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https://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/section-press-freedom-removed-doj-internal-manual

https://www.buzzfeed.com/zoetillman...-press-freedom?utm_term=.hdLwJ18Qz#.ewPXREvOl

Section On ‘Press Freedom’ Removed From DOJ Internal Manual


In an effort to overhaul its internal manual for federal prosecutors, the Department of Justice recently removed sections on the “need for free press and public trial” among several other edits, Buzzfeed News reported Sunday.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein led the charge to update the manual, which traditionally provides policies and guidance on DOJ legal work, and hadn’t seen a major update since 1997, according to Buzzfeed. Buzzfeed tracked the online changes to the manual through the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine.

In the manual’s “media contacts policy” section, a subsection titled “Need for Free Press and Public Trial” was deleted. According to Buzzfeed’s review of the manual, that section, which has been in the manual since 1988, said:

Likewise, careful weight must be given in each case to the constitutional requirements of a free press and public trials as well as the right of the people in a constitutional democracy to have access to information about the conduct of law enforcement officers, prosecutors and courts, consistent with the individual rights of the accused. Further, recognition should be given to the needs of public safety, the apprehension of fugitives, and the rights of the public to be informed on matters that can affect enactment or enforcement of public laws or the development or change of public policy.”

Parts of the rest of the media contacts section was edited to include new language about determining whether to release information to the public, including weighing the “right of the public to have access to information” with other factors, according to Buzzfeed.

The manual also includes new sections about topics that Attorney General Jeff Sessions has been vocal about— including the illegality of sharing classified information and reporting any media contacts about DOJ related matters.
 
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/livew...lists-should-not-call-out-president-for-lying

Matt Schlapp: Journalists Shouldn’t Say If The President Is Lying

In a heated appearance on CNN Monday morning, American Conservative Union chairman Matt Schlapp voiced harsh criticism for comedian Michelle Wolf after her monologue at the White House Correspondents Dinner Saturday, concluding that it is not her nor any journalist’s place to call out the President for lying.

“Just present the facts and let the American people if they think someone’s lying,” Schlapp said to CNN’s Alisyn Camerota. “Journalists shouldn’t be the one to say the President or his spokesperson is lying. What that does to 50 percent of the country is make them feel they are not credible to listen to.”

He stood by his words in a later tweet.



Schlapp and his wife, Mercedes, walked out of the dinner Saturday night after taking offense at Wolf’s monologue, saying that they had had “enough of the elites mocking all of us.”


 
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/go...rouble-borrow-from-trump-playbook-blame-obama

GOP Candidates In Legal Trouble Borrow From Trump Playbook: Blame Obama!

When a top Republican candidate for governor was confronted over his family company’s illegally underpaying workers earlier this week, he responded with a familiar refrain in modern GOP politics: Thanks, Obama.

Adam Putnam, Florida’s agriculture commissioner and a top candidate for his party’s gubernatorial nomination in the key swing state, responded to questions about his family company’s failure to pay four workers minimum wage by blaming it on the previous president.

“After three days of Obama regulators crawling around our lower intestine, they came up with a $250 fine, which was later dismissed,” he told local reporters — even though that Department of Labor investigation into his family’s company, which forced them to pay $1,672 in back wages, began a year before Obama was even in office.

Putnam’s strategy of blaming a politicized government and sowing doubts about the integrity of federal officials is just the latest example of a Trump-era GOP candidate with legal problems attacking the former administration. That borrows from the president’s own playbook of attacking the intelligence community, the FBI and anyone else who’s investigating his team for possible wrongdoing as being politically motivated members of the “deep state” loyal to the former president, even if they’re career civil servants or Republicans.

“You look at the corruption at the top of the FBI — it’s a disgrace,” Trump rantedduring a recent appearance on Fox & Friends, his latest broadside against the agency. “And our Justice Department — which I try and stay away from, but at some point I won’t — our Justice Department should be looking at that kind of stuff, not the nonsense of collusion with Russia.”

Some Republicans warn that Trump’s attacks have deepened the conservative base’s distrust of all government that helped him win the presidency in the first place, and given an opening to candidates that in past years never would have stood a chance.

“Law enforcement is now under question, maybe for political reasons, with the same fervor we’ve traditionally held for other government entities, whether it’s the IRS or the Bureau of Land Management or generic government,” Doug Heye, a former Republican National Committee spokesman, told TPM.

Heye warned that those attacks have signaled to candidates that “it’s not just okay” to attack law enforcement to score political points and avoid dealing with their own legal issues, “it’s beneficial to do so.”

Putnam’s relatively minor offense pales in comparison to some of the other Republicans’ who are currently making bids for federal office. A trio of actual convicted criminals are running serious races for Congress this year, shrugging off their pasts by capitalizing on the GOP base’s distrust of government institutions and the press that has been both fueled by and a strong source of support for Trump himself.

