Downhill Democrat America Cartoons

Last GOP congressman in New England files appeal in bid to keep seat

The last remaining Republican congressman in New England filed an appeal Tuesday that seeks to undo the election of his Democratic opponent under Maine's new voting system, asking the court to act quickly as the swearing-in of new U.S. House members nears.
A federal judge last week rejected U.S. Rep. Bruce Poliquin's concerns over the constitutionality of ranked voting, a system used in November for the first time in a congressional race.
Poliquin lost his re-election bid to Democrat Jared Golden. His appeal asks the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston to reconsider his request to nullify the election's outcome and either declare him the winner or order another election.
Poliquin claims he should be the winner because he had the most first-place votes on Election Day. But Golden won the race in an extra round of voting in which two trailing independents were eliminated and their votes were reallocated.
In his appeal, Poliquin claims that ranked-choice voting "violated all voters'" constitutional rights. Poliquin says the judge's rejection of his requests "sidestepped the explicit questions presented, often casting the questions at a more superficial level of analysis."
Meanwhile, Golden's chief of staff, Aisha Woodward, said the judge's decision was "crystal clear" and called it the "best response" to Poliquin's appeal.
Poliquin's appeal comes just weeks before Golden is set to be sworn in Jan. 3.
But Congress doesn't have to wait for the litigation to wrap up before deciding whether to swear Golden in, said Edward Foley, constitutional law professor at Ohio State University's law school. That decision is in the hands of the newly Democratic controlled House, where House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi earlier this month chided Republicans' fight against ranked-choice voting and Golden's win.
"Congress doesn't have to be controlled by the litigation in terms of deciding whether to seat the elected member," Foley said. "That's a decision Congress ultimately makes itself."
Another fight over a House race has been brewing in North Carolina , where Republicans want their candidate to take his seat in Congress in a still-undecided race marred by ballot fraud allegations.
But the fight there differs from Poliquin's lawsuit, which is about concerns over the system Maine used to tabulate winners.
Under ranked-choice voting, a system Maine voters approved in 2016, all candidates are ranked on the ballot, and a candidate who collects a majority of first-place votes is the winner. If there's no majority winner, then the last-place candidates are eliminated, and their second-choice votes are reassigned to the remaining field. The process is sometimes referred to as an instant runoff.
Poliquin has lambasted ranked-choice voting as being so "confusing" that it effectively disenfranchises voters.
Last week, U.S. District Judge Lance Walker said that critics can question the wisdom of ranked-choice voting, but that such criticism "falls short of constitutional impropriety." The judge rejected several of Poliquin's constitutional concerns and said the Constitution gives states leeway in deciding how to elect federal representatives.
Poliquin has also abandoned his request for a recount of Maine's election. The secretary of state's office said he is responsible for the "actual cost" of recount efforts.
Maine's top state court last year warned that ranked voting conflicts with the state's constitution, which says the winners of state-level races are whomever gets the most votes, or a "plurality." And so Maine uses ranked voting only in federal elections and state primary races, but not for general elections for governor or the Legislature.
Democratic Gov.-elect Janet Mills has vowed to seek to amend the state constitution so the system can be used in all elections.

Will Trump forgo border wall to avoid government shutdown?

There is no one else to blame but President Trump if there’s a partial government shutdown later this week.
The president said he would take the recriminations if there’s a shutdown. The question now is whether Trump will sign a spending bill that doesn’t fund his border wall.
“A lot of us are trying to help him,” Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Richard Shelby, R-Ala., lamented when asked about the effort to secure dollars for the border wall. “It didn’t work out.”
And so in the coming days, the House and Senate will likely approve some form of a short-term spending measure to avert a partial government shutdown in the wee hours of Saturday morning. If there's no action, then nine federal departments would close just days before Christmas. Instead, a tentative, stopgap package simply re-ups the remaining seven spending bills at current levels through Feb. 8.
“If we do go to February, what happens then?” asked Shelby, not so rhetorically.
Not much changes. Except Democrats will control the House next year.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., seemed mystified as to why House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., would want to wrestle with government funding issues when she matriculates to the speaker’s suite in January.
“I believe that incoming Speaker Pelosi has little latitude to make a deal,” McConnell observed. “I would assume her preference would be to roll out the new Democratic agenda with the fresh, new Democratic Congress.”

