Oh please.
$1.2 Million from the company and no red flags were raised but now all of a sudden its a concern?
He’s a fall guy.
Get too close to Trump World …
Pay the price.
Perhaps - but he’s also the General Counsel - literally “the last line of defense”. If he let this happen, there is no way he could stay on.
Royal Fuck Up gets to retire
Undoubtedly with a golden parachute
If it was you or me …
Need I say
This implies that there is a real ethical or legal issue involved. If this were viewed as a bad business use of corporate funds (like a bad investment), I don’t think you ask the GC to quit. You’d ask someone in finance, operations or senior management to quit. Novartis is facing legal scrutiny in Switzerland, but I feel there is more to it than that. There may be some conduct on their side that exposes the company to liability under US law.
Felix = scapegoat
And apparently, Novartis is expecting an end to any public discussion on these matters. I don’t think that’s their decision.
Basel, May 16, 2018 - Novartis announced today that Felix R. Ehrat, Group General Counsel of Novartis, has decided to retire from the company. Shannon Thyme Klinger, currently Chief Ethics, Risk and Compliance Officer, will be appointed Group General Counsel, effective June 1, 2018.
Mr. Ehrat, who has been Group General Counsel and Member of the Executive Committee of Novartis since 2011, has decided to retire from his position in the context of discussions surrounding Novartis’ former agreement with Essential Consultants, owned by Michael Cohen.
Mr. Ehrat said: “Although the contract was legally in order, it was an error. As a co-signatory with our former CEO, I take personal responsibility to bring the public debate on this matter to an end.”
They’re practicing their Jedi mind control techniques in preparation for the next shareholder meeting.
I think bribery that could be linked to a public official may still be illegal in this country. But who knows, maybe an Executive Order has changed that.
Um, it’s not.
I think that’s the issue I’m thinking about. Is there correspondence that is in the GC’s possession indicating that the payments to Cohen were intended as payments to earn Trump’s goodwill, and/or were actually intended for Trump controlled bank accounts? Did Trump receive a benefit, or the implied promise of future benefits, because of Cohen’s solicitation and acceptance of the payment? This could be conspiracy to commit bribery involving multiple players (even if Trump himself can plausibly deny knowledge of it).
Do you have 67 votes in the Senate to convict at an impeachment trial? If you don’t Trump is free to commit any crime of his choosing. Treason, murder, arson, pedophilia, you name it. 17-ish GOP Senators won’t be cajoled into crossing him regardless the crime, the penalty to be paid back home with their voters is too severe. Because those voters in those Red states care not what crimes he commits. You can take that to the bank.
A President can be indicted and put in a box where he would have to negotiate his way out to avoid prosecution (as Nixon did). Nixon didn’t resign to avoid the shame of impeachment/removal. He resigned in exchange for a pardon because he was certain to be indicted once he left office. Ford was willing to grant that pardon in order to heal the country.
The fact that the Grand Jury named Nixon an un-indicted co-conspirator was a compromise struck with reluctant prosecutors. The second that happened, Nixon was on indictment watch. He would be indicted as soon as he left office, either after completing his full term or if removed sooner because of impeachment.
The same thing, I believe, will happen here vis a vis Trump if the investigations are allowed to proceed unimpeded (big if I know, but my point is the legal case against Trump is clear to see, and I’m confident that Mueller has or will gather the evidence necessary, as would other DOJ attorneys if investigations are opened up on other crimes like these potential bribery issues).
…if something illegal was done. Which, currently, we don’t actually know if that’s true. All we know so far is the made a series of payments to a guy with no experience, who wasn’t a registered lobbyist, that was off the scale compared to what their going rate for actual lobbyists was. Looks bad, I agree…but no real big legal problems there (besides paying an unregistered lobbyist to be a lobbyist…which is relatively minor and mostly on Cohen, depending on how its presented).
But the fact he is leaving is a pretty huge signal that something(s) illegal did occur, and Novartis knows it.
You aren’t looking at what’s happening. Pence is moving to take over control of the RNC as we speak. Here in FL, he is backing one republican candidate for governor (Putnam) and telling the President to butt out and back off of supporting the other (DeSantis).
That’s huge. And it only happens if the RNC and Pence both believe that Trump won’t survive a full term.
Things are looking grim for the GOP in the Senate (and they look even worse in the House) for this midterm. They get dramatically worse looking into 2020.
I stand by my earlier assessments still. If Mueller provides an ironclad enough case for impeaching Trump, the Dems will rapidly move forward with it in the House, and enough republicans in the Senate will cross over to get to 67 (probably higher). They will want Trump off of their collective necks and will want to “pave the way” for a President Pence. Pence will likely be forced into a similar arrangement that Ford did, and pardon Trump, which will make him a dead man walking politically, he will then be primaried by his own party, and lose.
But the key to understanding this is look at what is going on with Pence and the RNC, and look at how many republicans (like Kasich) are brushing off their resumes and gearing up for a 2020 run…
As will Pence promise Trump an eventual pardon for all crimes. You know, to put the past behind us, begin the process of healing, allow the government to concentrate its efforts on rebuilding trust with the Executive Branch. Trump likely worries about 5 seconds in a day about post-Presidential prosecutions. There is no damned way a President Pence allows the exposure of all manor of crimes tied to the GOP. If Trump is staring at what is universally agreed to be prosecution for multiple offenses he’ll merely resign very near the end of his term and walk away a free, and pardoned, man. Sure. Pence might not like it. It might tank his electoral prospects in 2020, running as the incumbent that let Trump off the hook. But the Party will insist it happens, and he’ll be the good soldier and do it. Shenanigans will be revealed, but muzzling the Trump portion of them will limit the damage.
What the what, I’d gladly send that bun of a stitch $1.20 if it meant I’d get to retire. Except my retirement wouldn’t keep the lights on at home, and I’d have to cancel my Prime membership.
Pence’s situation is different than Ford’s, because Pence has legal exposure on #trumprussia. Granting the pardon to Nixon was a political mistake by Ford. He would’ve won election in 1976 had he not done so.
Yet another person tangentially connected to Trump having lost all credibility…
Sort of like a highly communicable form of leprosy that attacks your integrity…
If you follow ESG investing (investing that tries in various ways to be virtuous https://www.msci.com/esg-investing ) many international funds have Novartis as their biggest holding. They have had a rep of being good citizens, and have been a very profitable company.
In fact, I didn’t even know what they did as a company before this scandal. (I conflated them with chip maker Nvidia.) Just that they were in the virtue game. I had seen the name a lot messing around on Morningstar with possible ESG portfolios. They are all over that space, as the techies say.