Of course they used private accounts to coordinate this, but maybe not all… and these guys are so loose, so arrogant, so inept they probably hopped back and forth between official and private systems and even cc’d their gov account (d’oh!). Or just subpoena the various ISPs if necessary (pretty sure you can get a quick FISA warrant when investigating Russian collusion (lol)
I once knew a guy who worked for the W admin for a while. A R, gay guy, not a terrible person but he freely talked about how they used outside email systems to get around discussing - ahem - certain subjects on government email. They even had code words (43 was W as well as the price of oil that would make the invasion of Iraq worthwhile… really. That cynical.)
But investigators aren’t usually shy about asserting their authority. Words like “order” and “demand” imply that there are consequences for non-compliance, whereas “request” doesn’t. That leads me to think that Mueller doesn’t feel he has the power to really investigate. (I don’t know anything about the US justice system, so I don’t know what is implied by the terminology.)
Not quite. The “request” itself is a standard motion to put any parties in notice of their relevant duties to preserve possible evidence.
If anyone is wondering, IANAL. I’ve merely been through this as a third party (regarding outside litigation against a client of a database software company I worked at) and had to ask the firm our company kept on retainer what it meant and what my/our legal obligations were.
It’s been in the news for over a week. It’s not about actually preserving the evidence, it’s about creating more federal crimes to charge people with. Squeezing a staffer with inside information can be very productive.
Putin has amassed an enormous fortune over the 17 years that he’s been at the top of the heap in Russia, and the Magnitsky Act very specifically would target him. We have been able to track down information and evidence that shows that some of the proceeds from the crime—the $230 million fraud that Sergei Magnitsky uncovered, exposed, and was killed over—went to a man named Sergei Roldugin. (For those of you who remember the Panama Papers, he was the famous $2 billion cellist from Russia who got all this largesse from various oligarchs in Russian companies.)
No problemo. Trump has been learning up on how to grant Presidential pardons. What’s the record on those?
“I have granted more pardons than any President ever. Really, it’s historical. An unpresidented number. Look it up. I’m the most magma… magnum… magnanny… I’m the most generous of all Presidents when it comes to pardons. That’s just the kind of guy I am. Very Christian, you know, it’s very Christian to forgive, even though there’s nothing to forgive because these are really good people, excellent people, and this is all part of some witch hunt because Crooked Hillary lost the election.”
