Sussman Acquitted

[ajax18]

Michael Sussmann Acquitted; Trial Revealed Clinton Role in Russia ‘Collusion’ Hoax

Former Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann was acquitted Tuesday of lying to the FBI when he fed it false information about supposed “collusion” between then-candidate Donald Trump and Russia during the 2016 campaign.

Sussmann gave the FBI data that had been produced by researchers working with the campaign and that purported to link Trump to Russia via Alfa Bank. The accusation was soon found to be groundless, but was part of the overall “Russia collusion” conspiracy theory that the Clinton campaign used to smear Trump during the campaign and after his victory.


Sussmann was accused of presenting himself to the FBI as a concerned citizen, when he was working for Clinton. The jury included up to three donors to Hillary Clinton, and the Obama-appointed judge narrowly limited prosecutors’ evidence.

The defense argued that even if Sussmann was found to have given the FBI inaccurate information about his motivations, the lie was immaterial to the investigation that followed. Durham argued that the FBI protected Sussman’s sources as a result of the alleged lie, and that investigators would not have pursued the Alfa Bank tip had they known the source of the data.

Observers agreed that the evidence against Sussmann was convincing, but that he might prevail based on “jury nullification” — an effort by the jury to reject the charges, regardless of guilt, because of their political sympathies with the defendant.

Columnist Byron York of the Washington Examiner observed in the hours before the verdict was delivered on Tuesday:

There is no doubt Sussmann lied to the FBI. There is no doubt he is guilty. But the trial is taking place in Washington, perhaps the deepest-blue jury pool in the United States. Durham’s prosecutors are “facing a jury that has three Clinton donors, an Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez donor, and a woman whose daughter is on the same sports team as Sussmann’s daughter,” George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley said recently on Fox News. “With the exception of randomly selecting people out of DNC headquarters, you could not come up with a worse jury.”

…

So those are two major revelations from the Sussmann trial: Elements in and around the Clinton campaign sought to weaponize the FBI, and the FBI welcomed the effort — all in the name of defeating the Republican nominee for president.

…

So the Clinton strategy worked. No, it did not make Clinton president of the U.S. The voters just did not want that. But it did enormous damage to the Trump presidency and the Trump administration.

The acquittal is a defeat for Special Counsel John H. Durham, who was appointed to investigate the “Russia collusion” hoax, which was created by the Clinton campaign, took root in the FBI, and undermined the incoming Trump administration.

Still, Durham succeeded in revealing that Clinton herself personally approved the leak of the Alfa Bank hoax to the media. The Alfa Bank hoax was intended as an “October surprise” to damage Trump in the days before voters headed to the polls.

Durham’s investigation will continue, and in October he will prosecute Igor Danchenko, a researcher who allegedly was the source for former British spy Christopher Steele, who worked for Fusion GPS to produce the fraudulent “Russia dossier” on Trump. The Sussmann trial confirmed that the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee paid Fusion GPS, through Democrat election lawyer Marc Elias. However, Durham’s ability to obtain further indictments may be limited.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022 ... sion-hoax/

This was still well worth the expense to get the truth out and help explain why the two tiered justice system based on political sympathies exists in Washington.

[ajax18]

I doubt there will be any draining of the swamp or anything close to a politically neutral rule of law as long as 99.9% of Washington D.C. is filled with hard core liberal Democrats.

[Res Ipsa]

We've been through this. I doubt there will be any more indictments, let alone convictions. The right-wing media's fantasy about what actually happened is completely divorced from the facts of what happened. Durham led with his strongest case and completely failed. There's no there there.

[Gunnar]

I doubt there will be any draining of the swamp or anything close to a politically neutral rule of law as long as 99.9% of Washington D.C. is filled with hard core liberal Democrats.

99.9% Washington D.C. is filled by liberal Democrats?? Would that it were true! The main thing wrong with Washington D.C. is that too few of the Democrats in government are actually strong progressives, and too weak an opposition to anti-democracy, hard core Trump sycophants who are eager to support Trump's tyrannical ambitions and suppression of free and honest elections. If there had been more genuine, scientifically literate progressives in the last few decades, who generally cared more for the majority of ordinary Americans than they cared for the wealthy corporate donors, our country would be much farther along towards the goal of a sustainable, minimally polluting and much cleaner and consequently saner and more prosperous economy that green technology would make possible. We would also have the much less expensive and more effective universal healthcare that almost every other technologically advanced country now has. My main beef with Biden and most of the other Democratic leaders in the national government is that they are not nearly progressive enough! Which is very much to the detriment of our country, and bodes ill for its future economic viability and, perhaps, even its very survival!

