Michael Cohen Investigation

[Francisco 2.0 32389]

Just now, Mdhorn said:

The whores really came home to roost on this.  Seriously, WTF, they are full on treasonous sons of bitches.  Will be interesting to see if their followers are too.

Riiiiiight.

 

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2018/04/sean-hannity-michael-cohen-client-far-right-response?mbid=social_twitter

 

Quote

“So it has gone from Russia collusion, to a St. Petersburg troll farm, to Stormy Daniels, to Michael Cohen, and now, Sean Hannity?” Gateway Pundit founder Jim Hoft asked rhetorically, reeling from a whirlwind day that began with Cohen, Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, walking into federal court, and ended with the revelation that Cohen claimed Hannity as a client. “Where does it stop and what the hell does this have to do with the Russia collusion?”

 

Quote

Fellow MAGA pundit and troll Jack Posobiec called Hannity a casualty of the Mueller probe and Cohen’s incompetence. In fact, he added, people in his circles believe that Cohen is a greater danger to his other clients than to Trump. “Most [think] Cohen’s clients are going to kill him when their files all get leaked to the media,” he said, just minutes before the Hannity revelation went public. (“See what I mean?” he texted later.)

Kurt Schlicter, a pro-Trump columnist for Townhall, agreed that Trump, Cohen, and Hannity were getting a raw deal. “I don’t think Trump did anything wrong, so I don’t think it’s dangerous. It’s very clear that there’s no Russia stuff. What happened with Stormy Daniels”—the $130,000 payoff, which Cohen said he paid out of pocket, and which critics suggest may constitute an illegal campaign contribution, à la the John Edwards-Rielle Hunter affair—“I keep trying to find the crime, and I can’t.” Even if some sort of crime had been committed, Schlichter suggested, Trump and Cohen would have to be “terrible crooks” to keep the evidence. “But if these guys are this crime family why do you think they’d keep something incriminating around? That’s just silly. More than that, I don’t think there’s anything incriminating. I think there’s stuff that might be embarrassing.”

 

[Dutchrudder 11139]

Actually just Trump OR Cohen need to be terrible crooks to keep the evidence, but it sounds like the FBI has been taping their own evidence for a while. Maybe the raid will just be to compare notes and conversations on certain things, but if Cohen has lots of skeletons in his files, there will be plenty of more leads for them to follow.

[burntorangebongos 10710]

Michael Avennati seems to believe that the move to name Sean Hannity as a client was an attempt to keep something as atty-client privilege. He has been calling things correctly for the past few weeks and his thought is something has been collecting that was recorded or written between them that he is keen to not disclose. He also thinks Michael is going to be facing a long prison sentence and he is going to flip. We'll see but he has been pretty solid with his predictions.

[SuingToGetAMessageBoard? 3861]

Lulz at the claim criminals would never be so dumb as to keep incriminating evidence.  That how like 90% of convictions are obtained. 

[jimmyjazz 45915]

1 hour ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

Riiiiiight.

Only a Trumpkin could see increasingly interlinked evidence between Russia, Trump, and Fox and blow it off with "Riiiiiight".  Congratulations, you're a pawn.

[ChiTownDoc 21152]

15 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

Only a Trumpkin could see increasingly interlinked evidence between Russia, Trump, and Fox and blow it off with "Riiiiiight".  Congratulations, you're a pawn.

Maybe I'm wrong but I think he's saying the far right sycophants will just spin the news that much more...

[TwiceHorn 31457]

I'm very curious as to the crime.  Because Mueller punted this, either Trump is uninvolved (unlikely) or it precedes his presidential run by a good several years.  Or it could be that Cohen is just a dirtbag.  If there were something criminal about Trump/Daniels/Cohen/Campaign funds, I don't see why Mueller would punt it.

It's in the indictment thread, but the government's briefing on the Cohen TRO (good call Pig) makes it pretty crystal clear that Mueller punted this as being outside his mandate, not just for a "taint team."

