{"id":12344,"date":"2017-06-20T13:49:58","date_gmt":"2017-06-20T08:49:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/jwt2015\/?p=12344"},"modified":"2017-06-20T13:49:58","modified_gmt":"2017-06-20T08:49:58","slug":"trump-is-not-under-investigation-his-lawyer-insists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/studykit\/currentaffairs\/daily-articles\/trump-is-not-under-investigation-his-lawyer-insists\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump \u2018Is Not Under Investigation,\u2019 His Lawyer Insists"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Trump<\/a><\/p>\n

By: MICHAEL D. SHEAR and NOAH WEILAND<\/strong><\/p>\n

WASHINGTON \u2014 A member of President Trump\u2019s legal team said on Sunday that the president was not under investigation by the special counsel looking into Russia\u2019s election-year meddling, contradicting Mr. Trump\u2019s assertion in a Friday morning tweet that he is a subject of the widening inquiry.<\/p>\n

The denial on Sunday by Jay Sekulow, one of several personal lawyers Mr. Trump has hired to represent him in the Russia case, is the latest of many examples in which the president\u2019s aides and lawyers have scrambled to avert a public-relations mess created by Mr. Trump\u2019s tweets, off-script remarks or leaked private conversations.<\/p>\n

Advisers have been forced to perform postpresidential cleanup in the wake of Mr. Trump\u2019s tweet claiming he had been wiretapped by the Obama administration, his Oval Office comments to Russian diplomats about the former F.B.I. director, his private musings about the possibility of firing the Russia special counsel, his suggestion that there might be recordings of White House conversations, and his comments about a \u201cmilitary\u201d deportation operation.<\/p>\n

In Mr. Sekulow\u2019s case, his appearance on multiple Sunday morning talk shows took on the added urgency of trying to protect his client from admitting that he is in legal jeopardy during a criminal investigation, one that appears to be increasingly focused on whether Mr. Trump took steps to interfere with the normal progress of the federal inquiry.<\/p>\n

Rod J. Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, last month named Robert B. Mueller, a former F.B.I. director, as a special counsel to lead the sprawling investigation into the extent of Russia\u2019s meddling in the 2016 presidential election, and whether any of Mr. Trump\u2019s associates colluded in that effort.<\/p>\n

In addition, two congressional committees have issued subpoenas for testimony and documents as part of their wide-ranging, bipartisan investigations. All three inquiries are reportedly examining whether Mr. Trump, as president, sought to impede the progress of the inquiries.<\/p>\n

Mr. Sekulow repeatedly and forcefully denied that on Sunday, saying on CBS\u2019s \u201cFace the Nation\u201d program that \u201cthe president has not been and is not under investigation,\u201d and insisting that the administration had received no information from the special counsel\u2019s office to think otherwise.<\/p>\n

On CNN\u2019s \u201cState of the Union\u201d program, he said flatly, \u201cThe president is not a subject or target of an investigation.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Friday, the president wrote the opposite on Twitter, saying: \u201cI am being investigated for firing the FBI Director by the man who told me to fire the FBI Director! Witch Hunt.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Sekulow said that the message was merely a response by the president to a Washington Post article citing five unnamed sources who said Mr. Trump was under investigation in the Russia case. Mr. Sekulow said that Mr. Trump would have challenged the basic assertion of the article, but was constrained by Twitter\u2019s limit of 140 characters per post.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a limitation on Twitter, as we all know,\u201d Mr. Sekulow said on CNN. \u201cAnd the president has a very effective utilization of social media.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Sekulow did acknowledge on \u201cFox News Sunday\u201d that he \u201ccan\u2019t read people\u2019s minds,\u201d but said there had been \u201cno notification of an investigation\u201d of the president by Mr. Mueller.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t imagine a scenario where the president would not be aware of it,\u201d Mr. Sekulow said on CBS.<\/p>\n

Evidence that Mr. Mueller is in fact looking at Mr. Trump\u2019s actions grew last week when Mr. Mueller requested interviews with three high-ranking current or former intelligence officials, according to a person briefed on the investigation. Reports have raised questions about whether Mr. Trump requested their help in trying to get James B. Comey, then the F.B.I. director, to end an investigation into the president\u2019s former national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn.<\/p>\n

Veteran lawyers who have represented presidents during high-stakes legal cases said Mr. Trump\u2019s repeated comments about the Russia investigation were extremely unusual. They said previous presidents would make sure to have the White House counsel\u2019s office and their personal lawyers carefully review any comments about such an investigation before making them.<\/p>\n

