Thursday, August 18, 2022
Judge Won’t Unseal The Mar-a-Lago Affidavit, But It’s A Safe Bet The FBI Followed Its Depraved FISA Court M.O.
Ordering the unsealing of the Mar-a-Lago search warrant affidavit would be wrong as a matter of law. But as a matter of lessons learned, Americans can infer that the unprecedented search of former President Donald Trump’s home rested on circular reporting, material omissions, misleading assertions, informants of unproven reliability, and an investigation undertaken by partisan agents.
Federal Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart will hear oral arguments Thursday afternoon on the media’s motions to unseal the Trump search warrant materials. The Department of Justice, with Trump’s consent, already released the search warrant and the corresponding attachments: Attachment A, which described the places to be searched, and Attachment B, which identified things to be seized. The government also released a redacted Property Receipt list.
The Biden administration opposes, however, unsealing the affidavit filed in support of the search of Trump’s home, arguing that “the search warrant presents a very different set of considerations,” and that there are “compelling reasons, including to protect the integrity of an ongoing law enforcement investigation that implicates national security, that support keeping the affidavit sealed.”
Precedent solidly supports the government’s argument. While the First Amendment provides the press and the public the “right of access to criminal trial proceedings,” neither the U.S. Supreme Court nor the 11th Circuit — the federal appellate court that establishes mandatory precedent for the Florida federal district court where the case is pending — have addressed the question of whether the First Amendment right of access extends to sealed search warrant materials. However, other federal appellate courts have held that “there is no tradition of public access to ex parte warrant proceedings,” and based on that precedent, the DOJ argues that the “better view is that no First Amendment right to access pre-indictment warrant materials” exists.
The Sixth Circuit’s detailed analysis in In re Search of Fair Finance strongly supports the DOJ’s position. In that case, the federal appellate court explained that under Supreme Court precedent, for a First Amendment right to access a particular criminal proceeding to exist, the proceeding must have “historically been open to the press and the general public,” and “public access [must] play[] a significant positive role in the functioning of the particular process in question.” Then, after discussing the relevant history, the court concluded that there was no “historical tradition of accessibility to documents filed in search warrant proceedings,” and “that alone requires a rejection of the newspapers’ contention that there is a First Amendment right of access to them.”
Given the strength of the analysis in In re Search of Fair Finance, Reinhart is unlikely to unseal the search warrant affidavit because that precedent indicates there is no right to access the materials at all. However, rather than hold...
Texas cattle ranchers audited by IRS issue dire warning to Americans
The Raising Five Cattle Company ranchers spoke with Dana Perino on “America’s Newsroom” Tuesday, where they recounted the grueling tax audit they experienced 13 years ago.
“We got audited over basically a $7,800 engine rebuild on a very old tractor,” Deborah said.
“They just basically said this was a red flag, and we’re going to audit you, and we’re coming to your house,” she added.
Hajda said she asked if she could fax her bank records to the IRS, but they refused to give her the option. Instead, they came to her house and demanded all of her financial records in-person.
“I took out our box of receipts… and we handed it to him, and I said ‘Here’s your receipts’… we weren’t hiding anything,” she said.
Perino asked if the IRS agent sought out the ranchers simply to fill a quota.
“Probably. They said they flagged it because our expenses were high that year, and it was because of this repair,” David responded.
“He wasn’t satisfied. He kept digging, and he ended up nailing us. Our tax person was giving us 80% on our work vehicles, and he said you can only do 50%,” David said.
“I was very naive about the situation. I had no idea of the power, the scope [of the audit] going in three years of my life… and me having no control over that, no control over the information he was given,” Deborah said.
She went on to issue a warning to other middle-class Americans who could soon endure the same process.
“They want to get you. If they’re coming after you for an audit, they don’t want to see your receipt… they want to nitpick your life apart, and that’s not what the American dream is for...
DOJ Scrambles to Find Non-Existent Evidence of 'Intent'
Desperation to prevent Trump from becoming the 47th President of the United States.