[Anastasis 23469]

11 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

I'm very curious as to the crime.  Because Mueller punted this, either Trump is uninvolved (unlikely) or it precedes his presidential run by a good several years.  Or it could be that Cohen is just a dirtbag.  If there were something criminal about Trump/Daniels/Cohen/Campaign funds, I don't see why Mueller would punt it.

It's in the indictment thread, but the government's briefing on the Cohen TRO (good call Pig) makes it pretty crystal clear that Mueller punted this as being outside his mandate, not just for a "taint team."

Yeah, it seems to me that if there was a clear Russia nexus, Mueller would have kept Cohen under his jurisdiction. Or he's playing some real multi-dimensional chess. 

[triplehorn 2664]

33 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

Yeah, it seems to me that if there was a clear Russia nexus, Mueller would have kept Cohen under his jurisdiction. Or he's playing some real multi-dimensional chess. 

The products of Cohen's seizure could keep the US Atty's Office SDNY busy for awhile. 

Forget about arranging payoffs for abortions of RNC Finance chairs - small potatoes.  If you think NY real estate sales and development, and other enterprises might be opportunities for illegal business, opening Cohen's vault could go straight to some awfully powerful people who do national and international business in NY.  SDNY will have more warehouse space for evidence, for one.

[Gatorubet 30233]

I'm thinking that if the WH and Fox had any communication about how to push a narrative about firing Rosenstein and/or Mueller, that is conspiracy to obstruct.  Very simple and easy to prove.   Hannity's independent opinions on the investigation are his own, and protected by free speech up until the time Trump and Shawn (or them thru Cohen) talk about how to intentionally garner support for stopping the investigation.   

I bet that is why they are trying to create a really shitty assertion of an attorney client shield.    I have no proof.  But I am drinking.

 

 

 

[triplehorn 2664]

5 minutes ago, Gatorubet said:

I'm thinking that if the WH and Fox had any communication about how to push a narrative about firing Rosenstein and/or Mueller, that is conspiracy to obstruct.  Very simple and easy to prove.   Hannity's independent opinions on the investigation are his own, and protected by free speech up until the time Trump and Shawn (or them thru Cohen) talk about how to intentionally garner support for stopping the investigation.   

I bet that is why they are trying to create a really shitty assertion of an attorney client shield.    I have no proof.  But I am drinking.

Stormy's atty, Avenatti, tonight was pointing out that by naming Hannity as one of 3 clients that they sought to shield by atty/client privilege, there has to be something very specific about involvement with Hannity that Cohen et al are trying to hide - and that it relates to the next shoe to drop.

While no one is mentioning Louise Mensch for a Pulitzer tonight, she reported this last July:  Fox under counterintelligence investigation

 

Quote

Sources with links to the justice department report that Fox News is under an FBI counterintelligence investigation for co-ordinating with the Kremlin in broadcasting propaganda.

While the First Amendment guarantees freedom of speech and journalistic freedom, sources say that signals intelligence gathered from so-called ‘incidental collection,’ such as NSA collection on Sputnik and Russia Today,  which is ongoing.

Specifically, Sean Hannity is on signals intelligence co-ordinating his pro-Trump message with organs of the Russian state, such as RT, Sputnik, Wikileaks and Julian Assange. However, emails co-ordinating messaging with registered agents of the Russian state are said to exist from more shows than that of Sean Hannity.

Furthermore, sources familiar with the matter say that the FBI is actively considering a referral to the FCC, in addition to any criminal prosecutions that may result for individuals not registering under FARA for coordinating with official agents of the Russian state.

 

[Gatorubet 30233]

So - nothingburger again?

[triplehorn 2664]

54 minutes ago, triplehorn said:

The products of Cohen's seizure could keep the US Atty's Office SDNY busy for awhile. 

Forget about arranging payoffs for abortions of RNC Finance chairs - small potatoes.  If you think NY real estate sales and development, and other enterprises might be opportunities for illegal business, opening Cohen's vault could go straight to some awfully powerful people who do national and international business in NY.  SDNY will have more warehouse space for evidence, for one.

