Quote:
Originally Posted by dumars
|
what's to read? it's 34 counts of the same thing.
FALSIFYING BUSINESS RECORDS IN THE FIRST DEGREE
what's more important is what
isn't in the document .. how Bragg intends to make what is normally a misdemeanor into a felony. Bragg hasn't said. various speculation and at present that's all it is, speculation, claim tax evasion, possibly this so-called election law violation however that part if Bragg tries to make a claim is nonsense.
apparently Bragg's angle is that Trump should have paid Cohen via the Trump campaign rather than personally. Bragg appears to think it was an attempt to influence the election by "covering it up". a rather dubious claim. looks like Bragg doesn't understand why public figures make these deals, it's not about covering up guilt, it's about preventing people from making allegations that might be knowingly untrue to ruin one's reputation.
F.E.C. Drops Case Reviewing Trump Hush-Money Payments to Women
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/06/u...cohen-fec.html
The case had examined whether Donald Trump violated election law with a $130,000 payment shortly before the 2016 election to a pornographic-film actress by his personal lawyer, Michael Cohen.
The Federal Election Commission said on Thursday that it had formally dropped a case looking into whether former President Donald J.
Trump violated election law with a payment of $130,000 shortly before the 2016 election to a pornographic-film actress by his personal lawyer at the time, Michael D. Cohen.
The payment was never reported on Mr. Trump’s campaign filings. Mr. Cohen would go on to say that Mr. Trump had
directed him to arrange payments to two women during the 2016 race, and would
apologize for his involvement in a hush-money scandal. Mr. Cohen was
sentenced to prison for
breaking campaign finance laws, tax evasion and lying to Congress.
let's recall that Cohen, to avoid a longer sentence, was willing to plea to whatever the DA put in front of him. no guarantee any charge of breaking campaign finance laws would have held up at trial.
“The hush money payment was done at the direction of and for the benefit of Donald J. Trump,” Mr. Cohen said in a statement to The New York Times. “Like me, Trump should have been found guilty. How the F.E.C. committee could rule any other way is confounding.”
that's mikey's story and he's gonna stick with it. he has to for several reasons. if he goes back on it he's a liar which he is, and it could be a parole violation.
In December 2020, the F.E.C. issued an
internal report from its Office of General Counsel on how to proceed in its review. The office said it had found “reason to believe” violations of campaign finance law were made “knowingly and willfully” by the Trump campaign.
But the election commission — split evenly between three Republicans and three Democratic-aligned commissioners — declined to proceed in a closed-door meeting in February. Two Republican commissioners voted to dismiss the case while two Democratic commissioners voted to move forward. There was one absence and one Republican recusal.
Two of the Democratic commissioners on the F.E.C., Shana Broussard, the current chairwoman, and Ellen Weintraub, objected to not pursuing the case after the agency’s staff had recommended further investigation.
“To conclude that a payment, made 13 days before Election Day to hush up a suddenly newsworthy 10-year-old story, was not campaign-related, without so much as conducting an investigation, defies reality,” they wrote in a letter.
further investigation does not automatically mean a crime would be found.
apparently the tax evasion angle requires a campaign finance crime which many experts say is dubious at best.
The 34 Charges . . .
