A "Delicious Reveal" re: Mueller Obtaining Trump Team E-Mails

[kpete]

Note: Trump team knew Beckler had died. They didn’t know he had failed to lock down their electronics and emails - and didn’t know GSA staff had produced them all without telling anyone.

So, Trump appointed Backler and then Backler went and ensured Trump transition team attorneys that he would not allow his org (the GSA) to provide any of their emails to investigators.

One problem: Backler fell ill and ultimately passed away.


So, until Mueller's crew started asking Trump aides about those emails, they had absolutely no idea Mueller had them because they thought Trump's guy on the inside was running interference for them.

Let that one sink in.*****

As we now know:

1) Mueller obtained ALL of the emails sent to/from Trump transition team accounts
2) The Trump gang only realized this after Mueller's team seemed to know all about their emails
3) This made them quite... upset

Link to tweet

4) Thier lawyers then wrote the letter in the link to congressmen complaining about just how upsetting all of this is.

Here's the classically amusing reveal in the letter...

Link to tweet

*****

Earlier this year, Trump appointed the top attorney at the office responsible for providing all the electronics and email accounts the Trump transition team used.

That attorney's name was Richard Backler. *****

Link to tweet

Now, as background, Backler was a white collar criminal defense attorney before his appointment.

He helped rich criminals beat government convictions for a firm with a name you'll find familiar.

Bracewell & Giuliani.

Link to tweet

*****

So, Trump appointed Backler and then Backler went and ensured Trump transition team attorneys that he would not allow his org (the GSA) to provide any of their emails to investigators.

One problem: Backler fell ill and ultimately passed away.

So, until Mueller's crew started asking Trump aides about those emails, they had absolutely no idea Mueller had them because they thought Trump's guy on the inside was running interference for them.

Let that one sink in.*****

Link to tweet

https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000160-616c-dcd4-a96b-756de2a90000

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

********UPDATE***********

A little dessert after last night’s sumptuous buffet of Trumpian karma:

That Giuliani fixer Trump installed to keep his transition team’s email buried deep?

He was an anti-Hillary guy. Wrote a letter to the WSJ in the “...but her emails!” vein.

Link to tweet

https://www.wsj.com/articles/fbi-wasnt-serious-about-hillarys-email-1473962236

[annabanana]

1. VERY valuable post as we listen to the squeals coming out

from every tRump apologist and compromised congresscritter out there.

And they will be LOUD!

[Achilleaze]

2. The KGOP republicans are so sleazy - "running interference"

interfering with the truth, and interfering with the honest exercise of American democracy. Disgusting.

Shame on the deceitful and duplicitous KGOP republican cabal, and their punkass ringleader, Comrade Casino, aka the republican Draft-Dodger-in-Chief.

[FailureToCommunicate]

25. +1 for "KGOP" !

I'd not heard that one before.

[pandr32]

31. I like it, too

Aptly describes the whole sell-out Party.

[calimary]

35. So if they are indeed running interference here

then how is that not THEIR OWN obstruction of justice? Could they be held responsible for that? Doesn’t that strongly suggest obstruction of justice on THEIR part?

[Irish_Dem]

51. They are protecting themselves at this point. The heck with Trump.

Their own necks are in peril.

[emulatorloo]

3. Thanks for posting. No wonder Trump and GOP are in panic mode

[emulatorloo]

4. (Mueller Team) "We have secured either the account owners consent or appropriate criminal process"

https://www.democraticunderground.com/10029993296

[Tanuki]

5. Giuliani has been might quiet for a while. I will be very pleased if he gets nailed

in all of this.

[Iggo]

38. He's an ex-DA. He knows the value of remaining silent.

[Irish_Dem]

39. He is in all of this and knows he is in deep trouble. nt

[Solly Mack]

6. K&R

[Wwcd]

7. Here's the full list of Trump transition team. Pence to Bondi & beyond

I guess any name on the list could be in those thousands of Emails, now in Muellers hands.

Full list from top level executive to staffers.
--------
No wonder Trump is panicked about Transition Team emails.
Imagine:
Chair: Pence
Vice Chairs: Gingrich, Flynn, Giuliani, Sessions;
Members: Trump Jr., Eric, Ivanka, Kushner, Bannon, Priebus, Peter Thiel, Marsha Blackburn, Rebekah Mercer, Pam Bondi...etc

Could be a lot of 'Felicias' in those emails. Wow!

https://ballotpedia.org/Donald_Trump_presidential_transition_team

[kpete]

9. Don't forget KellyAnne:

Among the likely names:

Pence, KellyAnne Conway, Hope Hicks, Jeff Sessions, Mike Flynn...