Some other examples of places SDNY could go with the cracked Cohen vault:

 

 

[Dutchrudder 11139]

So apparently Cohen and his lawyer didn't have to make the name public? He had the option to write it down and hand it over, but he didn't? Or was the judge just going to say the name anyways?

 

[NBMisha 224]

26 minutes ago, Dutchrudder said:

So apparently Cohen and his lawyer didn't have to make the name public? He had the option to write it down and hand it over, but he didn't? Or was the judge just going to say the name anyways?

 

 

The best attorneys.

[Homercles 10205]

The best attorneys.

Oops shouldn’t have this bar association logo here either

[HenryJames 66048]

3 hours ago, Dutchrudder said:

So apparently Cohen and his lawyer didn't have to make the name public? He had the option to write it down and hand it over, but he didn't? Or was the judge just going to say the name anyways?

 

 

[Anastasis 23469]

So Hannity was under an fbi counterintelligence investigation for colluding with Russia, Cohen connects him explicitly to coordinating with the trump campaign, but mueller kicked it all down to sdny. That doesn’t make any sense.

[wildcat09 29353]

7 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

I'm very curious as to the crime.  Because Mueller punted this, either Trump is uninvolved (unlikely) or it precedes his presidential run by a good several years.  Or it could be that Cohen is just a dirtbag.  If there were something criminal about Trump/Daniels/Cohen/Campaign funds, I don't see why Mueller would punt it.

It's in the indictment thread, but the government's briefing on the Cohen TRO (good call Pig) makes it pretty crystal clear that Mueller punted this as being outside his mandate, not just for a "taint team."

I think another consideration in Mueller’s decision to punt this to SDNY was the fear that he or Rosenstein would be fired. He probably wanted to spread out the investigation to make it harder to meddle with.

[6th Street 6392]

#basta

[atomheartbevo 89659]

22 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

So Hannity was under an fbi counterintelligence investigation for colluding with Russia, Cohen connects him explicitly to coordinating with the trump campaign, but mueller kicked it all down to sdny. That doesn’t make any sense.

If that’s true about Hannity, Hannity was a high-profile media personality. Even if he wasn’t under investigation for the Russia stuff (just doesn’t seem like Hannity would do something like that), as said by wildcat, maybe he wanted to spread things out, but at the same time the Hannity stuff could overshadow a lot of other things.  Plus Trump can’t pardon Hannity lol. 

Trump and Hannity have been silent on twitter this morning.  

Edit Trump has his morning constitutional a little later.  He’s talking about taxes and California and avoiding the elephant in the room. 

Edited April 17, 2018 by atomheartbevo

[Hugo Stiglitz 23367]

20 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

So Hannity was under an fbi counterintelligence investigation for colluding with Russia, Cohen connects him explicitly to coordinating with the trump campaign, but mueller kicked it all down to sdny. That doesn’t make any sense.

None of this has been confirmed.  

My take on this is Mueller/FBI was looking at Cohen from the get go of the investigation.

In the process of the investigation they discovered a bunch of unrelated crimes that fell outside the scope of Mueller’s directive.  As a law enforcement officer he is duty bound to report those crimes to the proper authorities.  In this case it was Rod Rosenstein.  Rosenstein then decided to kick it to the department with jurisdiction, in this case the SDNY.  

This does NOT mean Mueller found nothing related to his directive while investigating Cohen.  To me, it means Mueller has completed his investigation into Cohen.

However, it is very possible the SDNY discovers more evidence of Russia related crimes in their investigation.  

Edited April 17, 2018 by Hugo Stiglitz

[Nice Guy Eddie 13512]

I don't have the quote but Dershowitz was on CNN saying how he thought the President's biggest problem would be potential state crimes committed before he was President.   Only conjecture but would Cohen be willing to face many years of prison for Trump?   