“I believe that incoming Speaker Pelosi has little latitude to make a deal. I would assume her preference would be to roll out the new Democratic agenda with the fresh, new Democratic Congress.”
— Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.

McConnell added that he thought punting to February “would be the least desirable outcome from the speaker’s point of view.”
Au contraire.
To quote McConnell, this is “the new Democratic agenda with the fresh, new Democratic Congress.”
Democrats flipped the House in part because Trump proved virulent in key districts. Pelosi is more than happy to tangle with the president over an issue like the border wall. The wall may energize Trump’s core supporters and enrapture red states. But the wall is utterly toxic in swing districts and suburbia.
That scenario helps Pelosi on two fronts. It presents the California Democrat a fulcrum to use for leverage against the president and simultaneously on behalf of liberal Democrats in her caucus.
Moreover, an elongated wall fight would potentially help Pelosi temper the narrative that all her side will do is investigate Trump.
To be sure, there will be plenty of investigating of the Trump administration by a Democratic House. But there are only so many cubic centimeters of available news oxygen.
A February fight over the wall means news outlets will have to devote some time to the wall brawl and not just focus on alleged misdeeds by the president.
Is there any question who prevailed here? If this were a boxing match, you could hear the bell clanging at ringside. Ding-ding-ding. Round one is over. The judges would award a unanimous decision to Pelosi.
The looming question now is will Trump sign a bill – sans wall – to avert a government shutdown this weekend?
Trump has been unpredictable on this issue before. In March, members of the president’s administration negotiated an omnibus spending package to avoid a government shutdown. Budget Director and now Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney ballyhooed the merits of the deal. The House and Senate approved the plan.
But just hours before the deadline, the president almost sparked a government shutdown when he threatened to veto the measure. He ultimately signed the accord.
Trump faced a revolt from his base when details leaked out about the size and scope of the omnibus spending package. One wonders if the president may reject anything Congress passes -- especially if his partisans threaten mutiny.
That’s the quintessence of the problem stemming from the Oval Office meeting Trump conducted last week with Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. Trump threatened a shutdown and took responsibility. The bravado invigorated the president’s loyalists. But Trump’s bluster could backfire if he retreats now.
White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders indicated on multiple occasions Tuesday that the administration could still build the wall – even without a congressional appropriation.
“There’s certainly a number of different funding sources that we’ve identified that we can use to couple with the money that would be given to us through congressional appropriations that would help us get to that $5 billion,” Sanders said.

“There’s certainly a number of different funding sources that we’ve identified that we can use to couple with the money that would be given to us through congressional appropriations that would help us get to that $5 billion.”
— White House press secretary Sarah Sanders

Such a maneuver is called “reprogramming,” in congressional-ese: Take money Congress already passed and “reprogram” it for a purpose other than the original intent. Trump signed into law the Military Construction/VA appropriations bill. The Army Corps of Engineers budget falls under the “MilCon/VA” bill. It’s possible the Trump administration could request a “reprogramming” of Army Corps of Engineers money for the wall. But that gambit requires sign-off by key members of the House and Senate appropriations Committees.
“They have to have congressional blessing for most reprogramming,” Pelosi said
That said, an administration can shift a little bit of money for purposes not sanctioned by Congress. But we’re only talking about a few million dollars here. That’s million with a “M.” Pocket lint in Washington.
The Trump administration says it’s seeking potential routes to bypass Congress. That’s a problem because Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution grants Congress the power of the purse.
“They should read the Constitution,” said one person familiar with the congressional appropriations process. Another source said “It would create a sh--storm” if the White House tried to circumvent Capitol Hill.
Don’t congressional Republicans have the back of the president? As Shelby said, they tried to help. But the political street couldn’t accommodate what Trump requested. Remember that many GOPers fear voters could blame them for a shutdown. So they were willing to cash it in.
A scenario like this one seems to unfold in much the same way every Christmas in Washington. There’s a crisis du jour. The sides appear steeled in their resolve. And then, almost at the last minute, somebody buckles not long before Santa slides down the chimney.
In truth, the outcome of this impasse was likely determined by the most influential people in Washington. Not the lawmakers, but the lawmakers spouses and their families. After all, they want to get everyone home for Christmas.

