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Experts Blast Chief Justice’s ‘Sham’ Leak Probe: ‘When Is an Investigation Not an Investigation?’

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Legal and political exerts are blasting the U.S. Supreme Court’s investigation that failed to determine who leaked the draft opinion in the Dobbs case that ultimately served to overturn Roe v. Wade and void the decades-old previously-constitutional right to abortion. Some, having read the Court’s report on the investigation, state it appears the Justices and their spouses were not interviewed or investigated.

In an unsigned statement Thursday the Court announced after a long investigation, “to date” it had been “unable to identify a person responsible by a preponderance of the evidence.”

Frank Figliuzzi, the well-known former FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence and MSNBC national security analyst, served up strong contempt for the process chosen by the Court, and what he suggested was the underlying reason the investigation failed to produce the leaker.

Asked point-blank on MSNBCs “Dateline: White House” if he believes the leaker is already known to the Court, he responded with one word: “Yes.”

“Looks like maybe they didn’t want to get to the truth,” he opined.

READ MORE: Supreme Court Announces It Can’t Figure Out Who Leaked the Draft Decision of the Ruling That Overturned Roe

Noted national security attorney Mark S. Zaid, who also handles government investigation cases, says investigators did not interview or investigate the Justices or their spouses.

“Having read [the] investigative findings, I am completely struck by fact does not appear Justices (or their families) were interviewed, much less investigated,” he tweeted.

“Since bare min[imum] ‘preponderance of evidence’ was standard that could not be met w/staff, who else does that leave as leaker?” he asked.

“When is an investigation really not an investigation?” Figliuzzi also rhetorically suggested to MSNBC anchor Nicolle Wallace. “When you’re told what you can and can’t do, you can’t do what you need to do or talk to the people you need to talk to to solve the investigation, and, when the investigation isn’t conducted by professional investigators.”

Figliuzzi, himself an expert investigator who served as the Bureau’s chief inspector, blasted the decisions made about how the investigation would be conducted and who would conduct it.

“The U.S. Marshal Service did not conduct this investigation. This investigation was conducted by someone called the Marshal of the Supreme Court. I’m sure she’s a wonderful person. But she has no law enforcement training or experience. She’s in charge of securing the building called the Supreme Court building and its justices. That’s what she does.”

He also criticized who he says was not investigated: former clerks and current Justices.

READ MORE: ‘War Has Begun’: Ex-NOM Spokesperson Carrie Prejean Lashes Out Over Miss Universe Being Owned by Trans Woman

“If you want to do real serious leak investigation, you’re going to talk literally to every person who may have had access to whatever it is that leaked. From what we can see so far, while they may have talked one hundred people, they didn’t talk to ex-clerks. They didn’t talk to the very universe of people who may have done the leaking and then left the court,” he noticed.

“They didn’t call the FBI, because you know what would happen, then a real case would have happened. They wouldn’t have actually had the criminal process.”

“Someone stole government property, someone mishandled government records, potentially a crime. They could have had subpoenas of former clerks and former employees they would have had that leverage over them. They could have subpoenaed phone carriers and internet providers, and they could have see who was talking to whom and when, at the media platform that obtained this information,” he said, presumably referring to Politico which obtained and published the leaked draft opinion. “All of that could have been done.”

“We still have, according to The New York Times reporting today, we have no evidence that the justices themselves were interviewed.”

There was “no serious intent to get to get to the bottom of it, in my opinion,” Figliuzzi added.

Wallace at that point specified she was calling it “a sham investigation,” and then asked, “Why would a sham investigation be ordered? If Justice Alito felt that his quote assassination was possible because of the leak?”

Former Deputy Assistant Director of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division, Peter Strzok, also points to the fact, based on the report from the Marshal of the Supreme Court, that the Justices and their spouses were not investigated, and former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff’s claim affirming the quality of the investigation.

“Kind of blows a huge hole in Chertoff’s statement that he ‘[could] not identify any additional useful investigative measures,'” Strzok wrote.

Former RNC chairman Michael Steele went even further, while agreeing with Figliuzzi’s take that the Court knows who the leaker is.

“I don’t think they want to know,” he alleged, also on MSNBC’s “Deadline: White House.”

“I don’t think they want to know because I think they already know. I think they already know enough to know who, what, where, when and why, inside that building.”

Steele, a veteran of politics, declared, “the worst outcome here is not a judicial one. It is a political one. It is one that steeps this building, and its justices in a political vortex that they cannot escape from. Sitting at 26% approval among the American people because of the prior bad acts and opinions in how people are perceiving how this Court is operating.”

READ MORE: Trump Moves to Return to Twitter and Facebook After Being Banned Over Risk of ‘Incitement of Violence’ and to Public Safety

“You layer on top of this, someone within their own ranks, whether it was a staffer or a justice, God forbid – which I do not take off the table here – leaking this for nefarious political reasons, whether to create outcome ‘A’ or create outcome ‘B’ around this opinion, that does not create an avenue to further entrust or garner the trust of the American people.