Under pressure from President Biden to find a way to prevent Donald Trump from becoming America’s 47th President of the United States, Attorney General Merrick Garland unleashed an army of FBI agents to scour Mar-a-Lago in search of something, anything that might fill in the enormous gap in DOJ’s case against the former president: The glaring absence of evidence of specific intent needed to bring any charge against former President Trump.
While DOJ can snow a grand jury into believing lame evidence credible and succeed in indicting just about anyone (not difficult when the prosecution runs the show unopposed), it cannot be sure of a conviction from a court without evidence beyond a reasonable doubt of the specific intent necessary to prove its case. That evidence rarely exists and proof of it is, indeed, a very tall order. Short of planting evidence or making things up (in other words committing the kind of government corruption and fraud as occurred in the deceitful manipulation of evidence by DOJ and FBI in support of the Russia hoax or, more recently, in the FBI fabricated Whitmer kidnapping plot), DOJ is destined to hit a very high, virtually impenetrable burden of proof that will dash its partisan dreams to pieces.
From the warrant released by Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhardt on August 12, we see in attachment B the legal predicate offered by Justice for the search: 18 USC §§ 793, 1519, and 2071. For want of evidence, each statutory section fails in Trump’s case when evaluated fairly, and never should have been accepted as adequate justification under the Fourth Amendment for the unprecedented issuance of the warrant against a former President on the eve of his announcement of a second candidacy for that office. That want of evidence, of course, did not stop DOJ because the entire unprecedented pursuit is one driven by political motivations, not objectivity. DOJ is not investigating a crime for which it has probable cause; it is trying to discover fragments of proof that can be woven into a tale of criminality to, at a minimum, place a cloud over candidate Trump’s head or, in their ideal scenario, justify preventing him from becoming the 47th President of the United States.
Section 793 is a section of the Espionage Act which prohibits removal and misuse of defense information when done by one “with intent or reason to believe that the information is to be used to the injury of the United States, or to the advantage of any foreign nation.” DOJ scoured Mar-a-Lago through use of an ex parte warrant in a desperate attempt to find some scrap of evidence to shore up an otherwise inadequate case under this section. This now explains why they even went to the extreme of going through Melania’s dresses and the Trump bedroom. The aim was to find something, anything to support an “intent or reason to believe that . . . information is to be used to the injury of the United States, or to the advantage of any foreign nation.” DOJ was engaged in a massive KGB-style fishing expedition, angling to find fragments that could be woven together through a mighty stretch to make out an Espionage case against former President Trump (it's Russia, Russia, Russia all over again).
They are struggling at this very moment to come up with some kind of plausible story line suggestive of the needed criminal intent, a story line of fiction detached from reality. Make out Trump to be a spy for a foreign power or to be endeavoring to harm the United States and you will obtain an indictment, but winning a trial on the merits, where all relevant countervailing evidence (not just the DOJ story line) is before a judge and jury, and conviction appears an illusory goal. Obtaining a conviction for a specific intent crime is an extremely difficult mountain to climb in the absence of a confession or direct and irrefutable testimony and a case, to quote the discredited former FBI Director James Comey, no reasonable prosecutor would bring.
Section 1519 likewise requires DOJ to prove specific intent. It must show from direct evidence or testimony that Donald Trump intentionally endeavored to impede or obstruct an investigation by covering up or destroying records. The section reads: “Whoever knowingly alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, covers up, falsifies, or makes a false entry in any record, document, or tangible object with the intent to impede, obstruct, or...
The 90 Miles Mystery Video: Nyctophilia Edition #1114
Before You Click On The "Read More" Link,
Please Only Do So If You Are Over 21 Years Old.
If You are Easily Upset, Triggered Or Offended, This Is Not The Place For You.
Please Leave Silently Into The Night......
The 90 Miles Mystery Box: Episode #1814
You have come across a mystery box. But what is inside?
It could be literally anything from the serene to the horrific,
from the beautiful to the repugnant,
from the mysterious to the familiar.
If you decide to open it, you could be disappointed,
you could be inspired, you could be appalled.
This is not for the faint of heart or the easily offended.
You have been warned.
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