Judge's 'treason' insinuation in Flynn case ‘pretty reckless’: Katie Pavlich

Some remarks by the federal judge overseeing the guilty plea of former National Security Adviser Gen. Michael Flynn were “pretty reckless,” Townhall editor Katie Pavlich said Tuesday on the “Special Report” All-Star panel.
U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan unleashed on Flynn, the former Trump administration official who had admitted lying to the FBI about his communications with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.
“Arguably, you sold your country out!” Sullivan said to Flynn before suggesting that his wrongdoings were treasonous.
Pavlich insisted that the judge “knows” that the case before him is “one of the most high-profile cases that has been in the public atmosphere in a very long time.”
“For him to state things publically when the room is packed full of reporters and everybody is watching for things that aren’t true and then he has to walk them back, insinuating treason is pretty reckless,” Pavlich told the panel -- which also included Washington Examiner chief political correspondent Byron York and NPR national political correspondent Mara Liasson.
York felt similarly, calling Sullivan’s invoking of treason in the Flynn case “outrageous.”
“Before it was over, the judge had raised this question over whether Flynn had committed treason, which is outrageous especially coming from a federal judge on the bench, had suggested that maybe Flynn sold out his country and that he was an unregistered foreign agent inside the White House, which he was not,” York said. “A judge can bring up uncharged conduct in a sentencing case, but really to suggest that he was an unregistered foreign agent in the White House was false because even the prosecutor I believe corrected the judge to say that it had ended before. “
York added that it became “this weird situation” that was "almost like the craziness of the whole Trump debate moved into the courtroom for a day" and that Flynn’s future was “completely uncertain now” because his sentencing has been delayed until March.
Liasson agreed, calling some of Sullivan’s remarks “very confusing” since it seemed that he was “concerned” that Flynn was “pleading guilty to something he wasn’t guilty of” and then “suggested” that Flynn was “guilty of things he hadn’t been charged with yet.”
Pavlich also noted that White House officials seemed to be “distancing themselves” from Flynn “for the first time,” but asked whether President Trump “still stands by” his decision to ask for Flynn’s resignation after the revelation that Flynn lied to Vice President Mike Pence.

Alan Dershowitz: Michael Flynn now has three options to stay out of prison

U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan’s handling of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn’s sentencing hearing Tuesday on Flynn’s guilty plea to lying to the FBI was anything but exemplary. The judge – who has a well-deserved reputation as both tough and fair – made several fundamental errors right at the outset.
First, Sullivan suggested that Flynn might be guilty of treason. This reflects an abysmal ignorance of the governing case law. Nothing Flynn did comes even close to satisfying the strict definition of treason.
The U.S. Constitution states: “Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same Overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.”
Flynn admitted he represented Turkey – America’s NATO ally – before he became a federal employee as President Trump’s national security adviser, but said he failed to register until later under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller did not charge Flynn for failing to register – let alone with the far more serious crime of treason.
But Sullivan blundered by accusing Flynn of having been an unregistered foreign agent while he was serving in the White House, thereby having “sold your country out.” This was flat out wrong, since Flynn stopped working for any foreign government before he became President Trump’s national security adviser when Trump took office on Jan. 20, 2017.
During a recess, in the sentencing hearing, Judge Sullivan’s law clerks obviously set him straight on the law and the facts and the judge walked back his erroneous statements. But these statements reflect a kind of abiding bias that might well result in reversible error if Flynn’s lawyers appeal a sentence he eventually receives from Sullivan.

It is obvious that Judge Sullivan regards Flynn as guilty of far more serious crimes than he pleaded to or was even charged with committing.

