Mueller Examining Trump's Tweets in Wide-Ranging Obstruction Inquiry

[jayschool2013]

Source: NY Times

WASHINGTON — For years, President Trump has used Twitter as his go-to public relations weapon, mounting a barrage of attacks on celebrities and then political rivals even after advisers warned he could be creating legal problems for himself.

Those concerns now turn out to be well founded. The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, is scrutinizing tweets and negative statements from the president about Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the former F.B.I. director James B. Comey, according to three people briefed on the matter.

Several of the remarks came as Mr. Trump was also privately pressuring the men — both key witnesses in the inquiry — about the investigation, and Mr. Mueller is examining whether the actions add up to attempts to obstruct the investigation by both intimidating witnesses and pressuring senior law enforcement officials to tamp down the inquiry.

Mr. Mueller wants to question the president about the tweets. His interest in them is the latest addition to a range of presidential actions he is investigating as a possible obstruction case: private interactions with Mr. Comey, Mr. Sessions and other senior administration officials about the Russia inquiry; misleading White House statements; public attacks; and possible pardon offers to potential witnesses.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/26/us/politics/trump-tweets-mueller-obstruction.html

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Good.

[Botany]

1. "Mr. Mueller wants to question the president about the tweets."

He has given Trump enough rope to hang himself. Trump has been used to lying
as S.O.P. for many many years and now it will come back and crush him. Look
for Bob Mueller to link Trump's public tweets to Trump's private and semi private actions
to obstruct the investigations into Trump/Russia.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

4. I'm fine with Mueller gather tons of evidence to make a massive charge & a slam-dunk prosecution.

It is necessary to do that to get as many Americans convinced of tRump's perfidy as possible. His 15% hard core won't budge of course but there are many Americans who need to be persuaded beyond a reasonable doubt.

The bigger the case against him, the stronger the will and resolve of the American people will become to never allow such incompetence and travesty of democracy to occur again.

[Botany]

9. Bob might very well use the date of Trump's tweets to the date of his actions to make ....

... his obstruction of justice case.

[maddiemom]

12. OR simply get rid of the Electoral College to begin with.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

13. Easier to prosecute tRump first, get rid of him, then make Amendment to get rid of Electoral College

[mobeau69]

2. Mr. Mueller

Get his treasonaus ass.

[Fred Sanders]

3. If I am not mistaken SCOTUS did rule courts can consider Shitler's tweets as state of mind as

proof of animus, in the immigration ban based mainly on animus...but still apparently made the ban OK because policy based on hate and animus is good to go if the policy has a sliver of credibility...but I stray...

So a court of law certainly could...hoisted on his own petard!

[mobeau69]

8. Mobeauspear

"I want that motherfucker gone."

[erronis]

5. Isn't the obvious defense that the dump didn't actually write the tweets itself?

Maybe its just me but using a twit as a method for messaging "official" statements seems silly and shouldn't be even given a sous worth of attention.

But of course we're all fixated on its flatulences - or at least the news media is, and repeats it ad nauseam.

[jayschool2013]

7. Spicer told reporters in June 2017

Sean Spicer told reporters in June 2017 that Spanky’s tweets are “considered official statements of the president."

The Justice Department in November took him at his word and is including them as such in their investigation.

[mr_lebowski]

6. Presumably this means he's just strengthening his existing air-tight case of criminal conspiracy ...

Although it SHOULD, an obstruction charge alone won't make a blip on the political radar unless Mueller has the goods on an actual underlying crime which Dumpie was 'obstructing justice' in order to hide.

[cp]

10. Vives in gladio in gladio mori

Live by the sword, die by the sword. In this case, tweet.

[janx]

11. Trump's lawyers leaking again?

Those concerns now turn out to be well founded. The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, is scrutinizing tweets and negative statements from the president about Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the former F.B.I. director James B. Comey, according to three people briefed on the matter.

Who are these three people, and who gave them this information?

[berni_mccoy]

14. Well, you know what they say...?

You are what you tweet.

[DeminPennswoods]

15. Trump learned a lot of things from the mob, but

Omerta wasn't one of them.

[NBachers]

16. 1 count each for every single tweet and every single statement.

[Kind of Blue]

17. Fantastic! I've read DUers point out that shouldn't this

be an obvious investigative path and so glad it's now a thing, if not the most glaring and hopefully the easiest thing to prove.

[calimary]

18. WOW.

[OxQQme]

19. I'd bet dollars to donuts

that big forehead S. Miller tweeted many of those.

You know, the ALL CAPS ones.
And the ones with words that are beyond doophus's vocabulary.

"Steve baby, let our followers know how I'm feeling today about what you told me earlier."

[LiberalLovinLug]

20. Giuliani tries to hit a home run and misses

Mr. Trump’s lead lawyer in the case, Rudolph W. Giuliani, dismissed Mr. Mueller’s interest in the tweets as part of a desperate quest to sink the president.

“If you’re going to obstruct justice, you do it quietly and secretly, not in public,” Mr. Giuliani said.

Seriously?
Is this their new, or rather latest, defense? Reminiscent of the The Big Lie adapted for the Social Media age. That if you blatantly obstruct justice and mislead in the public eye, more public than any venue available in past history, then it doesn't count, because it is just so outrageous to even think that is possible, that some dufus would actually do that.

[Blue Owl]

21. A lot to examine in terms of volume

In terms of substance, not so much...