Slate’s legal expert Dahlia Lithwick added to the conversation, “I think that the decision was taken to do this is in-house using the Marshal Service, but probably other choices could have been made, to have a different, perhaps more thorough investigation. But I think the takeaway is exactly what you just heard, that for a leak that was characterized by most of the justices as the single most shocking, egregious violation of norms like trust. It’s still being credited for destroying collegiality amongst the justices.”

“This was a nuclear bomb that went off into court. And now the answer seems to be, ‘so sad, too bad, I’m good,'” she observed. “It’s pretty amazing in light of how absolutely consequential this has been, not just for the justices amongst themselves, but for the sort of integrity and reputational interests of the court.”

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Lawmaker Slammed for Claiming College Basketball Players Were Actually ‘Illegal Invaders’

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Michigan MAGA Republican state Rep. Matt Maddock is under fire after claiming three buses were “loaded up with illegal invaders.” The buses, according to multiple reports, were actually loaded with the Gonzaga University basketball team arriving for March Madness.

“Happening right now. Three busses just loaded up with illegal invaders at Detroit Metro. Anyone have any idea where they’re headed with their police escort?” Rep. Maddock wrote on social media Wednesday evening, tagging far-right former U.S. Congressman Pete Hoekstra, who served as U.S. Ambassador to the Netherlands under Donald Trump and is now the state’s Republican Party chair.

Informed of his error on social media, Rep. Maddock doubled down, and attacked.

READ MORE: Ronna McDaniel Is Just a ‘Normal’ Person Who ‘Never Denied the Election’ Says Hugh Hewitt

“Probably teams for the NCAA Mens Sweet 16 playing at LCA on Friday and Sunday,” a user on X wrote.

“Sure kommie. Good talking point,” Maddock quickly shot back.

ABC affiliate WXYZ executive producer Maxwell White, responding to the Maddock’s original post wrote: “Just to be clear, this was the Gonzaga basketball team. Photos show Gonzaga getting on an Allegiant plane to Detroit for the Sweet 16, and Flight Radar shows a plane from GEG to DTW landed at 7:25 p.m., around the time this photo was posted.”

“This is a wild tweet,” White added, before adding more evidence.

Hoekstra, who was accused of using racism and xenophobia to win his campaign for a U.S. Senate seat (he lost), did not respond directly to Maddock but did repost the apparently false claim.

Michigan State Senate Democratic Majority Whip Mallory McMorrow denounced Maddock’s claim as “dangerous.”

Maddock’s remark also made the national stage when U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell responded.

READ MORE: Trump Campaign Says It Will Deploy ‘Soldiers’ to Polling Places

“Hey Einstein,” the California Democrat wrote, “your state is hosting the Sweet 16. Could it be a team bus? If it is, will you resign for your spectacular stupidity?”

In 2021 The Washington Post reported, “Michigan state Rep. Matt Maddock and his wife, Michigan Republican Party co-chair Meshawn Maddock, have repeatedly been called out by fact-checking journalists for promoting baseless claims of widespread voter fraud and falsely suggesting that covid-19 is comparable to the flu.”

See the social media posts above 0r at this link.

 

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Comer Refuses to Investigate Trump Family Member Over ‘Influence Peddling’ Allegation

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Last year House Oversight Committee Chairman Jim Comer acknowledged former President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and senior White House advisor Jared Kushner had “crossed the line” when he accepted $2 billion in foreign investment funds from the government of Saudi Arabia as he started up a private investment firm just months after leaving the White House.

Now, Chairman Comer says he will not open an investigation into any possible wrongdoing, Huffpost reports, despite top Democrats alleging Kushner engaged in “apparent influence peddling and quid pro quo deals.”

On Tuesday, the top Democrat on Comer’s Oversight Committee, Ranking Member Jamie Raskin, and Democrat Robert Garcia, the Ranking Member on the Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs, formally requested Comer “convene a hearing regarding Jared Kushner’s apparent influence peddling and quid pro quo deals involving investments in exchange for official actions and to examine the resulting threats to our national security.”

“This Committee cannot claim to be ‘investigating foreign nationals’ attempts to target and coerce high-ranking U.S. officials’ family members by providing money or other benefits in exchange for certain actions while continuing to ignore these matters,” Raskin and Garcia wrote. “We therefore urge you to work with us to finally investigate Mr. Kushner’s receipt of billions of dollars from foreign governments in deals that appear to be quid pro quos for actions he undertook as senior White House adviser in Donald Trump’s Administration.”

READ MORE: Greene Says She Won’t Take Responsibility if Johnson Loses Speaker’s Gavel Before Election

The American people are deeply concerned about these business dealings and Mr. Kushner’s apparent influence peddling. We must address
those concerns with a fair, impartial, and public process to understand the truth and to institute meaningful reforms to safeguard public confidence in our executive branch.”

The two Democrats in their letter say their “request comes in light of allegations that Jared Kushner is pursuing new foreign business deals, just as Donald Trump becomes the presumptive Republican nominee for the presidency. Last year, well before these new allegations came to light, Chairman Comer had already conceded that Jared Kushner’s conduct ‘crossed the line of ethics’ and promised that the Oversight Committee would ‘have some questions for Trump and some of his family members, including Jared Kushner.'”

