https://twitter.com/therecount/status/1333876986377359362

Source: AP

WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General William Barr has given extra protection to the prosecutor he appointed to investigate the origins of the Trump-Russia probe, giving him the authority of a special counsel to complete his work without being easily fired.

Barr told The Associated Press on Tuesday that he had appointed U.S. Attorney John Durham as a special counsel in October under the same federal statute that governed special counsel Robert Mueller in the original Russia probe. He said Durham’s investigation has been narrowing to focus more on the conduct of FBI agents who worked on the Russia investigation, known as Crossfire Hurricane.

The investigations grew out of allegations of cooperation between Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and Russians to help him defeat Democrat Hillary Clinton.

With the 2020 election approaching, Barr told the AP on Tuesday, “I decided the best thing to do would be to appoint them under the same regulation that covered Bob Mueller, to provide Durham and his team some assurance that they’d be able to complete their work regardless of the outcome of the election.”



Read more: https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-donald-trump-robert-mueller-statutes-elections-ae0275b4eb23981c1e6fbf9fc49c3239?utm_source=Twitter&utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_medium=AP

Source: The Daily Beast

President Donald Trump may only have seven weeks left in office, but he’s given his top advisers the green light to batter the Iranian regime—anything that doesn’t hazard a full-on war before Joe Biden is inaugurated.

According to multiple U.S. officials familiar with the matter, in recent weeks Trump has taken a more passive role in personally overseeing Iran policy for the critical final months until Inauguration Day. One White House official last week described Trump as mostly “checked out” on this major foreign policy issue, having become consumed by his bumbling legal effort to steal the 2020 election amid the coronavirus pandemic, as well as by other his pet grievances of the moment.

But Trump has given some of his most hawkish administration officials, particularly his top diplomat, Mike Pompeo, carte blanche to squeeze and punish the Islamic Republic as aggressively as they wish in the coming weeks. All Trump asks is that they don’t risk “start[ing] World War III,” as the president has specifically put it in several private conversations with Pompeo and others, according to two senior administration officials.

That has left a host of options at the outgoing administration’s disposal—among them, a suffocating sanctions regime and a studied silence in the face of the assassination of Iranian nationals. Two officials who spoke to The Daily Beast said the administration is set to announce new sanctions on regime-linked companies and individuals in the coming weeks to solidify a years-long effort to paralyze Tehran’s economy.



Read more: https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-tells-pompeo-go-wild-on-iran-just-dont-risk-world-war-iii?ref=home

Source: CNN

(CNN)President-elect Joe Biden and his transition team are preparing for an early, all-out push to pass an ambitious new stimulus bill, while also drawing up plans for a flurry of executive actions aimed at delivering on campaign promises and undoing the Trump administration's efforts to undermine key government agencies.

Biden will be inaugurated in January with a pressing mandate to confront simultaneous and interwoven public health, economic and racial crises. At the same time, his team will take over the work of spearheading one of the most complicated, politically fraught mass vaccination campaigns in American history.

Biden's agenda for his first 100 days in office will, according to both those close to him and outside groups in contact with his top aides, center on two key avenues of action: the passage of a broad economic aid package and, where legislation is not necessary, a series of executive actions aimed at advancing his priorities. Containing the Covid-19 pandemic, launching an economic recovery and tackling racial inequality are his most urgent priorities, transition officials say.

The scope of stimulus legislation will likely turn on the results of the Senate run-offs in Georgia in early January, a little more than two weeks before Biden is inaugurated. If either Democrat fails to unseat their GOP incumbent rivals, and the body remains under the thumb of Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, the Kentucky Republican, Biden's ambitions will be checked from the outset. The immigration legislation Biden said he plans to send to the Congress within his first 100 days would likely be dead on arrival.

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/01/politics/biden-first-100-days/index.html

Source: Axios

Former CISA Director Chris Krebs is hinting at legal action against Trump campaign lawyer Joe DiGenova, who suggested Krebs should be "taken out at dawn and shot."

...

The big picture: DiGenova made the comment on Monday during an interview on Newsmax with host Howie Carr.

Krebs responded to DiGenova's comments in an interview with the Today Show on Tuesday, stating, "It's certainly more dangerous language, more dangerous behavior."

"And the way I look at it is that we are a nation of laws, and I plan to take advantage of those laws. I've got an exceptional team of lawyers that win in court, and I think they're probably going to be busy."

