Obama White House may have seen 'opportunity to disrupt' Flynn, ex-FBI official says

It would be "abominable" if the Obama White House was behind the FBI's controversial interview of former national security adviser Michael Flynn, a former assistant director of intelligence for the bureau said Friday night.

Kevin Brock shared his observations during an appearance on Fox News' "The Ingraham Angle," where he responded to reports that former President Barack Obama had claimed the “rule of law is at risk" after the Justice Department dropped its case against Flynn over charges of lying to investigators.
"I think they saw this as an opportunity to disrupt the general. And I think what we have to find out [is...] -- this is critically important -- did the FBI conduct this interview at the behest of the White House or was it motivated by their own now well-established personal biases and prejudices against the president?" Brock told guest host Raymond Arroyo.
"That has to be determined. If it's the former ... Well, if it's either, it's abominable."
“The news over the last 24 hours I think has been somewhat downplayed -- about the Justice Department dropping charges against Michael Flynn,” Obama said, according to Yahoo! News, in a web talk with members of the Obama Alumni Association.
“And the fact that there is no precedent that anybody can find for someone who has been charged with perjury just getting off scot-free," Obama reportedly said. "That’s the kind of stuff where you begin to get worried that basic -- not just institutional norms -- but our basic understanding of rule of law is at risk."
Yahoo! News, in reporting the tape, noted that Obama incorrectly states the charges against Flynn, who was not charged with perjury. Instead, Flynn pleaded guilty in 2017 to lying to the FBI about his conversations with the Russian ambassador in the transition period between the Obama and Trump administrations. But Flynn’s supporters have long argued that the FBI set a perjury trap for Flynn.
Brock disagreed with Obama's alleged comments.
"My response to that is the abrogation of the rule of law was conducting an investigation that was not legally predicated," Brock said. "So if I go in and I talk you, Raymond, about something... that's not a federal crime as an FBI agent and I accuse you of doing it and I have proof that you did it, but it's not a federal crime... and you lie to me. There's no materiality there because there's no reason for me to be investigating in the first place."
New details emerged this week about what Obama himself knew at the time of the Flynn case. Obama warned the Trump administration against hiring Flynn and said he was “not a fan” of the former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Fox News' Adam Shaw contributed to this story.

California Democrat reacts to Tesla lawsuit, pullout plan over coronavirus rules: ‘F--- Elon Musk’

Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez of San Diego

Elon Musk

A California Democrat seemed less than upset Saturday night at the news that entrepreneur Elon Musk planned to pull much of his company Tesla – along with an unspecified number of jobs -- out of the state over coronavirus shutdown rules that have stalled the automaker's operations.
Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez of San Diego appeared to be saying something along the lines of “Good riddance” – except she didn’t exactly use those words.
“F--- Elon Musk,” was Gonzalez’s brief response on Twitter.
Her message contrasted sharply with those from lawmakers and candidates in Texas and Nevada, where Musk said his company plans to relocate. They seemed pleased with the news that jobs would be coming to their states instead of leaving.
“Texas gets better every day,” U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, wrote on Twitter, retweeting Musk’s announcement of Tesla’s planned California pullout. “Good conservative principles make good governance, and attract the best and the brightest. The future is happening in Texas.”
In Nevada, Dan Rodimer – a retired professional wrestler running for Congress as a Republican – also welcomed the Tesla news.
“Nevada NEEDS these jobs most of all right now, @elonmusk,” Rodimer wrote. “We would love to have you and Tesla HQ right here in the Battleborn State!”
Earlier Saturday, Musk wrote on Twitter that he planned to move Tesla’s headquarters and “future programs” to Texas and Nevada – adding that the company’s current facility in Fremont, Calif., in the San Francisco Bay area would remain open for some activity “dependent on how Tesla is treated in the future.”
Musk noted for his nearly 34 million Twitter followers that Tesla was “the last carmaker left in CA.” He referred to Tesla’s dispute with Alameda County, where Fremont is located, as “the final straw.”
In its lawsuit, filed Saturday, Tesla referred to the actions of Alameda County as a “power grab.”
“Alameda County’s power grab not only defies the governor’s orders, but offends the federal and California constitution,” the suit claims, according to the Mercury News of San Jose.
In a previous tweet, Musk said Tesla would be filing a lawsuit against Alameda County over the company not being allowed to reopen because of coronavirus-related rules.
“The unelected & ignorant ‘Interim Health Officer’ of Alameda is acting contrary to the Governor, the President, our Constitutional freedoms & just plain common sense,” Musk wrote.
Erica Pan, the Alameda County health officer, had said Friday that Tesla was working with the county, but the company had not yet been cleared to reopen the Fremont facility, even after California Gov. Gavin Newsom said Thursday that manufacturers would be allowed to resume operations, Reuters reported.
In March, Tesla appeared to be operating the Fremont factory in defiance of a local “shelter in place” order over the pandemic, the report said.
Pan told Reuters Friday that the health department had recommended Tesla wait at least one more week to monitor infection rates before reopening.
Tesla has already restarted its China factory after the pandemic forced it to temporarily close. Musk pointed to that as an example of how the company could reopen responsibly elsewhere.
“Tesla knows far more about what needs to be done to be safe through our Tesla China factory experience than an (unelected) interim junior official in Alameda County,” he tweeted.
Alameda County spokeswoman Neetu Balram issued a statement in response to Tesla’s lawsuit, saying the county’s Public Health Department has been working with Tesla in “a collaborative, good faith effort to develop and implement a safety plan that allows for reopening while protecting the health and well-being of the thousands of employees who travel to and from work at Tesla’s factory," the Mercury News reported.
“The team at Tesla has been responsive to our guidance and recommendations, and we look forward to coming to an agreement on an appropriate safety plan very soon,” the statement added.
The Mercury News report noted that Fremont’s mayor and the Bay Area Council seemed to be siding with Musk in calling for Alameda County to loosen the restrictions on the automaker.
Musk has previously criticized Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom over statewide coronavirus rules.
Fox Business' James Leggate contributed to this story.

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Court halts ban on mass gatherings at Kentucky churches

FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — A federal court halted the Kentucky governor’s temporary ban on mass gatherings from applying to in-person religious services, clearing the way for Sunday church services.

U.S. District Judge Gregory F. Van Tatenhove on Friday issued a temporary restraining order enjoining Gov. Andy Beshear’s administration from enforcing the ban on mass gatherings at “any in-person religious service which adheres to applicable social distancing and hygiene guidelines.”

The ruling from the Eastern District of Kentucky sided with the Tabernacle Baptist Church in Nicholasville, but applies to all places of worship around the commonwealth. Two other federal judges, including U.S. District Judge David Hale, had previously ruled the ban was constitutional. But also on Friday, Hale, of Kentucky’s western district, granted Maryville Baptist Church an injunction allowing in-person services at that specific church, provided it abide by public health requirements.

Exceptions to the Democratic governor’s shutdown order include trips to the grocery store, bank, pharmacy and hardware store. Beshear had previously announced that places of worship in Kentucky will be able to once again hold in-person services starting May 20, as part of a broader plan to gradually reopen the state’s economy. Earlier Friday, he outlined requirements for places of worship to reopen, including limiting attendance at in-person services to 33% of building occupancy capacity and maintaining 6 feet (2 meters) of distance between household units.

The federal judge’s order in the Tabernacle Baptist Church case said Beshear had “an honest motive” in wanting to safeguard Kentuckians’ health and lives, but didn’t provide “a compelling reason for using his authority to limit a citizen’s right to freely exercise something we value greatly — the right of every American to follow their conscience on matters related to religion.”

Tabernacle had broadcast services on Facebook and held drive-in services, but the substitutes offered “cold comfort,” according to the opinion. The opinion went on to say that Tabernacle alleged irreparable injury and was likely to succeed on the merits of its federal constitutional claim, as the defendants didn’t “dispute the challenged orders place a burden on the free exercise of religion in Kentucky.”

“The Constitution will endure. It would be easy to put it on the shelf in times like this, to be pulled down and dusted off when more convenient,” Van Tatenhove’s opinion read. “But that is not our tradition. Its enduring quality requires that it be respected even when it is hard.”