He can't be happy that Trump threw him under the bus by stating that Trump never knew about the Stormy payment.   From my expert opinion, via watching cable news, this could lead to Cohen losing his law license.  And Cohen seems to derive income from using his law license to pay off women for rich men.  Of course, that income stream is most likely dead regardless of how this plays out.

Trump's drama plays out like a Univision telenovela.  

[Pescado_Rojo 19416]

Telenovelas have more believable plot lines than some of this stuff.

[Tuco 5076]

None of this has been confirmed.  
My take on this is Mueller/FBI was looking at Cohen from the get go of the investigation.
In the process of the investigation they discovered a bunch of unrelated crimes that fell outside the scope of Mueller’s directive.  As a law enforcement officer he is duty bound to report those crimes to the proper authorities.  In this case it was Rod Rosenstein.  Rosenstein then decided to kick it to the department with jurisdiction, in this case the SDNY.  
This does NOT mean Mueller found nothing related to his directive while investigating Cohen.  To me, it means Mueller has completed his investigation into Cohen.
However, it is very possible the SDNY discovers more evidence of Russia related crimes in their investigation.  

I see that as a credible possibility. It’s entirely possible the Hannity/Cohen connection was just unrelated and unintentional collateral damage to whatever the SDNY raided the office for. The next, interesting aspect to the story is whether Hannity was a legit client or if Cohen was just trying to cover up communications.

[atomheartbevo 89659]

Cohen won’t be willing to go to prison for people like Trump.  He’s a fixer, not s fall guy.   

His life has already been ruined.  Even if he kept his license, everybody knows he records and documents everything, so that would kill his business. 

[Gengs1 2583]

I can’t wait to find out that there are a few hookers that Cohen paid off for Hanity and company. Since Cohen has experience in that, I am certain Hanity indiscretions are coming to light 

[deech 2275]

9 hours ago, burntorangebongos said:

Michael Avennati seems to believe that the move to name Sean Hannity as a client was an attempt to keep something as atty-client privilege. He has been calling things correctly for the past few weeks and his thought is something has been collecting that was recorded or written between them that he is keen to not disclose. He also thinks Michael is going to be facing a long prison sentence and he is going to flip. We'll see but he has been pretty solid with his predictions.

I think that's obvious.  Especially with the seeming contradictions between Hannity's attempts to spin things publicly afterward and the story not being consistent with Cohen's attorneys.  IMHO, I think it's very likely that Hannity was coordinated with Assange like has been alleged earlier in the thread, but everyone brings up a really good point that Mueller would keep that instead of passing it off to the SDNY.  However, the flip side is that Mueller may not have known the extent of Hannity's involvement in the whole mess until now.  One of those benefits of Mueller spinning this down to the SDNY is that they go full after Cohen on the campaign finance mess and now they reap the rewards with stuff that spins back up to collusion.  It would honestly be appropriate if Hannity is the collusion smoking gun that puts Trump down.

Regardless, I think another possible scenario is that Hannity was coordinating with Trump's attorney about how to respond media-wise every step of the way.  When to attack Mueller, what to say, evidence, etc.  I mean I would not be surprised if Cohen scripted talking points for Hannity and he read them verbatim on his TV show.  

I honestly can't wait to see the fallout..

[Gengs1 2583]

1 minute ago, atomheartbevo said:

Cohen won’t be willing to go to prison for people like Trump.  He’s a fixer, not s fall guy.   

His life has already been ruined.  Even if he kept his license, everybody knows he records and documents everything, so that would kill his business. 

Once he gets pressured by the prosecution, he is going to spill the beans and all the stuff he knows. 

President will pardon him but not before a lengthy and very public trial 

[Nice Guy Eddie 13512]

2 minutes ago, Tuco said:

 

I see that as a credible possibility. It’s entirely possible the Hannity/Cohen connection was just unrelated and unintentional collateral damage to whatever the SDNY raided the office for. The next, interesting aspect to the story is whether Hannity was a legit client or if Cohen was just trying to cover up communications.

