For regular folks, a FARA violation while seeking or having a security clearance is a major red flag.
DNC headline:
“Do we want foreign interest conflicting with our national security? New DNI chief did not register while advocating for a corrupt Moldovan political party official!”
The GOP says it cares about our security, the GOP says that it cares for regular Americans, well if a regular American seeks or obtains a security clearance and then is found to have lied or not disclosed/registered paid foreign advocacy, then they would be fired and possible be subject to fine/incarceration. Grennell is not the first Trump/POTUS appointee to get a light treatment. It seems that if your friends with Trump/POTUS you get treated one way and if you are not then you get treated another. Does not sound like treating all Americans the same! The GOP, for the rich, for the entitled, the GOP for Trump and his friends/allies only!
“Grenell? Well, maybe I met the guy at a cocktail party or something, but he didn’t really do very much for the campaign. I think he was just in charge of getting coffee or something. I don’t really know anything about it, but it was unfair, the way he was treated by you people.”
Has anyone ever been jailed or suffered a significant criminal sanction for violating FARA?
And doesn’t Trump override whatever mechanisms are in place to grant security clearances, and insist they be bestowed upon anyone he pleases. regardless their suitability, background or personal history and conduct?
NOW it makes sense why Donnie hired him. You either have to be a smear merchant or Trump has to have the ‘goods’ on you…otherwise, you can’t work in his WH…for the good of the country, of course.
Gofman recalled to TPM that he felt like he had run out of options in publicizing the corruption allegations. German diplomats he was in touch with had declined to open an investigation, but told Gofman that his activism had put him in danger and advised him to immediately leave the country. Gofman fled with his family in a borrowed car to neighboring Romania, before flying onwards to Washington, D.C.
This piece makes my head spin but Trump’s m.o. is predictable. Grenell is corrupt so naturally Trump loves him. He will get filtered intelligence while Grenell and Patel are in charge putting our country at grave risk.
A real weakness, among so many that have recently been recognized. There should be a review panel for security clearances subject to a judge’s input if necessary. One person, especially the President, shouldn’t have the final say.
Looks like this Grenell nomination is going to backfire, bigtime. Grinell’s background isn’t going to stand up to scrutiny. Follow his money. What’s in his wallet, and what property and other wealth does he, and his relatives have?
This shit started on a limited basis in the Nixon administration; e.g., he appointed Howard Phillips as director of the Office of Economic Opportunity in order to wreck the Great Society-created agency.
It really got off the ground during the Bush administration. Anthony Cordesman (adviser to John McCain, but a pretty smart and honest analyst) surprised me with his honest appraisal of the Bush administration. He said that if you were a job applicant applying for employment with the Pentagon or the Coalition Provisional Authority to work on Iraq issues, knowledge of Arabic, or savvy in the history or politics of the Middle East disqualified you from being hired.
OTOH, if you were some recent graduate from Liberty University, or Regent, or Bob Jones, who didn’t know shit from Shinola, Rove and Company would send down the word: “You’re hired!”
Now, of course, in the Trump regime, this syndrome has reached pandemic proportions like the Corona virus.
The only good things about trumpists and oligarchs: when a story comes out where the trumpists/oligarchs say one thing, and someone who is not a trumpist or oligarch says something else, there is no need to guess as to which side is telling the truth.
(I say this partially in jest; claims should always be met with some degree of skepticism. But here we have an oligarch and his trumpian hirelings claiming they didn’t do crimes while smearing a nobody that says they did. Hmmmm I wonder who is telling the truth?)