The judge delayed sentencing for Flynn – a retired Army lieutenant general – until next year and gave each side until March 13 to file a status report with the court.
I had a case much like this several years ago and the appellate court reversed the sentence and remanded it for resentencing before a different and unprejudiced judge. Walking back erroneous statements cannot unring the bell of a judge’s prejudice.
It is obvious that Judge Sullivan regards Flynn as guilty of far more serious crimes than he pleaded to or was even charged with committing.
Sullivan probably came into the courtroom before the recess with his mind made up about the sentence he intended to impose based on his erroneous views regarding treason and Flynn’s supposed role as an agent for a foreign government while serving in the White House. The judge may even have written out the sentence in advance, as many judges do.
Sullivan deliberately telegraphed his intention to impose a prison sentence in defiance of the joint recommendation of the Mueller and Flynn’s defense attorney, who agreed that Flynn should not serve any prison time.
The Constitution limits the role of federal judges to actual “cases and controversies,” and there was no controversy regarding the appropriate sentence of probation for Flynn.
To be sure, the courts have carved out an exception – erroneously in my view – to this constitutional restriction on the jurisdiction of judges when it comes to sentencing. But most judges abide by the spirit of the constitutional restriction by rarely, if ever, imposing their own view when the parties have agreed.
Not Judge Sullivan, who knows far less about the facts and the defendant than do the parties, as evidenced by his serious misstatements.
Now the sentencing has been postponed, giving members of Flynn’s legal team an opportunity to reconsider their strategy.
There were serious issues surrounding the circumstances of Flynn’s questioning by the FBI and of the guilty plea he submitted. But Flynn’s lawyers understandably declined to raise challenges on these issues, because they expected a sentence of probation for their client – for which Flynn needed to show remorse, not contentiousness.
But now that the judge has signaled his willingness to consider a prison sentence, Flynn has three options – none of them good.
Flynn’s first option is to ask the judge to throw out his questionable guilty plea – but it will be difficult to do so in light of his statement at the sentencing hearing that he accepts his guilty plea and knew he was doing wrong when he lied to the FBI.
Flynn’s second option is to cooperate even more, but there may not be much more he can say or do. If he admits he withheld some cooperation that would hurt him.
The former national security adviser’s third option – a nuclear one – would be to seek to recuse Judge Sullivan because of the judge’s prejudicial misstatements about treason and about Flynn being a foreign agent while working in the White House. But this, too, may backfire, because judges often punish defendants for “judge shopping”.
So the sentencing will go forward after a delay. In the meantime, President Trump has the power to pardon Flynn or commute his sentence, either now or after the sentence is imposed.
Flynn can’t count on such executive action. But he also can’t count on Judge Sullivan to do what both parties recommended.
Flynn shouldn’t have lied to the FBI. He has already paid a heavy price and will probably pay an even heavier one.

Ocasio-Cortez Cartoons

Why some conservatives don't like the ruling against ObamaCare

Conservatives who have long despised ObamaCare might be expected to rejoice now that a federal judge in Texas has ruled the law unconstitutional.
But few of them are popping champagne corks, at least in the media.
"No one opposes ObamaCare more than we do," says The Wall Street Journal's editorial page, but the ruling "is likely to be overturned on appeal and may boomerang politically on Republicans."
ObamaCare was a "misbegotten law," says National Review. "Yet we cannot applaud Judge Reed O'Connor's decision. Indeed, we deplore it. It will not lead to the replacement of Obamacare, as much as we desire that outcome. It will instead give Republicans another opportunity to dodge their responsibility to advance legislation toward that end ... it is very likely to be overturned on appeal because it deserves to be."
ObamaCare was flawed legislation, to say the least, that drove up premiums for some people and, despite the former president's promises, caused others to lose their doctors and their plans.
But there's a reason that a Republican Congress, with President Trump's backing, failed in three attempts to repeal and replace the law. Much of the GOP didn't want to take the political heat for causing millions of Americans to lose their health insurance.
The law has become more popular now that its namesake is out of office, and especially the provision that bars insurance companies from rejecting people with preexisting conditions. Many Republicans spent the campaign vowing to preserve that part of the law (even some who had voted to abolish ObamaCare or moved to weaken it at the state level).
Not everyone on the right agrees. The Federalist says the judge's ruling is overdue because "the blunt reality that Obamacare was always at heart a bad-faith proposition. The basic operation of the law, never stated or acknowledged by its authors, was to force younger, healthier people to subsidize health insurance for older, sicker people. It was a redistribution scheme, plain and simple."
By the way, it's no coincidence that the decision came from O'Connor, a controversial and conservative Bush appointee who frequently ruled against the Obama administration. Nor is it happenstance that the states that filed the suit did so in Texas, where the courts are more conservative — the flip side of Trump complaining about lawsuits in the liberal 9th District in San Francisco.
When the John Roberts court upheld the law in 2012, it said Congress couldn't force people to buy insurance through the individual mandate, but that was okay because it could tax people for not buying coverage.
Last year, as part of tax reform, Congress set the penalty tax at zero, effectively eliminating the mandate. O'Connor ruled that the whole law must be tossed out because it's based on a tax-slash-mandate that no longer exists.
It's doubtful that the Supreme Court will buy this argument, but the political impact, in the short term, is clear. Democrats see a boost in their effort to pass some version of Medicare for All, although the ruling should freeze things and the GOP Senate won't go along in any event. Republicans have to navigate a path between rhetorical opposition to ObamaCare and not taking steps that would cause a health care crisis and blow up the preexisting conditions ban.
Trump, while tweeting that the law is an "UNCONSTITUTIONAL DISASTER," was quick to add: "Now Congress must pass a STRONG law that provides GREAT healthcare and protects pre-existing conditions. Mitch and Nancy, get it done!"
But getting it done would have been easier when Nancy was minority leader. Ultimately, a divided Congress, not the courts, must figure out a way out of this mess.