 

I see Cohen's attorney naming Hannity as a complete farce in that Hannity was never a client of Cohen, and it took Hannity by surprise that he was named.  Perhaps Cohen (or his attorney) asked Hannity if he could be named as a client but Hannity declined.    Then Hannity gets taken by surprise as he's about to go on-air.

[Mojo Hand 4580]

13 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

So Hannity was under an fbi counterintelligence investigation for colluding with Russia, Cohen connects him explicitly to coordinating with the trump campaign, but mueller kicked it all down to sdny. That doesn’t make any sense.

It doesn't, but that's just from Louise Mensch's "reporting."  From the credibly reported facts, the most plausible Hannity scenario seems to be that Mueller doesn't already have that stuff and SDNY would be kicking it back up to him if they come across some shit.   I mean, it's not clear that Mueller knew Hannity was Cohen's client.  

[Mojo Hand 4580]

5 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

I see Cohen's attorney naming Hannity as a complete farce in that Hannity was never a client of Cohen, and it took Hannity by surprise that he was named.  Perhaps Cohen (or his attorney) asked Hannity if he could be named as a client but Hannity declined.    Then Hannity gets taken by surprise as he's about to go on-air.

Before he was named, the attorney said he met with client #3 (Hannity) over the weekend and client #3 told him not to reveal his name and to appeal any direction to reveal his name.   So Hannity knew he was at risk of being named. 

[Nice Guy Eddie 13512]

1 minute ago, Mojo Hand said:

Before he was named, the attorney said he met with client #3 (Hannity) over the weekend and client #3 told him not to reveal his name and to appeal any direction to reveal his name.   So Hannity knew he was at risk of being named. 

But it seemed to take Hannity (or other important people in his life) by surprise that his name was released.  If Hannity would have thought his name was most likely going to be released, he would have done it himself.

[Mojo Hand 4580]

Yeah given the appeal request, he probably thought he had more time.  

[Francisco 2.0 32389]

9 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

Only a Trumpkin could see increasingly interlinked evidence between Russia, Trump, and Fox and blow it off with "Riiiiiight".  Congratulations, you're a pawn.

Maybe it didn't come across quite the way I intended...

9 hours ago, ChiTownDoc said:

Maybe I'm wrong but I think he's saying the far right sycophants will just spin the news that much more...

This.

[Anastasis 23469]

17 minutes ago, Gengs1 said:

I can’t wait to find out that there are a few hookers that Cohen paid off for Hanity and company. Since Cohen has experience in that, I am certain Hanity indiscretions are coming to light 

I mean, that's where this has to be going right, and why Hannity got so defensive on air. Bet his wife was pissed when he got home. 

[Anastasis 23469]

23 minutes ago, Pescado_Rojo said:

Telenovelas have more believable plot lines than some of this stuff.

As far as story lines and characters, it's hard to imagine that there will ever be another presidential production that will rise to this level. The bar really has been set. 

[retread 2951]

Has to be something serious. He wouldn't be this worried if it was mostly about real estate that he had discussed with his lawyer, who wasn't his lawyer in the traditional sense.

[Anastasis 23469]

17 minutes ago, Mojo Hand said:

It doesn't, but that's just from Louise Mensch's "reporting."  From the credibly reported facts, the most plausible Hannity scenario seems to be that Mueller doesn't already have that stuff and SDNY would be kicking it back up to him if they come across some shit.   I mean, it's not clear that Mueller knew Hannity was Cohen's client.  

Mueller knows what Cohen had for lunch on march 25, 2015. 

[SizzleChest 8283]

55 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

I think another consideration in Mueller’s decision to punt this to SDNY was the fear that he or Rosenstein would be fired. He probably wanted to spread out the investigation to make it harder to meddle with.

Punting this to SDNY to lead doesn't mean Mueller can't get involved again whenever deemed necessary.  Shrewd move.