[Dr Exiled]

Here is someone that is a progressive that didn't drink the russiagate hoax cool-aid.

https://taibbi.substack.com/p/shouldn't- ... banned?s=r

It was a made up political hit-job that practically all the mainstream media bought into. The Steele dossier was a complete fabrication and so was the alfa bank story. However, I get it. Trump is questionable, and narcissistic, and uncouth, and untrusworthy, and he wanted to make peace with Russia instead of having NATO surround Russia. That was a crime against empire that had to be stopped. So, he had to be weakened and discounted.

[Gunnar]

Here is someone that is a progressive that didn't drink the russiagate hoax cool-aid.

https://taibbi.substack.com/p/shouldn't- ... banned?s=r

It was a made up political hit-job that practically all the mainstream media bought into. The Steele dossier was a complete fabrication and so was the alfa bank story. However, I get it. Trump is questionable, and narcissistic, and uncouth, and untrusworthy, and he wanted to make peace with Russia instead of having NATO surround Russia. That was a crime against empire that had to be stopped. So, he had to be weakened and discounted.

Is there any conservative poster here who denies that Vladimir Putin is an incorrigible and despicable tyrant who hates democracy and the very idea of free speech and religion? Does anyone here deny or not remember that Trump effusively praised Putin, even as he invaded Ukraine, and also spoke favorably of other Tyrants as well, like Hungary's Victor Orban and the (if anything) even more ruthless and despicable Kim Jong Un of North Korea? Whether or not there was active and coordinated collusion between Russia and Trump's Presidential campaign, does anyone here doubt that Trump approved of and even directly and publicly asked Russia to help him in his political campaign? And doesn't it give you any pause at all to realize that as wicked and dishonest a Tyrant like Putin so obviously approved of Trump?

There isn't a doubt in my mind that Trump aspires to be able to get away with becoming every bit as ruthless and all powerful a dictator as Kim, Putin and China's Xi.

[Dr Exiled]

Here is someone that is a progressive that didn't drink the russiagate hoax cool-aid.

https://taibbi.substack.com/p/shouldn't- ... banned?s=r

It was a made up political hit-job that practically all the mainstream media bought into. The Steele dossier was a complete fabrication and so was the alfa bank story. However, I get it. Trump is questionable, and narcissistic, and uncouth, and untrusworthy, and he wanted to make peace with Russia instead of having NATO surround Russia. That was a crime against empire that had to be stopped. So, he had to be weakened and discounted.

Is there any conservative poster here who denies that Vladimir Putin is an incorrigible and despicable tyrant who hates democracy and the very idea of free speech and religion? Does anyone here deny or not remember that Trump effusively praised Putin, even as he invaded Ukraine, and also spoke favorably of other Tyrants as well, like Hungary's Victor Orban and the (if anything) even more ruthless and despicable Kim Jong Un of North Korea? Whether or not there was active and coordinated collusion between Russia and Trump's Presidential campaign, does anyone here doubt that Trump approved of and even directly and publicly asked Russia to help him in his political campaign? And doesn't it give you any pause at all to realize that as wicked and dishonest a Tyrant like Putin so obviously approved of Trump?

There isn't a doubt in my mind that Trump aspires to be able to get away with becoming every bit as ruthless and all powerful a dictator as Kim, Putin and China's Xi.

I think Trump disobeyed the powers that be, that want to return to the Yeltsin days when our billionaires were more able to loot russia and their vast resources. He had to be spanked for not following the consensus or at least wanting to put his "art of the deal" BS into the mix. I don't think he is the tyrant that the mainstream media wants to make him out to be. Had he been, he would have eschewed the insiders that were part of his administration, like Bolton. He would have immediately cultivated and installed his confederate military officers for the pending coup. Also, he wouldn't have left office.

