Dr. E contributed reporting to this story
(Editor Note: This is Part 2 of an exclusive TWP exposé series on the coordinated media disinformation campaign to incorporate Turkey into the existing Trump-Russia and Ukraine conspiracy theories as first reported by TWP on Oct. 13th 2020)
One of the more shocking and disturbing aspects of this Oct. 29th, 2020 New York Times (NY Times) article was the blatant corruption and insubordination occurring in the Manhattan office of the Department of Justice (DOJ).
With the recent revelations in the Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn and Roger Stone cases, many are shocked at the level of corruption throughout the DOJ and the Federal Judiciary; particularly within the District of Columbia (DC). But shockingly, the District of Columbia is not the most corrupt. That title belongs to the Southern District of New York (SDNY), or as the article states,
longstanding disdain for the Southern District, which has been called the Sovereign District for the way it guards its independence from Washington.
From the Oct. 29, 2020 New Times article “Turkish Bank Case Showed Erdogan’s Influence with Trump“
The “Sovereign District of New York” is an inside joke amongst career attorneys and staff who work in the Manhattan headquarters. The fact the article just outright states it and portrays it in a positive light is simply stunning.
The corruption and insubordination is perfectly illustrated in this passage,
Justice Department officials decided to ignore Mr. Whitaker’s edict, concluding that they most likely would outlast Mr. Whitaker in the department, since he was serving on an acting basis. They did not see appeasing Mr. Erdogan as sufficient justification for closing the investigation.
From the Oct. 29, 2020 New Times article “Turkish Bank Case Showed Erdogan’s Influence with Trump“
The NY Times passes it off as standard operating procedure.
In the very next sentence (the title of the next section) they actually trumpet it as some type of virtue,
‘This Is Not How We Do Things at the Southern District’
From the Oct. 29, 2020 New Times article “Turkish Bank Case Showed Erdogan’s Influence with Trump“
This is Looney Tunes
Apparently the NY Times needs a refresher course on the American System of Government. Policy decisions are made by elected officials (and/or delegated to their political appointees), not by career civil servants and permanent government bureaucrats. This is done because elected officials are accountable to the voters for their policy decisions. Therefore the people control the government, not the other way another. Get it NY Times?
This notion the US Media and Democratic Left have that career bureaucrats (i.e. the Swamp) should be able to defy the lawful directives of duly elected representatives of the people is having a crippling effect on America’s institutions and quite frankly, putting the continued survival of the republic at risk.
This is the same kind of bureaucratic corruption that was seen coming out of the US Intelligence Community (IC) during the Trump Ukraine Impeachment Hoax, highlighted by Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman’s nonsensicle “Interagency Consensus” concept that was used as a justification to attempt to overrule the President of the United States on foreign policy decisions and accuse him of a crime.
(*Editor’s Note: Pay close attention to the name of some of the publications Rep. Devin Nunes calls out for planting fake news stories. You might have heard these names somewhere before.)
But most disturbing of all has been the breakdown in the regular order of the chain of command between the Commander-in-chief and the US Military. There has been an unprecedented level of resistance not seen since the US Civil War from notable retired generals, current top-level active duty generals, and top brass within the Dept of Defense (DOD) and the Pentagon.
When the military becomes an independent political force … it’s over … democracy dies ~ Tucker Carlson
Compare this Address to the Nation Pres. George H. W. Bush gave during the Rodney King Riots to anything you’ve heard coming out of the Pentagon during the last 4 years. The US Army 7th Infantry? Active duty US Marines? If Trump gave this address, the Pentagon would mutiny and the press would call for civil war. So what happened?
Yet the NY Times thinks there should be this one completely autonomous office of the DOJ with authority over the financial capital of the United States, run by unelected, career bureaucrats who are accountable to no one… and the NY Times is telling you there’s “nothing to see here.”
It’s ludicrous.
Going Rogue
To give some background on the normal structure and order of the DOJ, the federal government divides the country into 93 Federal Districts. Each district has its own US District Court and Office of the US Attorney (OUSA) that represents the US Government in all legal cases before US District Courts and US Courts of Appeals, both criminal & civil. The OUSA in each district is staffed with career Assistant US Attorneys (AUSA) along with support staff headed by 2 two political appointees, the US Attorney (USA) and the First Asst. US Attorney (FAUSA).