Flynn responses in fateful White House interview documented in witness report released by Mueller

Then-National Security Adviser Michael Flynn told FBI agents at the White House on January 24, 2017 "not really" when asked if he had sought to convince Russian ambassador not to escalate a brewing fight with the U.S. over sanctions imposed by the Obama administration, according to an explosive new FD-302 witness report released just hours before Flynn is set to be sentenced.
Flynn issued other apparently equivocal responses to FBI agents' questions, and at various points suggested that such conversations might have happened or that he could not recall them if they did, according to the 302.
The heavily redacted document contained few definitive statements from Flynn, who later pleaded guilty to making false statements about his contacts with Russia's ambassador, in connection with the White House meeting.
Flynn was not charged with wrongdoing as a result of the substance of his calls with the Russian ambassador -- and a Washington Post article published one day before his White House interview with the agents, citing FBI sources, publicly revealed that the FBI had wiretapped Flynn's calls and cleared him of any criminal conduct.
ANTI-TRUMP FBI AGENT PETER STRZOK, WHO INTERVIEWED FLYNN, HAD 'MEDIA LEAK STRATEGY'
The 302 indicates that Flynn was apparently aware his communications had been monitored, and at several points he thanks the FBI agents for reminding him of some of his conversations with Russian officials.
Separately, a newly unsealed indictment Monday revealed that two Flynn associates had been charged with illegally lobbying for Turkey without properly registering under the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA), and Mueller has claimed Flynn also lied about his lobbying projects there. Flynn's guilty plea and cooperation with the Mueller probe helped him avoid similar FARA-related charges, legal analysts have said.
The newly released 302 was finalized on Feb. 15, 2017 after it was reviewed by top FBI brass, just two days following Flynn's resignation after he misled Vice President Pence about his communications with then-Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak.
The document stated that Flynn told agents "not really" and "I don't remember" when they asked if he had requested Kislyak and the Russians not engage in a "tit-for-tat" with the U.S. government over the Obama administration's sanctions in December 2016, or whether he had asked the Russians not to "escalate" the matter and to keep their response "reciprocal." (Trump, at the time, publicly said he wanted the U.S. to "move on" and not engage in a bitter dispute with Russia.)
Flynn -- who sold his home in Virginia this year as his legal bills mounted -- declared in his guilty plea nearly 11 months later that his comments on the issue were a knowing lie to the FBI agents.
"It wasn't, 'Don't do anything,'" Flynn told the agents when they asked him if he had requested that the Russian ambassador not retaliate against the U.S., according to the 302. Flynn intimated that the U.S. government's harsh sanctions came as a "total surprise" to him, the document states.
Separately, agents asked Flynn whether Kislyak had promised that Russia would "modulate" its response to the sanctions, which were imposed by the Obama administration in its final days in power in response to Russian election meddling.
TOP REPUBLICAN PREDICTS FLYNN GUILTY PLEA WILL BE TOSSED, CITING FBI 'MISCONDUCT'
"Flynn stated it was possible that he talked to Kislyak on the issue," the 302 stated, "but if he did, he did not remember doing so. Flynn stated he was attempting to start a good relationship with Kislyak moving forward."
The 302 continued: "Flynn remembered making four to five calls that day about this issue, but that the Dominican Republic [where he was vacationing] was a difficult place to make a call as he kept having connectivity issues. Flynn reflected and stated that he did not think he would have had a conversation with Kislyak about the matter, as he did not know the expulsions [of 35 Russian diplomats from the U.S. as part of the Obama administration's sanctions] were coming."
An entire paragraph of the 302 concerning a "closed-door meeting" between Flynn and Kislyak after the presidential election was redacted.

Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, at right, meets with President Trump and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. The May 10, 2017 meeting took place the same day Trump fired James Comey as FBI Director. Trump was widely criticized during the meeting for revealing information to the Russians about intelligence obtained from Israel about an ISIS terror plot involving laptop bombs. Although the president has the authority to disclose classified information, critics charged the move was reckless and endangered Israeli sources. (AP)

The document concluded by noting that "Flynn stated he did not have a long drawn out discussion with Kislyak where he would have asked him to 'don't do something.'"
Flynn, in fact, had asked Kislyak to "refrain from escalating the situation in response to sanctions that the United States had imposed on Russia that same day," according to prosecutors, who said Kislyak "had chosen to moderate its response to those sanctions as a result of his request."
Flynn also denied to investigators that he had asked Russia to vote in any particular way at the United Nations, saying his only calls to countries were requests for information as to how they planned to vote. But prosecutors said that Flynn had sought to convince Russia to veto a U.N. Security Council resolution that condemned Israel’s settlements in the West Bank. (The Obama administration abstained in that vote, which Republicans characterized as a betrayal of a close U.S. ally.)
EX-SENATE INTEL STAFFER PLEADS GUILTY TO LYING TO FBI -- BUT DID HE LEAK FISA APPLICATION DAMAGING TO TRUMP?
Prosecutors addititonally charged that a "very senior member” of the Trump transition team directed Flynn to contact foreign governments including Russia over the U.N. vote. The Associated Press reported the “very senior” official was Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner.
During the interview at the White House, Flynn twice thanked agents for reminding him about his contacts with Kislyak concerning the U.N. -- an apparent indication that he was well aware that the FBI, as The Post reported, had listened to his conversations. ("Yes, good reminder," he said at one point, according to the 302.)
Special Counsel Robert Mueller filed the witness report documenting FBI agents' fateful conversation with Flynn late Monday, shortly after U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan issued an order Monday requiring that prosecutors publicly turn over the document.
Sullivan had ordered the special counsel to turn over all government documents and “memoranda” related to the questioning of Flynn last week, after Flynn's attorneys, in a bombshell filing, claimed the FBI had discouraged him from bringing a lawyer to the White House interview and intentionally decided not to warn him of the consequences if he lied to agents.
Fired FBI Director James Comey admitted last week that the FBI's end-run around the White House Counsel -- which the FBI usually involves in any of its interviews with senior White House officials -- was not normal protocol, and that the FBI felt it could get "away with" the tactic in the early days of the Trump administration.
COMEY: WE GOT 'AWAY WITH' FLYNN INTERVIEW, BROKE PROTOCOL
Last Friday, Mueller met Sullivan’s deadline and provided some documents, some of which were heavily redacted. One memorandum produced by Mueller substantiated the claims by Flynn's lawyers that the FBI had cautioned Flynn against involving a lawyer in the interview because doing so would necessitate the Justice Department's involvement.
The memorandum, written by then-Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe, also confirmed that agents did not want to affect their "rapport" with Flynn by suggesting he would be exposed to criminal liability if he lied.
"I explained that I thought the quickest way to get this done was to have a conversation between [Flynn] and the agents only," McCabe wrote. "I further stated that if LTG Flynn wished to include anyone else in the meeting, like the White House Counsel for instance, that I would need to involve the Department of Justice. [General Flynn] stated that this would not be necessary and agreed to meet with the agents without any additional participants."

In this image made from a video taken on Dec. 10, 2015 and made available on Tuesday, Feb. 14, 2017, US President Donald Trump's former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, right, shakes hands with Russian President Vladimir Putin, in Moscow.  (Ruptly via AP) (The Associated Press)

