Under alleged plan, ex-Trump adviser and his son were to be paid millions to forcibly remove Fethullah Gulen from U.S. and deliver him to Turkish custody
Special Counsel Robert Mueller is investigating an alleged plan involving former White House National Security Adviser Mike Flynn to forcibly remove a Muslim cleric living in the U.S. and deliver him to Turkey in return for millions of dollars, according to people familiar with the investigation.
Under the alleged proposal, Mr. Flynn and his son, Michael Flynn Jr., were to be paid as much as $15 million for delivering Fethullah Gulen to the Turkish government
.. a meeting in mid-December at the ‘21’ Club in New York City, where Mr. Flynn and representatives of the Turkish government discussed removing Mr. Gulen, according to people with knowledge of the FBI’s inquiries. The discussions allegedly involved the possibility of transporting Mr. Gulen on a private jet to the Turkish prison island of Imrali
.. federal investigators’ interest in whether Mr. Flynn was pursuing potentially illegal means to forcibly deal with Mr. Gulen indicates that the former Trump adviser faces another investigation stemming from his work on behalf of Turkish government interests, both before and after the presidential election.
.. Mr. Gulen’s removal was discussed as “a covert step in the dead of night to whisk this guy away,”
.. Also present at the September meeting were Mr. Erdogan’s son-in-law and Turkey’s foreign minister
.. Turkey had been lobbying Obama administration officials for months to release Mr. Gulen to Turkish custody and wanted to avoid a legal extradition proceeding
.. Mr. Flynn wrote an op-ed published in The Hill on the day of the presidential election in which he praised Mr. Erdogan’s government and called the cleric “a shady Islamic mullah” and “radical Islamist” who may be running “a dangerous sleeper terror network” in the U.S.
.. Mr. Woolsey, who served briefly as an adviser to the Trump campaign, said he turned down a consulting fee from Mr. Flynn’s company
.. Mr. Flynn’s attorney, Robert Kelner, wouldn’t comment at the time on details of his discussions involving Mr. Flynn, but said “General Flynn certainly has a story to tell, and he very much wants to tell it, should the circumstances permit.”
Prosecutors Seek Plea Deal With Manafort’s Former Son-in Law
Jeffrey Yohai, who worked with his father-in-law on real-estate deals, hasn’t been charged with any crime
.. Mr. Manafort’s daughter, Jessica, filed for divorce from Mr. Yohai earlier this year. Records show a divorce judgment was issued in August.
.. Mr. Manafort, his wife and daughter put at least $4.2 million into house-flipping projects, federal bankruptcy-court records show. Mr. Yohai put the four properties into corporate bankruptcy in December 2016, as the lender, Genesis, was moving toward foreclosure, records show.
.. In September, Mr. Yohai said in a federal court filing in Santa Ana, Calif. that Mr. Manafort and associates had “conspired to mislead” the judge about purchase offers that had materialized for the properties.
.. Mr. Manafort told his tax preparer that the construction loan would allow him to fully pay off the mortgage on another apartment.
.. After Genesis went to court to foreclose on the Brooklyn property, Mr. Manafort obtained loans from another bank based in Chicago, run by a Trump campaign adviser
.. Mr. Mueller accused Mr. Manafort of subsequently defrauding a bank when applying for a mortgage on the property. Although the property was used to generate rental income, Mr. Manafort told the bank that it was a second home for his daughter and Mr. Yohai, so he could get a greater loan amount, for $3.185 million, than he could have otherwise, the indictment says.
.. The indictment says that on Jan. 26, 2016, Mr. Manafort wrote to his then son-in-law about a visit from an appraiser to the condominium, saying, “[r]emember, he believes that you and” Jessica Manafort “are living there.”
Preet Bharara Reads Bob Mueller’s Tea Leaves
A former top prosecutor gives his informed take on the special counsel’s investigation.
.. “I don’t talk about the things we were examining and investigating during that time I was U.S. attorney, including on the day that I left that job,” Bharara told me, in a separate interview for POLITICO’s Off Message podcast. “But there would be people who would know what we were looking at, including the attorney general, Jeff Sessions, because we provided summaries of significant and sensitive cases that we were working. And that’s all I’ll say.”.. he thinks Trump enabled an environment of people busting through norms and boundaries, and looking out for themselves above all. He’s also happy to talk about the reaction he had to the meeting and two phone calls he had with the then-president-elect last fall and winter... “This is a person who is a transactional player in the world—that’s how he did what he did in his business, and that’s how he thinks, I think, the justice system is supposed to work. And why not have people on your side, because like the Godfather says, the Godfather may come to you for a favor,”.. Deeply political people, whether you’re talking about a governor of a state or a chief of staff to a president, think that everyone acts like they do.”.. in his new office in Vanderbilt Hall at NYU School of Law, where the student lounge is named after presidential in-laws Seryl and Charles Kushner—whose big donations to the school coincided with their son Jared Kushner’s time getting a JD/MBA there.
Mueller braces for challenges to his authority
The special counsel has won some early court victories in the Russia investigation, but with charges filed defense attorneys and others are lining up to rein in the probe.
.. “Whenever you operate in uncharted legal territory, and this would be an example, you’d expect defense lawyers to push the envelope and edges.. In a case like Manafort’s, Mueller may be wise to hand it over to DOJ for prosecution.. But Rotunda also said a court is unlikely to give a defendant standing to object to Mueller’s jurisdiction. “The only entity that could object is the DOJ,” he said... U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson has proposed should go to trial starting May 7.. Jackson also told the attorneys for Mueller and the defense that she’s considering issuing a gag order that limits the public statements both sides may make about the case... Chief Judge Beryl Howell of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled last month in the special counsel’s favor when he tried to seek grand jury testimony from an attorney for Manafort and Gates... Richard Ben-Veniste, a former Watergate prosecutor, said that he expected defense lawyers representing indicted defendants to keep on challenging Mueller’s authority and jurisdiction. “I would also expect such challenges to be unavailing,” he said, “as Mueller’s authority to act is on firm legal ground.”