Did Robert Mueller pave the way last night for Donald Trump obstruction of justice charges?
Last night Michael Flynn filed his own sentencing memo, which should have been a non-event considering that Special Counsel Robert Mueller has already recommended no jail time for Flynn. Yet strangely, Flynn included some key details about his initial interview with the FBI. Flynn wouldn’t have done this without Mueller’s approval. We were initially left a bit dumbfounded as to what Mueller was doing – but we think we may have finally cracked it.
Michael Flynn revealed last night that when he was first interviewed by the FBI about his contacts with the Russian Ambassador, he lied partly because he believed he was simply having a friendly conversation, and not being interviewed. Flynn then pointed out that one of the agents who interviewed him was Peter Strzok, and the person who signed off on the interview was Andrew McCabe, two people who have since been fired by Donald Trump. We think that’s the key, along with the timing.
Trump has, publicly and famously, carried out vicious lying propaganda campaigns against Strzok and McCabe, resulting in them both being fired for illegitimate reasons. As Palmer Report has long pointed out, there was never any clear reason for Trump to have been obsessively targeting these two guys. Now it turns out these were the two FBI guys who picked off Michael Flynn.
It’s not difficult to imagine a scenario in which McCabe sends Strzok to ask Flynn questions about Russia. Flynn then runs to Trump and warns him that these two guys must be onto the Trump-Russia plot. Trump then immediately orders probes into McCabe and Strzok, in the hope of taking them down before they could expose the plot. These probes end up unearthing Strzok’s affair with Lisa Page, along with McCabe’s minor infractions.
So why would Robert Mueller want to put public focus on this sordid storyline, by allowing Michael Flynn to include it in the sentencing memo? The short answer is that if Donald Trump ordered probes into Strzok and McCabe in an attempt at derailing the Trump-Russia investigation, that would be felony obstruction of justice on Trump’s part. Come to think of it, as Mike Pence seemed to be particularly protective of Flynn, did Flynn run to Pence about this? Did Pence order the illegal probes?
There is admittedly a lot here that is far from clear. But two things are rather clear. First, Michael Flynn wouldn’t have dared to rip the band-aid off the Strzok mess unless Robert Mueller signed off on it. Second, Mueller wouldn’t have been okay with Donald Trump’s favorite bogey men being mentioned in Flynn’s filing unless he has a very specific reason for wanting to publicly establish that it was Strzok and McCabe who first targeted Flynn. Stay tuned; there has to be more coming on this front soon.
