Speaking louder in code by @BloggersRUs

Speaking louder in code

by Tom Sullivan

Mr. Trump did not directly tell me to lie to Congress. That's not how he operates ... He doesn’t give you questions, he doesn’t give you orders, he speaks in a code.
— Michael Cohen testimony before House Oversight Committee, Feb. 27, 2019
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) asked US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson on Tuesday to issue an emergency order to the White House to preserve all records of President Donald J. Trump's calls with foreign leaders. The request is part of ongoing litigation begun before recent revelations about Trump's July 25 call with the president of Ukraine.

The action comes in the wake of revelations in the whistleblower complain that records of that conversation and possibly others (including Trump's May 10, 2017 Oval Office meeting with Russian officials) were moved to a restricted computer system. Dahlia Lithwick speculates a May 10 memorandum may have been concealed there from former special counsel Robert Mueller during his investigation.

Zoe Tillman reports for BuzzFeed:
At a court hearing later in the day, a Justice Department lawyer told the judge that she couldn’t immediately commit to assuring that the administration would preserve records of all of Trump’s conversations, as well as other records about how the administration had handled those documents. The judge gave the government until Wednesday afternoon to make a decision.

Jackson, who sits in Washington, DC, has strongly and repeatedly suggested that the government should consider giving a voluntary assurance, as opposed to having her formally rule on the request filed by the challengers for an emergency order and issue a decision that she said one side “might not appreciate.”
Justice Department lawyer Kathryn Wyer would not give that assurance. Even voluntarily.

The Presidential Records Act passed in the wake of Watergate requires the President to send all official memos, letters, emails, etc., to the National Archives for preservation. Politico reported in June that Solomon Lartey, a records management analyst with 30 years' experience, found himself being paid $65,969 per year to tape back together scraps of paper the President had torn up and thrown in the trash or on the floor. Those are the documents he doesn't care about.

CREW and Congress are more worried about preservation of other documents that might implicate him in crimes. The man who "speaks in code" may not have to directly order his people to destroy anything.

The acting president has no clue how the U.S. Constitution or federal laws work, nor any interest in learning despite these tweets Tuesday evening.

....People, their VOTE, their Freedoms, their Second Amendment, Religion, Military, Border Wall, and their God-given rights as a Citizen of The United States of America!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 1, 2019
Has he learned extorting personal favors from foreign governments is illegal?

Has he learned destroying public records is illegal?

Has he learned it's illegal to use government resources for his reelection campaign?

Has he learned he can't stop impeachment by siccing his attorneys on Congress?

No, no, no, and no.

The acting president is still running the Trump Corporation, now with deeper resources and longer reach. Plus, millions of Twitter followers to whom he can speak in code.

....the Whistleblower, and also the person who gave all of the false information to him. This is simply about a phone conversation that could not have been nicer, warmer, or better. No pressure at all (as confirmed by Ukrainian Pres.). It is just another Democrat Hoax!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 1, 2019

Whistleblowers' anonymity is protected by federal statutes the president is obliged to uphold. Thus, Senator Mark Warner (D-Va.), vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, called this and Trump's other Twitter attacks on the whistleblower "outrageous." Warner said in a Tuesday statement:
“It is deeply disturbing that the president went on national television and told the American people that he’s trying to find out the whistleblower’s identity. The president’s comments about ‘spies and treason’ and ‘what we used to do in the old days’ are downright dangerous and will do serious damage to our national security long after this news cycle is over. That kind of rhetoric can only serve one purpose: intimidation of this whistleblower and anyone else within the intelligence community who is considering stepping forward to report wrongdoing.

“It is incumbent upon the Acting Director of National Intelligence and other intelligence leaders to publicly pledge that they will protect and stand by this whistleblower, and any other individual within the intelligence community who steps forward to lawfully report illegal or unethical behavior within the federal government, anonymously or otherwise.”
The whistleblower needs protection from anyone reading the code in Trump's Twitter stream:
Andrew Bakaj, an attorney for the whistleblower, writes that “the events of the past week have heightened our concerns that our client’s identity will be disclosed publicly and that, as a result, our client will be put in harm’s way.” Bakaj also claimed that “certain individuals have issued a $50,000 “bounty” for “any information” relating to our client’s identity."
Members of Congress leading the impeachment inquiry may themselves require protection.

Why isn’t Congressman Adam Schiff being brought up on charges for fraudulently making up a statement and reading it to Congress as if this statement, which was very dishonest and bad for me, was directly made by the President of the United States? This should never be allowed!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 1, 2019

Rep. Adam Schiff illegally made up a FAKE & terrible statement, pretended it to be mine as the most important part of my call to the Ukrainian President, and read it aloud to Congress and the American people. It bore NO relationship to what I said on the call. Arrest for Treason?

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 30, 2019

Yesterday, I posted an image from "Titanic" to illustrate what might be ahead for the Trump administration. Joel Mathis at The Week concurs that Ukraine may be just "tip of the impeachment iceberg." Or the first of many shoes to drop.