However, the special counsel did not publicly provide the January 302 witness report that FBI policy dictated should have been written immediately after the Flynn interview, leading to speculation as to whether one was drafted.
Sullivan's order on Monday stated that Mueller's team had made confidential arguments under seal as to redactions it would need to make to the 302. Sullivan ruled that the redactions were appropriate and that due to "strong presumption in favor of public access to judicial records," the 302 could be made public Monday.
STRZOK'S PHONE COMPLETELY WIPED AFTER HE WAS FIRED BY MUELLER FOR ANTI-TRUMP BIAS
The Flynn 302 released Monday further claimed Flynn was advised about the "nature of the interview" before it began.
However, the McCabe memorandum released Friday apparently showed that the FBI nudged Flynn not to have an attorney present during the questioning. And FBI agents deliberately did not instruct Flynn that any false statements he made could constitute a crime, and decided not to "confront" him directly about anything he said that contradicted their knowledge of his wiretapped communications with Kislyak.
One of the agents who conducted the Flynn interview, Peter Strzok, was fired from the Russia probe in late July 2017 over his apparent anti-Trump bias.
Other portions of the document described apparently routine calls between Flynn and Kislyak about other matters.
On Sunday, GOP Rep. Devin Nunes told Fox News' "Sunday Morning Futures" it was likely Flynn pleaded guilty only because of overwhelming financial pressure and because "he was just out of money."
California Republican Rep. Darrell Issa, for his part, told host Maria Bartiromo that he "would not be surprised a bit if the conviction of Flynn is overturned, because of the Justice Department and FBI's misconduct."
In June, Freedom Caucus Chair Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C, charged that the FBI may have "edited and changed" key witness reports in the Hillary Clinton and Russia investigations. Meadows also raised the possibility that the FBI misled the Department of Justice watchdog in an attempt to hide the identities of FBI employees who were caught sending anti-Trump messages along with Strzok.
Speaking separately to "Fox News Sunday," Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani flatly charged that Flynn had been "railroaded" and "framed."
"What they did to General Flynn should result in discipline," Giuliani told host Chris Wallace. "They’re the ones who are violating the law.
Giuliani acknowledged that Flynn had misled Pence regarding his conversations with the then-Russian ambassador, but added, "that was a lie, but that’s not a crime."

Ocasio-Cortez takes time off for 'self-help,' laments loss of yoga sessions due to politics

Congresswoman-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez hasn’t yet started her new job, but she’s already taking a break.
The Democratic Socialist said Monday that she’s taking time a week off for “self-care” after feeling burned out and lamented that her political activity changed her lifestyle.
“I am starting a week of self-care where I am taking the week off and taking care of me. I don't know how to do that though, so I would appreciate any and all self-care tips,” she said in an Instagram video.
“For working people, immigrants, & the poor, self-care is political — not because we want it to be, but bc of the inevitable shaming of someone doing a face mask while financially stressed. So I’ve decided to take others along with me on IG as I learn what self-care even means and why it’s important,” she added on Twitter.
Ocasio-Cortez, who unseated powerful New York Democrat Joe Crowley earlier this year during the primary election and easily cruised to victory in general election as she had no real opposition, went on to say that since her entry into politics and activism, she had to give up her more comfortable lifestyle.
“Before the campaign, I used to practice yoga 3-4x/week, eat nutritiously, read and write for leisure,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote on Instagram. “As soon as everything kicked up, that all went out the window. I went from doing yoga and making wild rice and salmon dinners to eating fast food for dinner and falling asleep in my jeans and makeup.”

"Before the campaign, I used to practice yoga 3-4x/week, eat nutritiously, read and write for leisure. As soon as everything kicked up, that all went out the window. I went from doing yoga and making wild rice and salmon dinners to eating fast food for dinner and falling asleep in my jeans and makeup."
— Congresswoman-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

“I keep things raw and honest on here since I believe public servants do a disservice to our communities by pretending to be perfect,” she added. “It makes things harder for others who aspire to run someday if they think they have to be superhuman before they even try.”
The New York Democrat revealed that she decided to spend “a few days in the middle of nowhere” in upstate New York.
Ocasio-Cortez, together with other newly-elected lawmakers, will start her term on Jan. 3.

Reporter who broke news of Steele dossier used to surveil ex-Trump aide calls its claims largely 'false'