Former coal baron Don Blankenship is running for the right to face Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) this fall even though he’s still on parole after a year in prison for his role in failing to prevent a mine accident that killed 29 workers. Former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio (R) only avoided jail time for criminal contempt because Trump pardoned him — and now he’s running for the Senate in Arizona. Former Rep. Michael Grimm (R-NY) is seeking a comeback in his old congressional district after a stint behind bars for tax fraud, challenging Rep. Dan Donovan (R-NY) by complaining/bragging “the entire Obama Justice Department [was] weaponized against me.” All three have largely blamed Obama for their past troubles rather than take responsibility for their actions, even when the courts have found them all guilty.

And that’s not to mention other GOP candidates who’ve been in legal trouble turning on both law enforcement officials and the press, and claiming politicized “witch hunts.” That was the strategy Alabama GOP Senate candidate Roy Moore took after multiple women accused him of sexual misconduct during his Senate campaign, after he’d already secured the Republican nomination. Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) has made similar attacks against Republicans in his state as he seeks to fend off calls for his resignation over accusations of sexually and fiscally illegal behavior. Rep. Greg Gianforte (R-MT) lied about body-slamming a reporter on his way to winning office, and while he’s since apologized for his actions he’s also fundraised off claims that the “leftist media” is unfairly out to get him.

Republicans warn that they must stop those candidates in the primaries before they win their nominations and destroy their party’s chances of winning their races. But they admit that’s easier said than done.

“When I chaired the NRSC [National Republican Senatorial Committtee], what I conveyed to people in states across the country is if you nominate somebody who can only win a primary but cannot win a general election then you have not served the cause of winning a Republican majority, in this case keeping a Republican majority, so it matters,” Sen. Jerry Moran (R-KS) told TPM. “But I think it’s very difficult for a Republican Party, an NRSC or an organization to convince voters that that view is better than their view, so voters are going to decide this.”

Moran, like many other GOP senators, showed no interest in discussing the question of what these types of candidates were doing to Republican voters’ trust in the rule of law.

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL), one of the few Alabama Republicans who refused to back Moore even as he was facing growing legal problems last fall, told TPM, “It’s best for both parties to have good candidates, to have clean candidates — you’re going to be scrutinized, you’re going to be scrubbed and scrubbed again.”

But he argued Trump’s attacks on the legal system and voters’ distrust of institutions were valid, saying that while they were overall trustworthy there were plenty of bad apples.

“Look, you have rogue people in every agency,” he said. “You have that in the IRS, you’ve seen that. You see that in the FBI, you see that in prosecutors, in the courts.”

Grimm, Arpaio and Blankenship are all underdogs in their races. Moore lost after a large chunk of GOP voters abandoned him. Greitens is facing plenty of pressure from his fellow Republicans to step down. Gianforte may have a real race partly because of his past violence. But this phenomena of politicians behaving badly blaming the government and the media — while retaining cachet within their party — shows how Trump’s attacks on law enforcement have bled into the GOP base’s consciousness. It’s left plenty of right-wing media consumers just as skeptical of law enforcement as they long have been of other parts of government — distrust that has been built by years of right-wing faux and overblown scandals, from the IRS to Benghazi to Fast & Furious. And candidates who would have had zero chance of even winning a primary in past years see an opening.

Republicans don’t have a monopoly on candidates blaming conspiracies for their legal troubles — or even on blaming Obama. When the Justice Department indicted Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) on corruption charges, he and his allies suggested that it was payback for his refusal to support the administration’s positions on Cuba and Iran. Hillary Clinton had plenty of her own complaints about how the DOJ handled its investigation of her use of a private email server, some more valid than others. And during Rep. Jim Traficant’s (D-OH) legal scandal two decades ago, he vowed to expose the FBI for corruption. Others have had success attacking their investigators — Oliver North almost became senator years ago after being a central player in Iran-contra by doing the same.

And this is far from the first time a raft of unelectable GOP candidates has made real noise in primaries. But in the past, their problem was usually ideology, not illegality. In the Trump era, that’s changed.

Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) admitted he was concerned about that chunk of the party base that wouldn’t even accept legal verdicts as settled fact, but argued “gratefully I think it’s pretty small” in terms of the overall GOP electorate.

But he warned that those candidates becoming the nominee would be deeply damaging.

“Usually, it works itself out in the primary,” he said. “But when a Roy Moore gets nominated, we see what happens.”
 
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/doj-removes-language-racial-gerrymandering

DOJ Nixes Racial Gerrymandering Section From Prosecutor’s Manual

Under Attorney General Jeff Sessions, the Justice Department has removed language stressing the need to prevent racial gerrymandering from the manual used by federal prosecutors, Buzzfeed News reported Sunday.

Before the section was removed in March, it affirmed that DOJ would support redistricting plans that are drawn to help minority communities achieve meaningful representation, and would fight racially gerrymandered plans that undermine minority voting power.

“The Voting Section defends from unjustified attack redistricting plans designed to provide minority voters fair opportunities to elect candidates of their choice and endeavors to achieve racially fair results where courts find, following Shaw v. Reno, 113 S.Ct. 286 (1993), and Johnson v. Miller, 115 S.Ct. 2475 (1995), that redistricting plans constitute unconstitutional racial gerrymanders,” the section read, according to an archived version of the online manual.