Link to tweet

[Wwcd]

11. The Kellyanne that never ever stops talking? 😭 I kinda feel sorry for her cellmate,

..unless its someone like Sara Huckabee, or Jeff Sessions.

[shraby]

13. Makes one feel warm and fuzzy all over.

[pangaia]

16. I hope hope hope they have Chris Collins MY sleazebag non-rep

[BumRushDaShow]

12. "Could be a lot of 'Felicias' in those emails."

DUzy!

[Eyeball_Kid]

44. From the Twitterverse, I read that Guiliani had offered to make a deal with Mueller.

But Mueller refused to make the deal more than once.

Why? Because Mueller will learn nothing new from Guiliani. In other words, Mueller already has Guiliani trapped and isn't going to give him a break. There will be no deal for Guiliani unless he offers to cop a plea first.

If true, this makes me happy. The thought of Guiliani dying in jail brings peace to my soul.

[kentuck]

8. Bookmarked!

Thanks!

[nolabels]

10. Makes sense to me

The Mueller's crew was asking about them and so with that idea in hand then these genius Trump aids assumed they didn't have them since they were asking about them. Then with that idea in hand, like some foolish ground sniffers do, they focused their efforts on the wrong target. All the while, the Mueller's crew was making hay going through them all.

Then you can add in that special guy, that guy named Backler, that criminal defense Attorney that was going to protect this end of the deal, appointed to the GSA having literally clocking out makes for a whole lot of gotcha.

In a normal case of criminal law all these weird things couldn't have happened but its an inside government case where it's just normal to do these type of housecleaning things and nothing special is needed other than just ordinary type of warrants. Looks like the smarter fox got to ole Hen-house first.

[concreteblue]

14. Next on Hannity: "Some people are saying.....

...That Mueller had Beckler killed so he could steal the emails!!!!!111!!!!"

[pangaia]

18. OH yes... 10, 9, 8 come on Kellie Ann... new face lift time...

[Ilsa]

20. You beat me to it! Of course they will say Mueller killed Beckler!

Or had him killed by someone in the "deep state FBI".

[Alwaysna]

32. No they will say Hillary

Had him killed because she is a sore loser.

[kag]

33. I'm curious...

Does anyone know what the "illness" was? I'm just wondering what he could have contracted and died of in such a relatively short period of time. Also, none of the obituaries or news stories I read say what it was, which makes me think AIDS or something that the family wouldn't have wanted the general public to know about. Just curious.

[Irish_Dem]

41. Yes how did Backler die? In light of all the recent Russian deaths

of people connected to Putin's coup of the US, does raise the question.

[2naSalit]

42. Wondered that myself....nt

[Ilsa]

46. Somewhere in the thread they are saying prostate cancer,

metastasized, killed him. Im surprised he took this appointment if he knew he was ill. I cant imagine it being this advanced without knowing you are ill.

Then again, maybe he took the job to make certain records were preserved. Maybe it was a "deathbed conversion" of sorts.

[Irish_Dem]

48. Yes if you know you are dying, why take such an important and sensitive job.

And why would the Trump people hire him under those circumstances.

Of course, all we know is what we are being told.

[L. Coyote]

15. In summary, they all lied to the FBI thinking someone was covering up their crimes. LOL.

This is going to be a really great indictments party.

[Irish_Dem]

49. Hard to imagine them being this naive, but there it is.

I wonder if they will ever realize how stupid they have been, or instead continue to blame other people.

[tazkcmo]

56. Hard to imagine?

Not for me since everyday these maroons exhibit new depths of incompetence. They really are that ignorant, stupid and full of hubris.

[Irish_Dem]

57. True, it still boggles my mind. nt

[L. Coyote]

59. This is the thing about illegal activity, you are forced to coverup for as longas possible.

Thinking you will get away with it is the foolishness. Then the cover up just adds to your problems, or becomes the worst problem. Lying to the FBI can be so much easier to prove than the original offense.

[Irish_Dem]

60. They got away with a lot in NYC. I guess they figured they were smarter

than Washington DC.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

17. Re excerpt: "assured" a person, "ensured" an action. . . . nt

[USALiberal]

19. Great post!! n.t

[rickford66]

21. So, was that the moment in time when God changed sides ?

[kpete]

34. YEP!

Bwahahhaaha! Sucks when your clean-up guy ventures off to meet his maker and leaves the evidence locker wide open.

