MaddowBlog-Trump's Justice Department agrees to financial settlement with Michael Flynn

[LetMyPeopleVote]

The financial settlement with Ashli Babbitt’s family was indefensible. The payout to Trump’s former national security adviser is worse.

For Michael Flynn, the corrupt pardon he received wasn’t enough. He wanted a payout, too, claiming federal law enforcement subjected him to malicious prosecution when they charged him with crimes he’d twice pleaded guilty to.

Thanks to Trump’s DOJ, he’ll now get a taxpayer-financed check.

— Steve Benen (@stevebenen.com) 2026-03-25T19:54:38.318Z

https://www.ms.now/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/trumps-justice-department-agrees-to-financial-settlement-with-michael-flynn

This week, it happened again. MS NOW reported that Trump’s DOJ has struck a deal with former White House national security adviser Michael Flynn. Bloomberg News published a related report:

The Justice Department has reached a financial settlement with Michael Flynn, a conservative activist and former official in the first Trump administration who sought millions of dollars from the government for what he alleged was a wrongful prosecution effort.

Lawyers for the government and for Flynn notified a federal judge in Florida on Wednesday that they had reached an agreement and that it would involve the payment of “settlement funds,” but did not disclose the amount or any other terms.

The brief court filing alerting the court to the financial settlement was posted online Wednesday afternoon.

While we don’t yet know how much money Flynn will get, the fact that he’ll walk away with any amount of taxpayer money is outrageous.......

Late on a Wednesday afternoon, the day before Thanksgiving 2020, Trump quietly pardoned Flynn. It was among the most corrupt moves the president made during his first term.

The editorial board of The Washington Post (back when it was still the editorial board of The Washington Post) wrote soon after about Trump’s America: “Guilty is innocent; lies are truth; traitors are patriots. The question is not whether Mr. Trump has degraded the presidency. The question is how much long-term damage he has done. Will future presidents now feel free to use the pardon power — or the other vast powers of office — with such nakedly crooked motives? How many will calculate that they can make corruption appear to be patriotism as long as enough of the country wants to believe the lies they tell?”

The pardon, however, apparently wasn’t enough. Flynn wanted a payout, too, claiming federal law enforcement subjected him to malicious prosecution when they charged him with crimes he had twice pleaded guilty to.

Thanks to Trump’s DOJ, he’ll now get one.

[Pinback]

1. And what's the "service fee" for the Commander In Thief? (nt)

[sop]

2. Contigency fees on settlements are commonly between 33% and 40% of the total recovery.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

3. Justice Department settles lawsuit from Trump ally Michael Flynn for $1.2 million, AP source says

Evidently Flynn is getting $1.2 million in this travesty of justice

Link to tweet

https://apnews.com/article/trump-michael-flynn-russia-justice-department-7b1d493300b5336900cb508c855fd59d

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department has settled for roughly $1.2 million a lawsuit from Michael Flynn, the former national security adviser to President Donald Trump who pleaded guilty during the Republican’s first term to lying to the FBI about his conversations with a top Russian diplomat and was later pardoned.

Court papers filed Wednesday do not reveal the settlement amount, but a person familiar with the matter, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to disclose nonpublic information, confirmed the total as about $1.2 million.

The settlement resolves a 2023 lawsuit in which Flynn sought at least $50 million and asserted that the criminal case against him amounted to a malicious prosecution. It also represents a stark turnabout in position for a Justice Department that during the Biden administration had pressed a judge to dismiss Flynn’s complaint. Attorney General Pam Bondi, a former personal lawyer for the president, has openly criticized the Russia investigation in which Flynn was charged and the Justice Department in the last year has opened investigations into former officials who participated in that inquiry.