Just to give some context to the power of these appointments, there are fewer US Attorneys (93) than there are US Senators (100), and each one is the top government attorney/prosecutor in their respective districts.
Most of the larger eastern states, like New York and North Carolina, are broken up into several districts. Some smaller states and most of the western states, such as Connecticut & Utah, tend to have a single district.
New York is divided into 4 districts: the Northern District (NDNY) based in Albany, Western District (WDNY) in Buffalo, Eastern District (EDNY) in Brooklyn, and the Southern District (SDNY) in Manhattan.
I, myself, worked for several years as a non-governmental contractor in a US Attorney’s Office, so I have some firsthand knowledge of how things run when there is a transfer of power. When the White House changes from one party to another, the incoming Attorney General (AG) requests resignations from all USAs and FAUSAs (the two political appointees). The AG will then accept a large number (if not all) of the resignations and replace them with their own political appointees, with certain exceptions for people who are viewed as non-partisan by both parties. US Attorney John Durham in the District of Connecticut, is one such example.
The first time I realized there was something seriously wrong with the US media’s coverage regarding President Trump was when AG Jeff Sessions sent out the usual requests, and the press went hysterical. Headlines were plastered all over the Corporate Media painting it as some kind of attack by Trump on the US Justice System. I vividly remember calling and texting my former colleagues and all the conversations generally had the same theme, “What the hell are they doing? This isn’t news.”
The main focus was on then US Attorney for the SDNY Preet Bharara. Bharara went on this bizarre media blitz that saw him running around Manhattan giving media interviews claiming Trump had asked him to remain on in his current position at SDNY after the transition, and he was now refusing to resign, but instead had to be fired. At the time, I and others found his behavior quite odd; a political appointee believing he was somehow entitled to remain in his appointed role over the wishes of the President, whom he “serves at the pleasure of”?
The Oct. 29th NY Times article centers around Bharara’s successor at SDNY, Geoffrey S. Berman. Berman made headlines in June 2020, when DOJ first attempted to have him resign, and then, he too, wound up being fired by Trump. Only after he went on a bizarre media blitz about his refusal to step down, sending the same media hacks into a frenzy, was he finally terminated.
It should be noted, Berman was appointed by the District Court of the Southern District of New York, not by President Trump, under a statute permitting the court to temporarily fill a vacancy if left open for over 120 days. But, who still serves at the pleasure of the President. The fact that Berman was appointed by a highly politicized federal judiciary and not by Trump should raise all kinds of red flags.
Trump, in the span of 4 years, had to all but send US Marshals to drag two separate US Attorneys kicking and screaming out of the same office. This is shocking and speaks to the culture of entrenchment, entitlement, and corruption that exists within SDNY.
Nest of Vipers
The Southern District of New York (SDNY) in Manhattan, the Eastern District of New York (EDNY) in Brooklyn (both federal), along with the New York Attorney General (state), and the Manhattan District Attorney (municipal) have a history of highly political prosecutions and non-prosecutions targeting Trump and his supporters. The culture of corruption and political targeting permeates throughout all the offices of New York City-based prosecutors.
But the SDNY seems to be the epicenter. They either directly handle or are directly connected to nearly every major scandal making headlines these days. Let’s just run down the laundry list.
Targeting Trump Allies
The case against Steve Bannon / Brian Kolfage / Build the Wall
As detailed by the full Viva Frei Live Stream above, well-known defense attorney Robert Barnes, explains that the SDNY “Build the Wall” prosecution seems to be entirely politically motivated featuring Roger Stone-style “shock ‘n awe” FBI raids on triple amputee, war hero Brain Kolage and former Trump advisor Steve Bannon. The timing of the indictments right before the Republican National Convention (RNC) and the location of the Bannon raid were meant to intentionally smear Bannon right before the RNC and distance him from Trump. As a long-time, political advisor, the left likely saw Bannon’s continued assistance to Trump as a viable threat. The arrest also give the media more splashy headlines against Trump where they could twist the facts in their favor.