His opinion says Kentucky’s attorney general urged the court to apply the injunction statewide, and since the executive order challenged didn’t solely apply to Tabernacle, the injunction granted would also have a similar scope.

“Both rulings affirm that the law prohibits the government from treating houses of worship differently than secular activities during this pandemic,” Attorney General Daniel Cameron, a Republican, said in a statement late Friday.

A three-judge federal appeal court panel had last week cleared the way for Maryville Baptist Church to hold drive-in worship services while adhering to public health requirements, an alternative that Beshear has strongly encouraged throughout the coronavirus pandemic. But that panel had stopped short of applying its order to in-person worship services.

Maryville had defied Beshear’s order for houses of worship to not hold in-person services amid the COVID-19 outbreak. At least 50 people attended its Easter service at the church, and the church has held other services since. In response, the governor said Kentucky State Police troopers would record license plates and place notices on vehicles telling Easter service attendees they would have to self-quarantine.

Maryville had turned to the appeals court after Hale had initially refused to stop Beshear’s order from applying to religious services, saying it bans all mass gatherings and thus does not discriminate against religion.

In his order Friday, Hale said the governor failed to prove there was no less restrictive alternative to help reduce the spread of COVID-19 and failed to address the appeals court’s suggestion to limit the number of people who could attend services. He said that the burden of proof was on the governor and Maryville Baptist Church “would likely succeed on the merits of their claim under the Kentucky Religious Freedom Restoration Act.”

Beshear’s office had not issued a statement on the injunctions as of late Friday night.

For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up within weeks. For some, especially older adults and those with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, even death.

Russia, Belarus mark Victory Day in contrasting events

MOSCOW (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin marked Victory Day, the anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II, in a ceremony shorn of its usual military parade and pomp by the coronavirus pandemic.

In neighboring Belarus, however, the ceremonies went ahead in full, with tens of thousands of people in the sort of proximity that has been almost unseen in the world for months.

Putin on Saturday laid flowers at the tomb of the unknown soldier just outside the Kremlin walls and gave a short address honoring the valor and suffering of the Soviet army during the war.

Victory Day is Russia’s most important secular holiday and this year’s observance had been expected to be especially large because it is the 75th anniversary, but the Red Square military parade and a mass procession called The Immortal Regiment were postponed as part of measures to stifle the spread of the virus.

The only vestige of the conventional show of military might was a flyover of central Moscow by 75 warplanes and helicopters.

The ceremony was the first public appearance in about a month for Putin, who has worked remotely as the virus took hold.

In his speech, he did not mention the virus — Russia has nearly 200,000 confirmed cases — or how its spread had blocked the observances that were to be a prestige project for him.

But he promised that full commemorations would take place.

“We will, as usual, widely and solemnly mark the anniversary date, do it with dignity, as our duty to those who have suffered, achieved and accomplished the victory tells us,” he said. “There will be our main parade on Red Square, and the national march of the Immortal Regiment — the march of our grateful memory and inextricable, vital, living communication between generations.”

The sharply reduced observances this year left a hole in Russia’s civic and emotional calendar. The war, in which the Soviet Union lost an estimated 26 million people including 8.5 million soldiers, has become a fundamental piece of Russian national identity.

Beyond the stern formalities of the Red Square military parade and smaller parades in other cities, Russians in recent years have turned out in huge numbers for the Immortal Regiment processions, when civilians crowd the streets displaying photographs of relatives who died in the war or endured it. Russian officials routinely bristle at criticism of the Red Army’s actions in the war, denouncing the comments as attempts to “rewrite history.”

An online substitute for the processions was taking place Saturday and many people are expected to display relatives’ photos from their balconies and windows in the evening.

A full military parade of some 3,000 soldiers was held Saturday in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, which has not imposed restrictions to block the virus’ spread despite sharply rising infection figures. Tens of thousands of spectators, few of them wearing masks, watched the event.

President Alexander Lukashenko, who has dismissed concerns about the virus as a “psychosis,” said at the parade that Belarus’ ordeal in the war “is incomparable with any difficulties of the present day.”