[Gengs1 2583]

12 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

As far as story lines and characters, it's hard to imagine that there will ever be another presidential production that will rise to this level. The bar really has been set. 

I am going with he paid off some Men to keep quite, Sean has that gay aura around him, he seems to suck some d

[Mojo Hand 4580]

I find it hard to believe that Hannity used Cohen for anything but a Trump go-between.   Cohen isn't a real lawyer that someone would hire for standard business.   He's basically Trump's fixer.  Trump either loaned him out to the RNC guy or the RNC guy is Trump's fall guy for the abortion payoff, but Trump is the connection there too.  It's not like Cohen is the guy Republicans go to for legal advice.  Hannity is a moron but he has plenty of money and his own attorneys from well before Cohen and Trump went in the political spotlight.   His relationship with Cohen had to be about Trump. 

[chainsaw 9867]

"Real Estate" in the way that the talks with Russians were about "adoptions"

[Hugo Stiglitz 23367]

There are several possibilities with Hannity and Cohen.  Too many for me to even speculate.

[triplehorn 2664]

1 hour ago, Anastasis said:

So Hannity was under an fbi counterintelligence investigation for colluding with Russia, Cohen connects him explicitly to coordinating with the trump campaign, but mueller kicked it all down to sdny. That doesn’t make any sense.

I don't think Mueller kicking this to SDNY has anything to do with Hannity, and if Hannity/Fox is in the Mueller crosshairs, the evidence will be from other sources than Cohen's raid.  The fallout from Cohen's raid serves as a tangential public glimpse of the circle of involvement, not Mueller's actual roadmap. 

Assuming the unconfirmed, that Hannity is/was under an FBI counterintelligence investigation,  that would involve signals intelligence, ie spying on agents of the Russian state, such as RT, Sputnik, Wikileaks and Julian Assange, and getting caught up in incidental collection for example.  FBI Counterintelligence cases get prosecuted at Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA).  Recall this is where Dana Boente was the acting US Atty there until he was forced out last Fall.

We already know Roger Stone was in contact with Guccifer 2.0 (RUS military intelligence) and Assange.  Hannity being in communication/coordinating with the same organs of the Russian state, especially given his revealed connections to Trump inner circle, are very plausible.  Hannity's attempt to hide comms with Cohen from the Feds is laughable at this stage.

[ShaggyBevo RIP 3868]

1 hour ago, wildcat09 said:

I think another consideration in Mueller’s decision to punt this to SDNY was the fear that he or Rosenstein would be fired. He probably wanted to spread out the investigation to make it harder to meddle with.

That was my thought too. This makes it harder for Trump to stop.

[ShaggyBevo RIP 3868]

25 minutes ago, Mojo Hand said:

I find it hard to believe that Hannity used Cohen for anything but a Trump go-between.   Cohen isn't a real lawyer that someone would hire for standard business.   He's basically Trump's fixer.  Trump either loaned him out to the RNC guy or the RNC guy is Trump's fall guy for the abortion payoff, but Trump is the connection there too.  It's not like Cohen is the guy Republicans go to for legal advice.  Hannity is a moron but he has plenty of money and his own attorneys from well before Cohen and Trump went in the political spotlight.   His relationship with Cohen had to be about Trump. 

I would agree with this.  Back line communication for Hannity and Trump is the most likely answer.

[woohorn 1131]

So what are we thinking Cohen is guilty of other than being an idiot.

Hiring goon to threaten poor little Stephanie's life in front of her dear innocent child?

[jimmyjazz 45915]

1 hour ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

Maybe it didn't come across quite the way I intended...

This.

Sorry, my bad.  "Triggered".

[Pig Bellmont 8717]

1 hour ago, atomheartbevo said:

Cohen won’t be willing to go to prison for people like Trump.  He’s a fixer, not s fall guy.   

His life has already been ruined.  Even if he kept his license, everybody knows he records and documents everything, so that would kill his business. 

https://goo.gl/images/q8YByP

”I’m not the guy you kill, I’m the guy you buy”