Even so, there are a lot of people that don't like the Clintons or Bidens of the world that the oligarchy pushes on us. Trump is a symptom of this. In a better world where all candidates don't come from the billionaire left or billionaire right, Trump wouldn't stand a chance. He's a clown, a real estate hustler, a reality t.v. personality. But, he is a loud mouth that tells enough for people to be conned by him. People are desperate from 40 plus years of inflation and wages that don't keep up. Trump was able to exploit this and might again in 2024.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

It’s perhaps useful to remind the gentle reader that Conservatives, well, Right-wing Trumpers have all gotten on the same page that 'it was a fake scandal that has been thoroughly disproven' … but that's not true at all.

The fears about 'Putin backing the Trump campaign in order to divide America' were absolutely confirmed, including by the Senate Intelligence Committee while it was controlled by a Republican majority - source: Senate panel finds Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. election -- PBS

...and The Mueller Report didn't 'disprove election interference' either; it said:

The Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion.

... and Trump did meet with "...Sergey Kislyak...considered by US intelligence to be one of Russia’s top spies and spy-recruiters..." in the Oval Office, and gave him intelligence that the Russian government was not supposed to have. source: Trump 'shared classified information with Russia' -- BBC

So...how are we supposed to take anything that they say about "Russiagate" seriously? A lot of people went to jail over Russiagate. The government recouped millions in ill-gotten gains. It was the most successful special prosecutor investigation in the history of the program. And Mueller charged a lot of Russians, I think, 2 ~26.

I mean, I could judt go on and on, but it’s pointless. The carnival barkers will keep barking like trained seals, “ARF ARF! BIG LIE ARF! ARF ARF! RUSSIAGATE WAS A HOAX! ARF!”

- Doc

[doubtingthomas]

Who the hell is Sussman and why should anyone care?

[Gunnar]

Is there any conservative poster here who denies that Vladimir Putin is an incorrigible and despicable tyrant who hates democracy and the very idea of free speech and religion? Does anyone here deny or not remember that Trump effusively praised Putin, even as he invaded Ukraine, and also spoke favorably of other Tyrants as well, like Hungary's Victor Orban and the (if anything) even more ruthless and despicable Kim Jong Un of North Korea? Whether or not there was active and coordinated collusion between Russia and Trump's Presidential campaign, does anyone here doubt that Trump approved of and even directly and publicly asked Russia to help him in his political campaign? And doesn't it give you any pause at all to realize that as wicked and dishonest a Tyrant like Putin so obviously approved of Trump?

There isn't a doubt in my mind that Trump aspires to be able to get away with becoming every bit as ruthless and all powerful a dictator as Kim, Putin and China's Xi.

I don't think he is the tyrant that the mainstream media wants to make him out to be. Had he been, he would have eschewed the insiders that were part of his administration, like Bolton. He would have immediately cultivated and installed his confederate military officers for the pending coup. Also, he wouldn't have left office.

I suspect the main reason for that is that, luckily for us, he also lacked the intelligence and competence to successfully pull it off.

Even so, there are a lot of people that don't like the Clintons or Bidens of the world that the oligarchy pushes on us. Trump is a symptom of this. In a better world where all candidates don't come from the billionaire left or billionaire right, Trump wouldn't stand a chance. He's a clown, a real estate hustler, a reality t.v. personality. But, he is a loud mouth that tells enough for people to be conned by him. People are desperate from 40 plus years of inflation and wages that don't keep up. Trump was able to exploit this and might again in 2024.

I despairingly agree with most of the above. I hope we will be pleasantly surprised and proven wrong about that come November. Though I am not convinced that Biden was best possible choice for President in 2000, and will not be in 2024, he is (at least) a lesser evil than Trump or any of his cohorts.

Whom I would really love to see nominated to and become President is Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island. He seems to be by a wide margin the most scientifically literate of all the U.S. Senators I know anything about (it probably doesn't hurt that his wife is highly qualified marine biologist), and the most well-informed on a great many issues. He does a good job of exposing the corruption due to dark money and corporate greed that has bought our country to its currently sorry and perilous state. Look up some of his presentations on YouTube where he very intelligently discussed before congress these issues. They are well worth watching!