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To: locogringo who wrote (1201263)	2/14/2020 7:47:46 AM
From: sylvester80	Respond to of 1577020

BREAKING: Jessie Liu resigns from Treasury after pulled nomination. cnn.com Updated 12:38 PM ET, Thu February 13, 2020 (CNN)The US attorney whose nomination for a top Treasury Department job was yanked because she ran the office that oversaw Roger Stone's prosecution has resigned, an administration official tells CNN. Jessie Liu, who previously headed the US attorney's office in Washington, submitted her resignation to the Treasury Department, effective Wednesday evening. She went to the Treasury Department with the intention of filling a Senate-confirmed position, which is no longer available after her nomination was withdrawn earlier Wednesday, the official said. The revoked nomination -- paired with the mass withdrawal of the career prosecutors from Stone's case on Tuesday -- punctuated a stunning cascade of developments set into motion on Monday. Decision to pull Liu's nomination directly linked to her oversight of Stone and McCabe cases Prosecutors from the DC US Attorney's Office, who are Justice Department employees, wrote Monday in a filing that a judge should issue Stone a seven- to nine-year sentence after he was convicted on seven charges last year that came out of Mueller's investigation, including lying to Congress and witness tampering. Top Justice Department officials later overruled that recommendation after Trump complained publicly on Twitter, though he has insisted he did not intervene directly. While head of the US Attorney's Office in Washington, Liu inherited many of the major ongoing cases from Robert Mueller's special counsel investigation and was also handling the politically charged case of former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, a frequent target of Trump's ire who is also a CNN contributor. Trump's decision to abruptly withdraw her nomination was directly tied to her former job. As Trump and administration officials weighed pulling Liu's nomination to serve as the Treasury Department's under secretary for terrorism and financial crimes, a central factor in the talks was how she had run the US Attorney's Office. The problem wasn't that she necessarily did anything wrong, one person familiar with the thinking said, but that she didn't do more to get involved in those cases, though it's not clear what leeway she would have had. Liu was nominated in December to serve as the Treasury Department's under secretary for terrorism and financial crimes. Previously she headed the US attorney's office that oversaw the prosecution and conviction of Trump's longtime political adviser until Attorney General William Barr replaced her last month. She also led the team that worked on the sentencing of former Trump deputy campaign manager Rick Gates. Fox Business anchor Lou Dobbs, who counts Trump among his viewers, on Tuesday accused Liu of softening her office's case against a former Senate aide convicted in relation to sensitive leaks, and suggested that she had helped "cover up" his ties to the origins of the Russia investigation. Both of Dobbs' claims were presented without evidence. Attorney General Bill Barr had advocated for the President to stick by Liu's nomination in recent weeks as the campaign against her nomination kept building and appeared to be making headway with Trump, according to a person familiar with the matter. Justice Department officials were surprised to learn on Tuesday that Trump had pulled her nomination. CNN's Evan Perez contributed to this report.

To: locogringo who wrote (1201263)	2/14/2020 7:50:21 AM
From: sylvester80	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1577020

OOPS! Decision to pull Liu's nomination directly linked to her oversight of Stone and McCabe cases By Kaitlan Collins, CNN Updated 4:03 PM ET, Wed February 12, 2020 cnn.com Washington (CNN)President Donald Trump's decision to abruptly withdraw a Treasury Department nomination for Jessie Liu, the former US attorney who headed the office that oversaw Roger Stone's prosecution, was directly tied to her former job, CNN has learned. While head of the US Attorney's Office in Washington, Liu inherited many of the major ongoing cases from Robert Mueller's special counsel investigation and was also handling the politically charged case of former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, a frequent target of Trump's ire who is also a CNN contributor. As Trump and administration officials weighed pulling Liu's nomination to serve as the Treasury Department's under secretary for terrorism and financial crimes, a central factor in the talks was how she had run the US Attorney's Office. The problem wasn't that she necessarily did anything wrong, one person familiar with the thinking said, but that she didn't do more to get involved in those cases. Trump withdraws Treasury nomination of ex-US attorney who oversaw Stone prosecution Initially it wasn't clear that Liu's nomination was pulled due to the handling of the politically sensitive cases, but CNN has now confirmed it was. Trump made the final decision to pull the nomination two days before her scheduled confirmation hearing. Liu stepped down from her job before she was confirmed to the Treasury position, an unusual move. That office is now run by Tim Shea, a close adviser to Attorney General Bill Barr. According to a separate source familiar with the situation, despite multiple warnings from people around her that there was a campaign actively working against her, Liu was blindsided when her second potential nomination in a year fell apart. The White House dismissed concerns from a group of conservative lawyers about her nomination, but remained hung up over her role overseeing the politically charged cases in the US Attorney's Office. It was the Stone sentencing recommendation that moved Trump to pull the nomination. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told lawmakers Wednesday he was informed about the Liu decision two days ago. "I believe it was two days ago," he said when asked by Sen. Sherrod Brown, an Ohio Democrat, during a Senate Finance Committee hearing on the President's budget. Brown asked Mnuchin why she was withdrawn a few days before she was expected to show up for her confirmation hearing and referred to the nixed nomination as part of the President's "retribution tour." "Nominations are at the President's direction," said Mnuchin, who declined to provide further comment. CNN's Kristen Holmes and Donna Borak contributed to this report. This story has been updated with additional reporting.