The yacht Bannon was arrested on was not simply owned by a “Chinese mogul”, but by Chinese dissident Guo Wengui, an outspoken critic of the Chinese Communist Party, who Bannon has been working with for some time. Guo owned GTV began releasing Hunter Biden sex tape footage in late October, apparently in coordination with Bannon’s revelations about the Hunter Biden laptop.
Barnes says about the “Build the Wall” case,
.. this is the weakest mail fraud case … I’ve ever seen.
Given recent revelations, is it possible the FBI & SDNY were aware Bannon and Guo were in possession of the Hunter Biden laptop material and attempted to silence and intimidate them to keep the information from coming out or to discredit the sources? Sounds pretty plausible now.
The Tony Podesta / The Podesta Group / Paul Manafort / Rick Gates Cases
Nothing highlights the two-tier justice system better than the investigations into Tony Podesta and the Podesta Group compared to those of Paul Manafort and Rick Gates.
Paul Manafort and Rick Gates were criminally prosecuted by the Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA) and plead guilty to FARA violations, money laundering, and tax evasion related to their lobbying in Ukraine. The charges were brought against the pair based on investigations previously done by the FBI in 2014, and determined no crimes were committed. The case was only revived when a mysterious photocopied “black ledger” showing secret payments made to Manafort was discovered in Ukraine. The document had been randomly left on the front doorstep of a member of the Ukrainian Parliament and later discovered to be a Soros-funded forgery.
In contrast, Tony Podesta, the brother of John Podesta who was the former chairman of the Clinton Campaign and also served as chief of staff to Bill Clinton, and others associated with The Podesta Group had their cases sent to the SDNY where they were handled as civil not criminal violations. Podesta, who had hired Manafort and Gates to perform the work they had been prosecuted for in EDVA, and his associates were allowed to retroactively file FARA 6 years after the fact and had their cases dropped with no criminal charges.
The Podesta Group was especially problematic for the Mueller Special Counsel Investigation, because the lobbying they had done on behalf of Russia and Uranium One were substantially more questionable than anything the DC & EDVA was pursuing Lt. General Michael Flynn and the Flynn Intel Group for with regard to Turkey-related FARA violations. The cases were sent to the SDNY where The Podesta Group could be quietly closed down and the cases neatly disposed of and buried away.
Targeting Trump’s Other Allies & Family
The SDNY has continuously targeted other Trump political allies like Rudy Giuliani, who ironically rose to fame himself as the US Attorney for the SDNY in the 1980’s for his battles against organized crime. Also Michael Cohen, as well as the Trump Children were also targeted by corrupt prosecutors. This was done to send a clear message: Anyone giving any degree of support to Trump will be continuously targeted.
Covering For The Democrats & Trump Opponents
It’s sometimes said, “The FBI is where Democrat crimes go to die” … with one notable exception, that of Lt. Gen Michael Flynn.
It might be more accurate to say the SDNY is where Democrat crimes go to die. Here are a few notable examples.
Anthony Weiner’s Laptop
Case in point, when the New York Field Office of the FBI discovered Anthony Weiner’s laptop containing hundreds of thousands of previously undiscovered Clinton emails among other things,
SDNY immediately sprung into action to bury the evidence.
Comey Intelligence Leaks Investigation
When James Comey, a former SDNY US Attorney himself, was investigated for leaking classified information in order to get a special counsel appointed in the Trump Russia Collusion hoax, his case was handled out of the District of Columbia with the assistance of the FBI NY Field Office and the SDNY. It seems the SDNY has been very good to the Comey Family. Daughter helped look after daddy, maybe?
Jeffrey Epstein & Ghislaine Maxwell Cases
At the time of his death under highly unusual circumstances, Jeffrey Epstein, a native New Yorker who split his time between his Upper East Side Manhatten townhouse, New Mexico, US Virgin Islands, and Palm Beach, was being held under a criminal indictment for sex trafficking by the SDNY.
While a 2007 sweetheart plea deal shielding Epstein and anyone associated with him from federal prosecution was handled out of the Southern District of Florida (SDFL) and led only to state charges in Florida for solicitation of prostitution, SDNY repeatedly declined to pursue charges against Epstein or Ghislaine Maxwell since at least 2016, despite overwhelming evidence of their crimes. Epstein was also able to get the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office to intervene on his behalf to remove the requirement for him to register as a sex offender despite a ruling in Florida.
