Trump's top intelligence chief declassifies Obama officials who requested 'unmasking' of Michael Flynn
Fox News chief legal correspondent and 'Fox News @ Night' anchor Shannon Bream breaks down the details.
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There is lots of Flynn chatter today. Three quick points:
1. As I explain in a piece at The Hill today, I understand why the Justice Department relied on a legal argument — viz., lack of materiality — for moving to dismiss the case against Michael Flynn. It spares DOJ the need to get into the facts of the case which, to put it mildly, are unflattering to the FBI and prosecutors.
MICHAEL GOODWIN: FLYNN CHARGES DROPPED — WHAT THE LATEST PIECES OF THE PUZZLE REVEAL
Nevertheless, the best reason to dismiss the Flynn case is that the government would not be able to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt in court. The evidence is equivocal, the witnesses have profound credibility problems — and those witnesses actually thought Flynn was not lying to them.
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The issue for the Justice Department is not whether Flynn made misstatements to Vice President Pence and other administration officials; it is whether prosecutors are in a position to carry their burden of proof that Flynn willfully lied to the interviewing agents. On the evidence as we understand it, I do not believe a jury would be confident even that they knew exactly what statements Flynn made, much less whether his statements were intentionally false rather than honest failures of recollection.
2. It is repeatedly claimed in the reporting that James Comey, then the FBI director, withheld information about the Flynn-Kislyak conversations from Sally Yates, then the acting attorney general, even though President Obama had clearly been briefed on it by the time of the White House meeting on the morning of Jan. 5, 2017. That is not true.
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Mary McCord, then-chief of DOJ’s National Intelligence Division, has explained that Comey’s deputy, Andrew McCabe, informed her of the Flynn-Kislyak conversations on Jan. 3. At that point, McCord should have briefed her superior, Yates, and she planned to do just that — on the afternoon of Jan. 5.
When people are very busy, this is the kind of screw-up that frequently happens. I’m betting McCord did not realize her boss was meeting with the president that morning; or, if she was aware, she did not realize Flynn was on the agenda. But the fact remains: The FBI did inform DOJ at a very high level.
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