Raskin and Garcia paint a picture of “Kushner’s pattern of profiting off of his time in the White House.”

Citing The New York Times (apparently this article), they write, “Jared Kushner was closing in on investments in Albania and Serbia, leveraging relationships he built during his time as a senior adviser in his father-in-law’s White House. Reportedly, Mr. Kushner is considering an investment on the site of the former Yugoslav Ministry of Defense.”

“Mr. Kushner is reportedly being advised by Richard Grenell, another former senior Trump Administration official who served as U.S. Ambassador to Germany and, concomitantly, as ‘special envoy for peace negotiations between Serbia and Kosovo.’ Mr. Grenell reportedly ‘pushed a related plan’ for redevelopment of the same site during his time in the Trump Administration.”

READ MORE: Trump Says He Thinks He’s ‘Allowed’ to Accept Foreign Money to Pay Fines

“In pursuing investment opportunities in Albania, Mr. Grenell and Mr. Kushner have been openly leveraging their relationship with Edi Rama, the Prime Minister of Albania. While Commander-in-Chief, President Trump received unconstitutional payments from Prime Minister Rama and other senior Albanian government officials who spent thousands of dollars at theTrump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., over three separate stays,” Raskin and Garcia write.

They also allege, “Mr. Kushner successfully overruled State Department officials, including Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, to make President Trump’s first foreign trip as President to Saudi Arabia. Mr. Kushner personally intervened to inflate the value of a U.S.-Saudi arms deal and to finalize the deal President Trump signed, which was worth $110 billion. Mr. Kushner
also provided diplomatic cover and support to the Crown Prince after the brutal murder of Jamal Khashoggi, an American permanent resident and journalist. Mr. Khashoggi’s murder was assessed by American Intelligence to have been approved by the Crown Prince himself.”

Despite their extensive allegations, Chairman Comer is refusing to open an investigation.

“Unlike the Bidens, Jared Kushner has a legitimate business and has a career as a business executive that predates Donald Trump’s political career,” Comer said, as HuffPost reports. “Democrats’ latest letter is part of their playbook to shield President Biden from oversight.”

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Greene Says She Won’t Take Responsibility if Johnson Loses Speaker’s Gavel Before Election

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Despite filing a motion to vacate the chair last week, which could end Mike Johnson’s short term as Speaker, and despite pummeling him in the press, U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) says she will take no responsibility if House Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries becomes Speaker of the House before the November election.

Appearing on right-wing media Tuesday, the far-right Georgia Republican targeted Speaker Johnson again, telling GOP voters Johnson stabbed them “in the back.”

Johnson “has a duty and responsibility to care for our conference,” Greene told Real America’s Voice. “That means not force us to vote on full-term abortion, funding the trans agenda, DEI funding, 300 million to the Ukraine war, and many other horrific far-left funding wishlist items that the Democrats were thrilled with.”

“He shouldn’t make us vote on that in order to pay our military soldiers. That’s outrageous. It’s also an election year,” she continued, “and that means that Republicans are out trying to get re-elected and he forced our Republican conference, those that voted for this basically walked the plank for him and that is outrageous.”

READ MORE: $500 Per Second: Ronna McDaniel Reportedly Has a Few Expectations

After talking for several minutes about how Johnson “broke” and “violated” the rules by holding votes to keep the government from shutting down, she insisted her attacks are “not personal against Mike Johnson.”

“I filed the motion to vacate basically issuing a pink slip saying you’re going to be fired, we will not tolerate this any longer. And Republican voters all over this country agree with me,” she insisted.

In October, after Kevin McCarthy was ousted by his own party as Speaker of the House, CBS News reported its new polling “shows the American public wants the next Republican speaker to prioritize federal spending cuts, but also work across the aisle with Democrats and stand up against the ‘MAGA’ movement.”

Declaring, “Our conference needs a new Speaker of the House,” Greene insisted her actions have no effect on Republicans, who increasingly are exiting Congress early.

She also insisted that pinning a possible Speaker of the House Hakeem Jeffries on her is merely “twist” and “spin.”

READ MORE: ‘Absurd & Dangerous’: Truth Social Made Donald Trump Billions Today

“This is simple math,” she said. “The more Republicans like Mike Gallagher that resign and leave early, guess what that means we have less Republicans in the House. So every time a Mike Gallagher or Ken Buck leaves that brings our members down and brings us dangerously closer to being in the minority. It’s not Marjorie Taylor Greene.”

“I am not going to be responsible for Hakeem Jeffries being Speaker of the House. I am not going to for a Democrat majority taking over our Republican majority. That lies squarely, squarely on the shoulders of these Republicans that are leaving early because they don’t have the intestinal fortitude to handle the real fight, and the responsibility that comes with leadership at the end of our Republic when our country is nearly destroyed and when our Constitution is being ran through a paper shredder. So no one is going to blame that on me.”

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