In one of the final events of the VE Day commemoration in Western Europe, which took place a day earlier, Berlin’s landmark Brandenburg Gate was illuminated late Friday.

The words “Thank You” against a blue backdrop were projected onto the monument in Russian, English, French and German.

Earlier in the day German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier described May 8 as the day Germany, too, was “liberated” from Nazi dictatorship.

___

Yuras Karmanau in Minsk, Belarus, contributed to this report.

Trump says ‘jury’s still out’ on FBI boss Wray – despite Barr defense

In a Fox News interview Friday, President Trump was noncommittal on whether FBI Director Christopher Wray would remain in the job following the Justice Department’s decision to drop its case against Michael Flynn.
“Let’s see what happens with him,” the president told “Fox & Friends,” adding that “the jury’s still out” on Wray’s future in the bureau.
Trump said he would leave the decision up to Attorney General William Barr, head of the Justice Department, which oversees the FBI.
“You know, I told Bill Barr, you handle it,” the president said. “I would be absolutely entitled in theory, as the chief law enforcement officer, in theory. But I said, ‘You know what, I want Bill Barr to handle it,” adding that the attorney general “has done an unbelievable job.”
One day earlier, Barr appeared to defend Wray during an interview with CBS News, although he claimed that both he and Wray needed to “step up” following the Flynn case.
“You know, he's been a great partner to me in our effort to restore the American people's confidence in both the Department of Justice and the FBI,” Barr said Thursday, according to the Washington Examiner. “And we work very well together. And I think both of us know that we have to step up. That it's very important to restore the American people's confidence.”
In the same interview, Barr said he still had confidence in Wray’s ability to do the job.
“Well, you know, Chris Wray has always supported and been very helpful in various investigations we've been running,” Barr told CBS. “But, you know, there are a lot of cases in the Department of Justice, and I don't consider it the director's responsibility to make sure that all the documents are produced in each case. So I don't — I wouldn't say that this has affected my confidence in Director Wray.”
Also defending Wray on Friday was Brian O'Hare, president of the FBI Agents Association.
The director “continues to lead through unprecedented challenges with a steady hand,” O’Hare told The Washington Post, credting Wray with making “the changes needed to ensure that the FBI is best positioned to deal with threats to the American people.”
On Thursday, Barr’s Justice Department moved to drop its case against Flynn, the former U.S. national security adviser who had pleaded guilty in 2017 to lying to the FBI. The decision followed the release of documents that called into question the handling of the Flynn case by FBI personnel.
On the same day, the FBI’s top prosecutor in the case, Brandon Van Grack, abruptly withdrew, without explanation.
Prior to the Justice Department dropping the Flynn case, several Republicans on Capitol Hill and in the Trump administration placed pressure on Wray following the release of the documents, which included handwritten notes from former FBI official Bill Priestap that showed FBI personnel had debated whether they should try to catch Flynn in a lie during a conversation at the White House on Jan. 24, 2017 – just days after President Trump took office.
Although Wray did not become FBI director until August of that year – succeeding James Comey, whom Trump fired in May 2017 – Republicans including Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio and Mike Johnson of Louisiana earlier this week questions why Wray hadn’t previously divulged information about the Flynn case that wasn’t made public until earlier this week.
“It is well past time that you show the leadership necessary to bring the FBI past the abuses of the Obama-Biden era,” the congressmen wrote in a letter to Wray on Monday.
On Wednesday, counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway called on Wray and Comey to fully disclose what they know about the Flynn case.
“We have every need to know transparently what happened,” Conway told Fox News.
On Thursday, documents released in connection with the Justice Department’s motion to drop the Flynn case revealed that former President Barack Obama had been aware of details of intercepted December 2016 phone calls between Flynn and then-Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.
In statements to the Washington Examiner, Brian Hale, the FBI’s assistant director for the Office of Public Affairs, said that recently released documents from the Flynn case had previously been made available to the inspector general of the Justice Department and to U.S. Attorney John Durham, who had been appointed by Barr to investigate the origins of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.
Hale also underscored that Wray was not with the bureau at the time of the Flynn investigation.
“The Flynn investigation was initiated and conducted during this time period, under prior FBI leadership,” Hale said. “Since taking office, Director Wray has stressed the importance of strictly abiding by established processes, without exception. Director Wray remains firmly committed to addressing the failures under prior FBI leadership while maintaining the foundational principles of rigor, objectivity, accountability, and ownership in fulfilling the Bureau’s mission to protect the American people and defend the Constitution.”
Fox News’ Ronn Blitzer and Gregg Re contributed to this story.

