will be held to account. Those who corrupt federally

regulated financial institutions will be held to account. All right, with that, my picks, my draft for the fantasy indictment league today include Eric Prince. He's under federal criminal investigation and has been for a while. Rudy and Toneson out of Southern District of New York, Gates, Engels and L.A.K. out of the middle district of Florida, a Trump organization out of the Manhattan D.A.'s office, Sydney Powell out of the U.S. Attorney's Office in D.C. Parnas superseding indictments out of,

oh, let's call this Southern District of New York and Tom Barrick, a plea agreement in the Eastern District of New York, which that's mostly out of sheer hope and optimism. I don't know if he's going to cooperate, but I know he doesn't want to go to prison. All right, that's our show. Thanks again to Pete Struck and check out the latest installment of the MSW book club, Uncorruptible by Brian Klaus. That's also out today. I'll be back with Dana tomorrow on the Daily Beans, and then until then, please take care of yourselves, take care of each other, take care of the planet, and take care of your mental health.

I've been AG, and this is Mullershi Road. [♪ Music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background Muller She wrote is written and produced by Allison Gill in partnership with MSW Media. Sound designed in engineering or by Molly Hockey, Jesse Egan is our copywriter and our art and web designer by Joelle Reeder at Moxie Design Studios. Muller She wrote as a proud member of MSW Media, a group of creator-owned podcasts focused on news, justice and politics. For more information, visit mswmedia.com. 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 in crucial

state house races and fighting back a non-existent red wave. But the Magga 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 seize power, dismantle our government, and take away our freedoms. So the official podcast of the persistence is back with season four.

There's so much more important work ahead of us to fight for equity, justice, and our very democracy itself. We'll take you behind the lines and inside the rooms where it happens, with strategy and inspiration from progressive change makers all over the country. And we'll dig deep into the weekly news that matters most and what you can do about it, with messaging and communications expert, co-founder of Way to Win, and our new co-host, Jennifer Fernandez-Ancona. So join Steve and I every Wednesday

for your weekly dose of inspiration, action, and hope. I'm Steve Pearson. And I'm Jennifer Fernandez-Ancona. And this is How We Win.