To: locogringo who wrote (1201263)	2/14/2020 7:52:50 AM
From: sylvester80	1 Recommendation Recommended By pocotrader Respond to of 1577020

MUST READ: The Real ‘Miscarriage of Justice’ in the Stone Sentencing; Trump’s public pressure campaign on behalf of a convicted ally will haunt the Department of Justice. politico.com By RENATO MARIOTTI 02/12/2020 07:01 PM EST President Donald Trump praised his attorney general Wednesday for “taking charge” of the Roger Stone case. But if the events of the past several days tell us anything it’s that the person having the biggest influence on the proposed prison sentence for the convicted Trump ally is the president himself. Despite the president’s insistence that he “didn’t speak to the Justice Department” and that he has “not been involved with that at all,” it’s clear that a single Trump tweet on Tuesday set in motion an unprecedented collapse of prosecutorial independence. In fact, the real “miscarriage of justice” is that Trump’s meddling and Attorney General William Barr’s willingness to bend his department’s policies to serve Trump’s personal interests will have a disastrous long-term effect on the public’s confidence in the essential fairness of federal prosecutors. To understand how a more or less routine sentencing turned into a completely unnecessary political scandal, let’s look at the stunning series of events. On Tuesday, four federal prosecutors filed a court document recommending Stone—who was convicted in November of lying to Congress and witness tampering—receive a sentence of seven to nine years in prison. Less than one day later, all four men either withdrew from the case or resigned, and a high-ranking supervisor filed a document asserting that the sentence recommended one day earlier was “excessive and unwarranted,” asking for a sentence that was “far less” severe. The Justice Department’s initial recommendation was consistent with its usual policy, which is that in a “typical case,” a recommendation of a sentence within the federal sentencing guidelines range is appropriate. DOJ policy requires “supervisory approval” to recommend a sentence above or below the guidelines range. The policy does state that an “individualized assessment of the facts and circumstances of a particular case” can support a recommendation for a sentence below the guidelines range consistent with “the interests of justice and the public interest.” In my experience, federal prosecutors handling high-profile cases discuss sentencing recommendations with their supervisors. It’s hard to believe that they signed the name of the United States attorney appointed by Trump without that attorney’s approval. And no one can seriously believe that the Justice Department conducted an “individualized assessment” that changed its view one day after it recommended a guidelines-based sentence for Stone. What changed between Monday and Tuesday? This could be it: “This is a horrible and very unfair situation. The real crimes were on the other side, as nothing happens to them. Cannot allow this miscarriage of justice!”—a tweet sent by Trump. For criminal defendants, it pays to have a friend in the Oval Office. Although the DOJ tried to distance its decision from Trump’s tweet, it is unheard of for the Justice Department to recommend a sentence on one day and tell the judge one day later that what it had recommended is wrong. It’s also highly unusual for all four prosecutors on a case to withdraw, apparently in protest of the politically motivated move. For the acting criminal chief of their office—a man three rungs above them on the organizational chart—to personally appear in the case and file the document reversing their position is just as unusual. But what’s apparent based on what we know now is that the sentence sought by the Justice Department in this case was influenced by the defendant’s personal relationship with the president. There’s only one word that can describe that practice: corrupt. It should be noted that federal sentencing guidelines are not without fault. In fact, the DOJ’s policy of defending the guidelines and recommending guidelines-based sentences in most cases has been roundly criticized by many observers, given our incarcerated population has increased by 700 percent since 1970. But DOJ's decision to recommend a lower-than-usual sentence shouldn't depend on the defendant's friendship with the president. The Justice Department should reconsider its policy when it’s in the public interest, not Trump’s interest. Ironically, the sudden change of heart by prosecutors was likely unnecessary. Judge Amy Berman Jackson gave other defendants, such as Paul Manafort, lenient sentences and her average sentence given is below the nationwide average. Plus, it’s hard to imagine that the DOJ’s new position will carry much weight with her anyway, given the circumstances surrounding the sudden change. Trump seems to have missed these nuances, choosing to attack Jackson instead. “Is this the Judge that put Paul Manafort in SOLITARY CONFINEMENT, something that not even mobster Al Capone had to endure?” Trump wrote on Tuesday after sharing a tweet that mentioned Jackson’s role in the Manafort case. “How did she treat Crooked Hillary Clinton? Just asking!” Although this move by DOJ will likely have little practical impact for Stone, particularly since Trump has publicly signaled his intent to pardon him, it sends a disturbing message—that Trump will corruptly intervene to help those who help him. Coming off the heels of Trump’s acquittal in the Senate on charges that he abused his power, Trump has shown that the lesson he learned from that saga is that he can get away with doing so. We don’t know whether Trump ordered the Justice Department’s new position. Perhaps it was ordered by Barr or another Trump ally below Barr in the department. But regardless of who made the decision, the takeaway is the same: The sentence sought by the DOJ depends on political pull. Have we reached a point where criminal defendants have to hire a lobbyist or do business with Trump’s family to obtain a better sentence? If that sounds more like a third-world autocracy than the United States of America, that’s because it is.