Obama says ‘rule of law is at risk’ after DOJ dropped Michael Flynn case

Former President Barack Obama on Friday reacted to the Justice Department’s move to end its case against Michael Flynn by declaring that the “rule of law is at risk” -- as new details emerge about what the former president knew about the case against Flynn in the last days of his administration.
“The news over the last 24 hours I think has been somewhat downplayed — about the Justice Department dropping charges against Michael Flynn,” Obama said, according to News, in a web talk with members of the Obama Alumni Association
“And the fact that there is no precedent that anybody can find for someone who has been charged with perjury just getting off scot-free," he reportedly said. "That’s the kind of stuff where you begin to get worried that basic — not just institutional norms — but our basic understanding of rule of law is at risk. And when you start moving in those directions, it can accelerate pretty quickly as we’ve seen in other places.”
Yahoo News, in reporting the tape, noted that Obama incorrectly states the charges against Flynn, who was not charged with perjury. Instead, Flynn pleaded guilty in 2017 to lying to the FBI about his conversations with the Russian ambassador in the transition period between the Obama and Trump administrations. But Flynn’s supporters have long argued that the FBI set a perjury trap for Flynn.
The move this week by the DOJ came after the release of memos showing bureau officials debating at the time whether their purpose in interviewing Flynn was to get him to lie and prosecute him or get him to “admit to breaking the Logan Act” -- an obscure law that bars non-government officials from pretending to represent the U.S.
New details emerged also this week about what Obama himself knew at the time of the Flynn case. Obama warned the Trump administration against hiring Flynn and said he was “not a fan” of the former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency.
According to declassified interview transcripts, Obama told then-Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates and then-FBI Director James Comey in early 2017 that he had “learned of the information about Flynn” and his conversation with the Russian ambassador about sanctions
Obama "specified that he did not want any additional information on the matter, but was seeking information on whether the White House should be treating Flynn any differently, given the information."
At that point, the documents showed, "Yates had no idea what the president was talking about, but figured it out based on the conversation. Yates recalled Comey mentioning the Logan Act, but can't recall if he specified there was an 'investigation.' Comey did not talk about prosecution in the meeting."
The exhibit continues: "It was not clear to Yates from where the President first received the information. Yates did not recall Comey's response to the President's question about how to treat Flynn. She was so surprised by the information she was hearing that she was having a hard time processing it and listening to the conversation at the same time."
On Friday, Obama cited the Flynn case as a reason for why former officials needed to help his former Vice President Joe Biden beat Trump in November.
“So I am hoping that all of you feel the same sense of urgency that I do,” he said. “Whenever I campaign, I’ve always said, ‘Ah, this is the most important election.’ Especially obviously when I was on the ballot, that always feels like it's the most important election. This one — I’m not on the ballot — but I am pretty darn invested. We got to make this happen.”
Obama also reportedly cited the coronavirus pandemic as a reason to fight harder for Biden, blaming what he saw as a poor response on “tribal” trends stoked by Trump and his allies.
“What we’re fighting against is these long-term trends in which being selfish, being tribal, being divided, and seeing others as an enemy — that has become a stronger impulse in American life,” he said.
“And by the way, we’re seeing that internationally as well. It’s part of the reason why the response to this global crisis has been so anemic and spotty. It would have been bad even with the best of governments. It has been an absolute chaotic disaster when that mindset — of ‘what’s in it for me’ and ‘to heck with everybody else’ — when that mindset is operationalized in our government.”
Fox News’ Brooke Singman and Gregg Re contributed to this report.

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