Gregory Craig, Former Obama Aide, Indicted on Charges of Lying to Justice Department.

[elleng]

Source: nyt

Gregory B. Craig, a White House counsel in the Obama administration, was charged on Thursday with lying to the Justice Department and concealing information about work he did in 2012 for the Russia-aligned government of Ukraine.

The indictment of Mr. Craig, 74, stemmed from an investigation initiated by the office of the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III.

An Ivy League-educated lawyer who held prominent positions in the administrations of President Bill Clinton and President Barack Obama, Mr. Craig becomes the first person associated with the Democratic Party to be charged in a case linked to the special counsel’s investigation.




Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/11/us/politics/gregory-craig-indictment.html

[DirtEdonE]

1. Mr. Craig becomes the first person associated with the Democratic Party to be charged in a case

"Mr. Craig becomes the first person associated with the Democratic Party to be charged in a case linked to the special counsel’s investigation."

Yet mueller recommended no further indictments of repubicans in his report! You can't make this stuff up.

We need a mueller investigation of mueller.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. Looks to me like there's plenty of evidence that he committed a crime.

Read the whole indictment. He is accused of violating FARA by intentionally concealing the fact that he was lobbying for and getting money from a foreign government. Being a Democrat shouldn't shield him from prosecution; Democrats aren't inherently more virtuous than anyone else just because they're Democrats.

[DirtEdonE]

6. I'm not disputing he committed a crime

I'm just saying that there are gop criminals, trump especially, that haven't been indicted on anything even though their crimes are well documented and have gone on for decades.

Or you can believe the mueller report, or those portions barr is willing to allow us to see.

Or maybe we can glean something from barr's color coded redactions.

The rule of law has been severed by the gop and we're worrying about which Democrats mueller is going to indict.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

8. The fact that some people who probably should have been indicted haven't been

doesn't mean people who are being indicted shouldn't be. My personal suspicion, for which I have no proof, is that Barr shut Mueller down before he could indict Don Jr. and Jared. The indictment of Craig has nothing to do with the Russia investigation, so I don't think it's relevant.

[DirtEdonE]

9. Selective enforcement of the law is tyranny nt

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

10. After reading the indictment, do you think Craig should not have been charged?

[DirtEdonE]

12. I think DEFINITELY he should have been charged

After all the motherfucking repubicans STARTING WITH TRUMP have been charged.

[DirtEdonE]

13. Blowing out someone else's candle won't make yours shine any brighter.

Blowing out trump's candle will make the entire human race shine brighter.

[ZZenith]

14. Holy shit, but you do try hard!

[DirtEdonE]

15. I push back

Harder than I'm being pushed.

I know it's difficult to comprehend in most Democratic circles these days but it used to be known as winning before we decided to become reactive instead of proactive.

They've been cheating to win since nixon and now we have a real first; a repubican who not only cheated but conspired with a foreign power to win.

In the early days of the trump campaign, reports stated trump's campaign had been soliciting foreign donors. A clear violation of the law.

Nothing happened and you don't even year a peep about it anymore.

trump not only solicited donations from foreign powers he conspired with them to overthrow the duly elected government of the United States of America.

That means. HILLARY CLINTON SHOULD BE PRESIDENT.

That means that while, holy shit, I try hard. In realty I can't try hard enough.

I don't think people understand what's coming. Any candidate soliciting donations from foreign powers or committing any one of the myriad crimes trump committed ON CAMERA would have been excoriated and banished from the campaign.

How do you think trump was able to not only slice and dice his way through 16 seasoned repubican opponents but lose three debates and an election and still be sitting in the White House?

I try hard because people are being too complacent. This is it. This is the end game. There is no return to "normal" after this - or at least not for a long time and after much grief.

[ZZenith]

16. Understood.

[SunSeeker]

22. Then why did SDNY decline to indict him when Mueller sent them the case?

It is very unusual for the DC office to essentially overrule SDNY and proceed withan indictment after SDNY sent it back. Something smells.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

23. Jurisdiction, possibly.

[SunSeeker]

25. If they didn't have jurisdiction, Mueller would not have sent the case to them.

Nope, that would not be the reason.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

26. Could depend on whether additional evidence turned up after the referral

that made it either necessary or more convenient to switch. I don't know, I'm just speculating, but there are a lot of procedural reasons relating to jurisdiction and venue that might have been behind the change.