The World’s Policeman … Well, Sometimes
As seen in the “We Build The Wall” case, the SDNY has a long history of bringing cases they really have no jurisdiction over. The SDNY (and their sister office in Brooklyn, the EDNY) have a view of themselves as the World’s Policemen believing any crime having even the most tangential connection to New York is theirs to prosecute; completely out line with the constitutional concept of “Venue”.
by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law,
From the 6th Amendment in the Bill of Rights of the US Constitution
Given their propensity for taking on high profile cases that they can sweep under the rug for the Democrats, it’s also very curious when a case that is clearly under their jurisdiction is shipped out to another district office. Let’s take a look at one very well known example.
Clinton Foundation & Email Scandal
Despite widespread and well-documented accusations about corruption related to the Clinton Foundation, not a single criminal case has been prosecuted. The FBI investigation of payoffs from foreign actors was also run out of the New York Field Office. Yet despite the all the Clinton-involved offices being located in Manhattan, including Bill Clinton’s long-time office in the Harlem neighborhood of northern Manhattan, and the Clinton’s primary residence (and home-brew email server) in Chappaqua, in SDNY jurisdiction, the investigations have been primarily run out of the EDNY or the District of Columbia and/or the “7th Floor” at Main Justice in the case of the Hillary Clinton’s email investigation.
Why was EDNY running the investigation despite SDNY jurisdiction? And considering the narrative spin in the Oct. 29th NY Times article about how US Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman for the SDNY was “shocked” about “interference” from Main Justice in the Turkish state-owned Halkbank case, does that make any sense?
Could it be the EDNY is where Obama Attorney General Loretta Lynch came from in 2015 after Obama’s “Wingman” Eric Holder left the administration to return to private practice (and to allegedly frame Gen. Flynn)? Obama had named Lynch US Attorney for the EDNY in 2010, giving her a second stint after she had previously been USA-EDNY under Bill Clinton from 1999 to 2001. Lynch had hired nearly every prosecutor in the Office of the EDNY and had near complete control of it even as AG. Knowing this, the infamous meeting on the tarmac in Phoenix looks even more nefarious.
And It’s Not Just The Feds
The New York State Attorney General’s office continuously attempts to harass Trump and those around him with investigations like the one into Trump’s businesses, the Trump Foundation, and tax returns which were conveniently leaked to the NY Times. NY Attorney General Letitia James also has a pending lawsuit against the NRA in an attempt to get access to their donor list so she can start politically targeting other conservatives, which after reading all this should be scaring the hell out of everyone by now.
The Manhattan District Attorney office also gets in on the act with their own investigation into Trump’s tax returns, as well as investigations into “hush money” payments and business and insurance fraud cases. They just keep coming after him from all directions. They never let up.
Time To Drain The Other Swamp
Soon after Berman almost had to be dragged out of his office in the SDNY, AG Barr gave a speech at Hillsdale College where he eviscerated the media-driven narrative that career line prosecutors should be completely autonomous and free from political oversight. He preemptively dismantled the NY Times portrayal of Berman as some kind of hero of the federal bureaucracy who was fired for standing up to political pressure.
The speech was intended to send a clear message to the other SDNY and remaining Mueller Team line prosecutors that continued insubordination is not going to be allowed in a second Trump Administration.
Barr also called out the Mueller Team line prosecutors for their political targeting and belief that they too should be free from any degree of oversight. He took specific aim at Andrew Weissmann by referencing the Arthur Andersen case, a major case on which Weissmann led the prosecution, which was quickly reversed 9-0 by the Supreme Court, but only after wiping out 85,000 high-paying jobs for no other reason than to put a scalp on his wall.
After all this (and so much more), the idea that President Trump would concede the 2020 election is laughable. Trump is known as a ferocious fighter and this is the moment he’s just going to rollover and give up? With the history of politically motivated prosecutions in the SDNY, as well as all the other New York prosecutor offices, and all the bogus criminal cases they continue to set-up, Trump and his family would immediately be deluged with criminal indictments the moment he left the White House … or as MSNBC puts it,
SDNY is going to be waiting with cuffs on his way out the door.
Please stay tuned for Part 3 of this exclusive TWP exposé series as we continue to report on the origins and purpose of the latest Trump Collusion Hoax.
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