[rickford66]

45. This should be the headline. Well said.

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

54. Bwaaaahhhhaaaahhhhaaaa!!

[kentuck]

22. I am astounded by the fact....

...that with all the problems facing this White House, Donald Trump was focused on getting Richard Beckler to keep all his communications within his Transition Team secret and from public view???

[Irish_Dem]

40. He's been a sociopath for a long time. Secrecy, lies, breaking the law, are second nature to him.

[-Steph-]

23. I hope Mueller takes them all down. They've betrayed the entire country.

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

55. Can't wait!!

[bpositive]

24. Can't wait to see

The movie when it comes out. For sure to be a comedy

[Ilsa]

47. There will be a serious, dramatic movie, followed

by a farce on Broadway that will tour longer than Cats.

[ret5hd]

52. Too bad Jerry Lewis can't play Trump.

A farcical comedy.

[Doodley]

53. Yes, an Oscar awaits Alec Baldwin and Trump will be awarded the Putin Order of Friendship

[Irish_Dem]

62. Depends upon how the rest of this story plays out in real life.

There might not be a lot to laugh about when all is said and done.

[Zorro]

26. Looks like Trump is going to drain the swamp as he said he would

just not in the way he intended.

[PatrickforO]

28. LOL, if you read about Hitler's connections with occult and love

of psychics, you'll know there is a close parallel here. The psychic said Germany would become a world power after a time of tribulation, and Hitler mistakenly believed it was he who would lead Germany out of that tribulation to be a world power, but it didn't turn out that way.

[PatrickforO]

27. You know, kpete, I sure hope that our political institutions are strong enough, that

what little democracy we actually have is strong enough, to bring these criminal traitors down.

It worries me Fox's Hannity, and Lord only knows how many hate-talk radio heads, are issuing thinly veiled calls for violence should Mueller indict Trump and impeachment proceedings begin.

We already saw Trump's nazis in action in Charlottesville, where there was blood in the streets. Let's hope, if these white supremacist 'militias' rise up, our own armed forces will not forget the oaths they swore were to protect this nation and its constitution, not a specific president.

[Eyeball_Kid]

43. Hannity's little problem:

Mueller has him colluding with Putin/RT/Russia to promote propaganda favoring Russia's interests, without registering as a foreign agent. He's quite likely one of Mueller's many targets. Once he gets an indictment, he'll have to clam up or be slapped with more Obstruction charges, and he may have to sit in jail without bond until his trial comes up.

But don't tell Hannity. He can find out the hard way. "Conspiracy Against the United States" will be a difficult charge to beat, because Mueller is meticulous and thorough.

[PatrickforO]

50. Oh. That's a happy thing!

I didn't know. No wonder he's getting shrill.

[Squinch]

29. The OTHER HUGE point in all this: how could it possibly NOT be obstruction of justice for the GSA

to assure Trump(R)s lawyers, and Trump(R)'s lawyers to accept that assurance, that the GSA would not turn over any incriminating information to a duly appointed Special Prosecutor?

[Nitram]

30. You've just made my weekend! Thanks for the delightful info.

Whenever the Mueller team has been quiet for a while, and Dems start getting nervous and wondering "what's taking so long," something like this just happens to come along. coincidence? I think not. Mueller is playing the Trump Gang like a violin.

[leanforward]

36. Thank you.

Just finished the lead and subsequent comments. Great stuff.

Yes, yes, and yes. Most pleasant reading. Without getting into a lot of derogatory language, I like to use the word SUPERMAX.

I've been reading mystery and spy novels all my life. What I'm reading makes sense.

[SCVDem]

37. After all the email stories from the past years,

Trumps ignorant and arrogant campaign learned nothing and used EMAILS!

They should have used couriers and pigeons!

I am loving the karma!

[malaise]

58. This is as good as my Christmas dinner

and that is quite delish

[smirkymonkey]

61. Hey FatFuk!

Merry Fucking Christmas! Bwahaahahaha!

[herding cats]

63. Comey fired May 9th. Beckler placed as gatekeeper May 12. Comey appointed as SC May 17th.

May sure was a busy month in DC.

The funny thing is we’d not even be talking about, or even thinking about Beckler, if Langhofer hadn’t made the statement about him in his letter to the congressional committee leaders.