Read more: https://www.axios.com/krebs-cisa-digenova-trump-election-security-cyber-f4276746-7ae5-4032-b59b-97c944b790ae.html?utm_campaign=organic&utm_medium=socialshare&utm_source=twitter

https://twitter.com/kyledcheney/status/1333540949037895681

Source: USA Today

WASHINGTON – Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger on Monday pushed back at new conspiracy theories floated by President Donald Trump and his allies as the state prepares to finish its second recount of the presidential election this week.

"Truth matters, especially around election administration," Raffensperger, a Republican who is under fire from the president, said before announcing that officials are on schedule to finish the latest recount by the end of Wednesday.

President-elect Joe Biden won Georgia and its 16 electoral votes, an outcome reaffirmed by an initial hand audit ordered by the secretary of state that found Biden won by 12,284 votes. The Trump campaign requested a second hand recount after the election was certified.

Raffensperger, who has stressed that he voted for Trump, said voters should have confidence in the recount results despite the "massive amounts of misinformation that is being spread by dishonest actors."

Read more: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/11/30/brad-raffensperger-says-dishonest-actors-spreading-misinformation-georgia/6464658002/

Source: Forbes

TOPLINE North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Ambassador and former Republican Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison broke with President Trump on Monday by acknowledging Joe Biden as president-elect and referring to his team as the “incoming administration,” making her one of the first Trump appointees to do so.

KEY FACTS
During a virtual press conference in Brussels, Hutchison said “President-Elect Biden certainly is pro-NATO,” calling him a “supporter of the trans-Atlantic bond” and asserting he “likes to have allies.”

Hutchison predicted Biden’s first trip to Europe would be to NATO headquarters in Brussels and that there would be a “seamless transition” in the U.S.-NATO relationship, claiming, “there will not be a difference. There will be a commitment to this trans-Atlantic bond.”

For her part, Hutchison vowed a “smooth” transition for the “incoming administration,” which she said would be able to review and make determinations about Trump administration decisions like the president’s plan to pull troops out of Germany.

Read more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsolender/2020/11/30/trumps-nato-ambassador-calls-biden-president-elect-vows-seamless-transition/?sh=243151c07e84

Source: The Hill

Outgoing GOP Rep. Denver Riggleman (Va.) said Monday that people close to him have called him a “traitor” for recognizing President-elect Joe Biden as the victor in the 2020 White House race.

Riggleman, a former intelligence officer and Air Force veteran, was asked by CNN’s John Berman why more Republican lawmakers weren't speaking out about President Trump’s unfounded claims of widespread voter fraud.

"I don't know what's in their hearts, and I wish I could tell you. I've tried to call. I've tried to talk to individuals about this,” Riggleman said. “And by the way my own — well, I shouldn't say this exactly — but people very close to me have called me pretty much a traitor to the cause because of my belief in data and statistical analysis and technology and people that have taken an oath to the Constitution."

...

Riggleman praised Christopher Krebs, the former head of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) who was fired by Trump earlier this month, for standing by the election results during an interview on CBS's “60 Minutes” over the weekend.

Read more: https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/527986-gop-lawmaker-says-hes-been-called-a-traitor-by-people-close-to-him-for

Source: Law & Crime

A federal judge on Monday partially advanced a lawsuit accusing Russian mafia-tied businessman Felix Sater of laundering millions stolen from Kazakhstan’s BTA Bank through Trump Organization properties.

“In this case, Kazakhstan’s largest city and a Kazakhstani bank seek to recover millions of dollars in stolen funds from those who allegedly helped the culprits launder them,” U.S. District Judge Alison Nathan summarized in a 25-page opinion dismissing only two counts of a six-count complaint. “Felix Sater—the alleged ringleader of the money-laundering operation—along with his associate Daniel Ridloff and several business entities they control, move to dismiss.”

Like Sater, Ridloff was also formerly associated with the Trump Organization. The lawsuit stems from allegations of the systematic looting of Kazakhstan’s largest city Almaty and its bank in 2009.

“The Court emphasizes that the Kazakh entities will need to adduce evidence showing the Sater defendants’ deceptive conduct and their justifiable reliance on that conduct in significantly greater detail to meet their burdens of production and of proof as the case progresses,” Nathan wrote. “However, at this stage, the Court concludes that it is not clear on the face of the complaint that their claims are untimely, and so declines to dismiss any claims on that basis.”

Read more: https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/federal-judge-advances-lawsuit-accusing-felix-sater-of-laundering-loot-through-trump-properties/