Buzzfeed News discovered that the section no longer exists and that the current manual does not mention redistricting or racial gerrymandering elsewhere. The handbook does still mention some voting rights issues, such as bans on literacy tests and poll taxes, Buzzfeed News noted.

News of the change comes a week after the Supreme Court heard a challenge to a Texas redistricting plan that the courts have found to be a racial gerrymander aimed at undercutting Latino voting power. Under the Trump administration, the Justice Department has sided with Texas in defending the maps.


The Justice Department also removed a section on the need for a free press and public trial, Buzzfeed News reported.

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https://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/stormy-daniels-trump-defamation-lawsuit

Stormy Daniels Files Defamation Lawsuit Against Trump


Porn actress Stormy Daniels on Monday filed a new lawsuit against President Donald Trump, accusing him of defamation for his response on Twitter to the release of a composite sketch of a man who allegedly threatened Daniels in 2011.

The new lawsuit takes issue with Trump’s tweet about Daniels, whose legal name is Stephanie Clifford, earlier in April. She and her lawyer released a composite sketch of the man Daniels claims threatened her to stay quiet about Trump in 2011. Trump said that the sketch depicted a “nonexistent man” and claimed that the release of the image was a “con job,” retweeting a message arguing that the sketch looked similar to Daniels’ husband.

“In making the statement, Mr. Trump used his national and international audience of millions of people to make a false factual statement to denigrate and attack Ms. Clifford,” Daniels’ lawyer, Michael Avenatti, wrote in the complaint. “Mr. Trump knew that his false, disparaging statement would be read by people around the world, as well as widely reported, and that Ms. Clifford would be subjected to threats of violence, economic harm, and reputational damage as a result.”

Daniels’ lawyer argued that Trump either knew his tweet was false or acted recklessly without knowing the truth and that Trump’s tweet caused Daniels to suffer damages including “harm to her reputation, emotional harm, exposure to contempt, ridicule, and shame, and physical threats of violence to her person and life.”

Daniels’ lawsuit against Trump filed at the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of New York is separate from her lawsuit against Trump and his longtime personal attorney Michael Cohen filed in California.

In her original lawsuit, Daniels sued Trump seeking to be released from a nondisclosure agreement barring her from discussing her alleged sexual encounter with Trump. She charged that Trump did not sign the hush agreement, rendering it invalid. Daniels later added Cohen to that lawsuit, accusing him of defamation over his statement suggesting that she lied.
 
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/livew...-for-over-muslim-ban-rhetoric-during-campaign

Trump: ‘Nothing To Apologize For’ Over Muslim Ban Rhetoric During Campaign

President Donald Trump said Monday that he felt there was “nothing to apologize for” when asked about his campaign-era rhetoric about a Muslim ban.

During a joint press conference with Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, a reporter told Trump that “in the Supreme Court case over your travel ban, the lawyers for the opponents said that if you would simply apologize for some of your rhetoric during the campaign, the whole case would go away.”

“I was wondering if— ” the reporter began.

“I don’t think it would, number one,” Trump interrupted him.

“And there’s no reason to apologize. Our immigration laws in this country are a total disaster,” he continued. “They’re laughed at all over the world, they’re laughed at, for their stupidity and we have to have strong immigration laws. So I think if I apologize, it wouldn’t make ten cents worth of difference to them.”

“There’s nothing to apologize for,” he continued. “We have to have strong immigration laws to protect our country.”

 
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https://www.mediaite.com/online/tru...000-to-help-cover-michael-cohens-legal-costs/

Trump Campaign Reportedly Paid $228,000 to Help Cover Michael Cohen’s Legal Costs


A new report on the Trump 2016 campaign’s filings with the Federal Election Commission is raising new questions about whether the president’s personal lawyer violated campaign finance laws during the 2016 election.

ABC News reviewed the FEC’s records and found that the campaign made three payments to McDermott Will and Emery, the law firm representing Michael Cohen. The payments were described as “legal consulting” costs with a grand total of approximately $228,000.

Cohen has been under major legal scrutiny ever since the FBI raided his offices in order to investigate the potential illegalities involved in his hush money payment to Stormy Daniels. Cohen insists he didn’t have a formal role in his boss’ campaign, and Trump recently minimized his importance by saying that he has lots of other attorneys working for him. The president did say, however, that Cohen represented him with regard to the Daniels matter.

Campaign finance laws cited by ABC state that its illegal to use campaign money for personal uses. If Cohen received the three fees to help cover legal expenses pertaining to the ongoing Russian investigation, then the campaign is most likely within the bounds of the law. If the money had anything to do with the Daniels payoff though, that’s possibly a more-problematic matter.

Sources told ABC that Cohen’s legal work did not involve Daniels, though Cohen’s attorney and a Trump campaign spokesman both declined to comment when asked about the payments.
 
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