They said Mr. Sekulow\u2019s denials on Sunday were not so much a legal argument as an effort to repair the political damage from the apparent admission by Mr. Trump on Twitter.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith all due respect to Mr. Sekulow, what he says about what Mr. Mueller is or isn\u2019t doing will make no difference,\u201d said Gregory B. Craig, who led the legal team defending President Bill Clinton against impeachment charges. \u201cIf Mueller thinks there is evidence that obstruction occurred, Mueller\u2019s job is to investigate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Several lawyers who requested anonymity because they did not want to publicly comment on the president\u2019s legal situation dismissed Mr. Sekulow\u2019s comments about the president\u2019s not having been notified that he is a target of the investigation. One noted that very few criminal investigations begin with an identified target. Rather, targets are notified much later, after evidence in the case is developed.<\/p>\n

On Capitol Hill, members of both parties expressed exasperation with Mr. Trump\u2019s continuing public commentary about the Russia investigation. Senator Marco Rubio, Republican of Florida, pleaded on Sunday for the president to give Mr. Mueller the room he needs to manage the inquiry.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I were the president, I would be welcoming this investigation,\u201d Mr. Rubio said on CBS. \u201cI would ask that it be thorough and completed expeditiously, and be very cooperative with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Rubio added, \u201cThe best thing that can happen for the president and for America is that we have a full-scale investigation that is credible.\u201d<\/p>\n

Representative Adam Schiff, Democrat of California, accused Mr. Trump and his allies of seeking to undermine Mr. Mueller\u2019s investigation, setting a pretext for potentially firing those leading it. Mr. Trump has reportedly told friends that he considered firing Mr. Mueller, and the president\u2019s tweet on Friday appeared aimed at Mr. Rosenstein, raising questions about whether the president might fire him, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s happening here is the president wants to take down Bob Mueller. His lawyer wants to take down Bob Mueller,\u201d Mr. Schiff said on ABC\u2019s \u201cThis Week\u201d program. \u201cThey want to lay the foundation to discredit whatever Bob Mueller comes up with. They\u2019re essentially engaging in a scorched-earth litigation strategy that is beginning with trying to discredit the prosecutor.\u201d<\/p>\n

During his five months as president, Mr. Trump has repeatedly made comments that administration officials later sought to correct or explain.<\/p>\n

After Mr. Trump repeatedly called for a \u201cMuslim ban\u201d during the presidential campaign, White House aides and lawyers said the travel ban he imposed shortly after taking office was not aimed at any religious group. Federal judges, however, said they had looked to the president\u2019s own statements as they assessed the constitutionality of the effort to impose a travel ban, a case that has reached the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n

Just weeks after taking office, Mr. Trump told reporters that new immigration policies were getting rid of \u201creally bad dudes\u201d and added, \u201cIt\u2019s a military operation.\u201d John Kelly, the secretary of homeland security, quickly corrected: \u201cNo \u2014 repeat \u2014 no use of military force in immigration operations. None.\u201d<\/p>\n

On a Saturday morning in early March, Mr. Trump accused former President Barack Obama of wiretapping, a charge that aides repeatedly struggled to explain. \u201cI\u2019m just going to let the tweet speak for itself,\u201d Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, said at the time. \u201cI think the president speaks very candidly.\u201d<\/p>\n

In May, word leaked out that Mr. Trump had told Russian diplomats in the Oval Office that Mr. Comey was a \u201cnut job,\u201d and that his firing had relieved \u201cgreat pressure\u201d on the president. Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, his national security adviser, later went on television to say that \u201cthe gist of the conversation was that the president feels as if he is hamstrung in his ability to work with Russia to find areas of cooperation because this has been obviously so much in the news.\u201d<\/p>\n

And after a longtime friend of Mr. Trump said this month that the president was considering whether to fire Mr. Mueller, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a spokeswoman, clarified his remarks during a gaggle with reporters on Air Force One.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile the president has the right to, he has no intention to do so,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Source: https:\/\/www.nytimes.com<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By: MICHAEL D. SHEAR and NOAH WEILAND WASHINGTON \u2014 A member of President Trump\u2019s legal team said on Sunday that the president was not under investigation by the special counsel looking into Russia\u2019s election-year meddling, contradicting Mr. Trump\u2019s assertion in a Friday morning tweet that he is a subject of the widening inquiry. The denial …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":149,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5285],"tags":[574,257,8438,1226,8471,2231,1161,8470,8472,8467],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12344"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/149"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12344"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12344\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}