The salacious and unverified opposition research dossier cited by the FBI as its main justification to surveil a top Trump aide contains many claims that are "likely false," according to the Yahoo News reporter who was among the first to break the news of the dossier's existence.
Michael Isikoff's statements on John Ziegler's Free Speech Broadcasting podcast came a day before Michael Cohen adviser Lanny Davis reiterated that Cohen has never been to Prague -- where, according to the dossier, he traveled to arrange a payment to Russian hackers during the 2016 presidential campaign.
The dossier was created by British ex-spy Christopher Steele and funded by the firm Fusion GPS -- which was retained by the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign.
"In broad strokes, Christopher Steele was clearly onto something, that there was a major Kremlin effort to interfere in our elections, that they were trying to help Trump's campaign, and that there was multiple contacts between various Russian figures close to the government and various people in Trump's campaign,” Isikoff said.
But he added: “When you actually get into the details of the Steele dossier, the specific allegations, we have not seen the evidence to support them, and, in fact, there's good grounds to think that some of the more sensational allegations will never be proven and are likely false."
On four occasions, the FBI told the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance (FISA) court that it "did not believe" Steele was the direct source for Isikoff's Sept. 23, 2016 Yahoo News article implicating former Trump aide Carter Page in Russian collusion.

Instead, the FBI suggested to the court, the article by Michael Isikoff was independent corroboration of the salacious, unverified allegations against Trump in the infamous Steele dossier. Federal authorities used both the Steele dossier and Yahoo News article to convince the FISA court to authorize a surveillance warrant for Page.
But London court records show that contrary to the FBI's assessments, Steele briefed Yahoo News and other reporters in the fall of 2016 at the direction of Fusion GPS -- the opposition research firm behind the dossier. The revelations were contained heavily-redacted documents released earlier this year after a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by the organization Judicial Watch.
"The FBI does not believe that Source #1 [Steele] directly provided this information to the identified news organization that published the September 23rd News Article," the FBI stated in one of the released FISA documents. "Source #1 told the FBI that he/she only provided this information to the business associate and the FBI."
The documents describe Source #1 as someone "hired by a business associate to conduct research" into Trump's Russia ties -- but do not mention that Fusion GPS was funded by the DNC and Clinton campaign.
Instead, the documents say only: "The FBI speculates that the identified U.S. person was likely looking for information that could be used to discredit [Trump's] campaign." Fox News believes that the U.S. person is Glenn Simpson, co-founder of Fusion GPS.

Senior Justice Department official Bruce Ohr, left, continued to communicate with former British spy Christopher Steele, right, even after the FBI cut ties with him. (AP)

Page announced in October he is filing a defamation lawsuit against the DNC over the dossier's claims. He is also suing Perkins Coie and its partners, the law firm that represented Clinton’s campaign and hired Fusion GPS.
Page told Fox News’ “Hannity” at the time that his lawsuit goes “beyond any damages or any financial aspects."
“There have been so many lies as you’re alluding to and you look at the damage it did to our Democratic systems and our institutions of government back in 2016. And I’m just trying to get some justice,” he said.
Meanwhile, ex-Cohen attorney Lanny Davis laughed off a suggestion during an MSNBC interview on Sunday that his former client had ever made a trip to Prague to pay Russian hackers.
“No, no Prague, ever, never,” Davis said.
While Cohen's team has long denied he made the trip, the latest denial comes after Cohen pleaded guilty in two separate prosecutions linked to his work for President Trump. Cohen has pledged to cooperate with federal authorities, and Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team has said he has largely done so.
ANTI-TRUMP EX-FBI AGENT STRZOK'S PHONE WIPED AFTER HE WAS FIRED FROM MUELLER'S TEAM
Fox News reported in August that embattled Justice Department official Bruce Ohr had contact in 2016 with then-colleague Andrew Weissmann, who is now a top Mueller deputy, as well as other senior FBI officials about the controversial anti-Trump dossier and the individuals behind it.
The sources said Ohr's outreach about the dossier – as well as Steele; the opposition research firm behind it, Glenn Simpson’s Fusion GPS; and his wife Nellie Ohr's work for Fusion – occurred before and after the FBI fired Steele as a source over his media contacts. Ohr's network of contacts on the dossier included: anti-Trump former FBI agent Peter Strzok; former FBI lawyer Lisa Page; former deputy director Andrew McCabe; Weissmann and at least one other DOJ official; and a current FBI agent who worked with Strzok on the Russia case.
Weissmann was kept "in the loop" on the dossier, a source said, while he was chief of the criminal fraud division. He is now assigned to Mueller’s team.
Ohr's broad circle of contacts indicates members of FBI leadership knew about his backchannel activities regarding the dossier and Steele.
Congressional Republicans are still trying to get to the bottom of Ohr's role in circulating the unverified dossier, which became a critical piece of evidence in obtaining a surveillance warrant for Page in October 2016.