[SunSeeker]

28. Nope, it was not based on additional evidence, but on a USDOJ escalation of FARA prosecutions.

The Skadden and Craig matters have prompted the Justice Department to escalate its pursuit of foreign influence operations. Last month, the head of the national security division said it had appointed a prosecutor who worked on Mueller's team to lead a revamped unit that will crack down on unregistered foreign agents.

In making the announcement, the official, John Demers, pointed to the Skadden settlement -- and alluded to the Craig case -- as having triggered the department's decision to escalate its enforcement in that area.

https://www-m.cnn.com/2019/04/11/politics/greg-craig-indicted-mueller-related/index.html?r=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F

And the above CNN article confirms SDNY declined to indict due to insufficiency of evidence, not any "jurisdictional" issues:

The investigation of Craig took an unusually circuitous route. After the initial inquiry into Craig and Skadden was opened by Mueller, Craig's case was referred to federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York and then again to prosecutors in the US Attorney's office for the District of Columbia.

It was transferred out of SDNY because, after examining Craig's case, federal prosecutors in New York concluded they had insufficient evidence to bring charges against him, CNN has reported.

https://www-m.cnn.com/2019/04/11/politics/greg-craig-indicted-mueller-related/index.html?r=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F

Sure looks like Craig's attorney has a good argument when he says USDOJ charged his client so that it did not look like they were only charging Republicans with FARA violations. This indictment was brought by Barr's USDOJ, not Mueller. Mueller has closed shop, after saying he will bring no further indictments. This is all Barr.

Like I said, this smells.

[Quackers]

4. I believe Mueller was honest and impartial in his investigation.

Don’t forget, there’s still a lot of info that hasn’t been released.

[DirtEdonE]

7. I believe mueller was a shill for trump and the gop from the start

It's all too familiar.

Look up Bridgegate for a primer. A couple of low level clowns go to jail. The real criminal got a job with ABC.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

20. That's the Q conspiracy theorists' contention.

Not a theory I subscribe to.

[DirtEdonE]

21. Well, I don't know who the Q conspiracy theorists are

But that's my opinion.

If mueller had all the evidence we were told over and over again that he had, the evidence we heard every night over and over again in the news, then his conclusions and his method of delivering them to barr without further recommendations for indictment or clear decisions on other crimes prove mueller is a shill.

What other explanation is there?

[Bernardo de La Paz]

31. Lots of other explanations, a couple very plausible, but you don't seem willing to discuss it.

You can't imagine them, so it seems you refuse to stretch your mind a bit.

[DirtEdonE]

32. What we're doing right now is discussing it. nt

[rockfordfile]

17. No way. Mueller is a far right Republican. He's just as guilty as Bush in the Iraq war

[former9thward]

19. Wow! Mueller started the Iraq War!

The things you learn on the internet....

[MadDAsHell]

27. Are you defending Mueller the warmongering Rethuglican? nt

[former9thward]

33. Speaker Pelosi says she trusts Mueller.

https://www.apnews.com/c1e53f17e84b4bd285b01b53f657ce7e

Are you attacking the Democratic Speaker of the House?

[MadDAsHell]

34. If she defends a Rethuglican? Yes I am. nt

[LanternWaste]

35. Cool little argumentum ab auctoritate you've created with that.

Pat yourself on the back for another fallacy well done.

[SunSeeker]

29. Mueller did not indict Craig. Barr's USDOJ did. nt

[mr_lebowski]

2. If he lied, he lied. This offers further proof that this investigation isn't some 'Democrat Scheme'

If it was, why are Democrats being indicted?

[BlueIdaho]

5. It also offers proof this investigation is on-going... nt.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

11. It is probably one of the cases Mueller spun off to other prosecutors.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

18. Former Obama less important than conspirator with Manafort. More both-sides-ism. Shitty headline. nt

[SunSeeker]

24. Exactly. His alleged crime in the indictment has NOTHING to do with his work under Obama.

It has to do with his work with MANAFORT, after he left the Obama administration. It is a really shitty, misleading headline.

[PeeJ52]

30. My understanding is he did this when Manafort hired his firm to write some puff piece...

to support the Ukraine. It had nothing to do with Obama. The press is framing it wrong. This was all the dirty crap Manafort was doing. He was just caught up in being an unregistered foreign agent like Manfort was because he lied about it and his firm was hired by Manafort to do PR work. Democrats work for dirty money too...