Trump pardons Michael Flynn
'I know you will now have a truly fantastic Thanksgiving!'
Amid a federal judge's continued refusal to rule on the Justice Department's motion to dismiss the case against Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, President Trump announced Wednesday he has pardoned his onetime national security adviser.
Flynn pleaded guilty in 2017 to making false statements to FBI agents in a case related to Robert Mueller's special counsel Russia probe. But after retaining attorney Sidney Powell, Flynn filed a motion to withdraw the plea, presenting evidence he was "ambushed" by agents after the bureau concluded it didn't have a case.
"It is my Great Honor to announce that General Michael T. Flynn has been granted a Full Pardon," Trump wrote Wednesday on Twitter. "Congratulations to @GenFlynn and his wonderful family, I know you will now have a truly fantastic Thanksgiving!"
CNBC reported that less than two hours before Trump's announcement, Flynn tweeted a Bible verse in the King James version, which read, "And they shall fight against thee; but they shall not prevail against thee; for I am with thee, saith the Lord, to deliver thee."
An investigation by a U.S. attorney found no foundation for the interview in which Flynn was accused of lying. The FBI already had a transcript of the telephone call at the center of the case, with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, meaning any false statements were immaterial. Unsealed evidence shows the FBI was prepared to drop the case for lack of evidence. But fired lead investigator Peter Strzok pressed ahead and set up the "ambush" interview at the White House. A memo shows FBI agents plotted before the interview to get Flynn to lie so he could be fired.
Powell, who is litigating challenges to the 2020 presidential election, said she had asked Trump not to issue a pardon to Flynn as she continued efforts to have his case dismissed.
She told CNBC in a statement Wednesday that the "pardon of Michael Flynn is solely up to the President, but given the corruption we have witnessed in the judiciary and multiple agencies of government executed against General Flynn, this persecution should end."
"The FBI and [Department of Justice] have been a national embarrassment for more than 15 years," Powell said.
Powell said it was her "fervent hope to make our judicial system work to exonerate an innocent man -- as all the Left would want were he anyone but Trump or Michael Flynn, but enough is enough."
"This is sick. It’s painfully obvious Judge Sullivan is playing an evil political game with a good man's life and family," she said.
In an interview Wednesday afternoon with Fox Business host Lou Dobbs, Powell said the Flynn case is "one of the most egregious injustices I've witnessed in American history."
She said the pardon is "bittersweet," because "if the justice system had worked properly, we would not to have had to have gotten this pardon."
See the interview with Sidney Powell:
Enough Was Enough: @SidneyPowell1 celebrates @realDonaldTrump’s pardon of @GenFlynn, says with all the evidence uncovered we were well past the point of proving his innocence #MAGA #AmericaFirst #Dobbs pic.twitter.com/qO3KmpIFcp
— Lou Dobbs (@LouDobbs) November 25, 2020
The Justice Department filed a motion earlier this year to dismiss the case, but the judge, Emmet Sullivan, refused to sign off. Instead, he appointed an outside lawyer to provide him with arguments to counter the Justice Department's motion.
Flynn appealed Sullivan's moves to a three-judge panel in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which agreed that the case should be dismissed.
Sullivan, however, then asked for a ruling from the full court, which reversed the decision and sent the case back to the trial judge.
Schiff condemns 'abuse of power'
Democratic members of Congress who pushed the bogus claims of Trump-Russia collusion that spawned the Flynn investigation condemned Trump's pardon Wednesday.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Adam Schiff of California -- who claimed for two years he had secret evidence of collusion -- charged that Trump "has repeatedly abused the pardon power to reward friends and protect those who covered up for him."
"This time he pardons Michael Flynn, who lied to hide his dealings with the Russians. Its no surprise that Trump would go out as he came in — Crooked to the end," he wrote on Twitter.
Schiff led the House investigation of Trump's phone call with Ukraine's president that led to a partisan impeachment and acquittal in the Republican-controlled Senate.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., who led the House managers in the impeachment trial, said the pardon "is undeserved, unprincipled, and one more stain on President Trump's rapidly diminishing legacy.”
Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., called Flynn and the president criminals.
Mueller, after nearly two years, having employed Strzok and other fiercely anti-Trump partisans, declared there was insufficient evidence that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia to win the 2016 election.
Democrats used a salacious anti-Trump dossier that was commissioned by the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee to further their case, even though it was unverified, a Justice Department inspector general found. The debunked document, he concluded, was the primary evidence submitted by the Obama DOJ and FBI to spy on the Trump campaign.
https://www.wnd.com/2020/11/4872755/
