It's actually worse than that. Cohen's latest subpoena is in relation to another campaign fund violation which is linked to The Trump Foundation, a charitable fund which is run by Trump's oldest children. The Charitable fund cannot be used for campaign funding, nor paying for "Technical Support", which may turn out to link to certain Russian hackers.I was under the impression it was the other way round. Cohen admitted to using Trump’s own money to buy the women’s silence so as not to jeopardise the campaign which made it a campaign related expense. You can’t evade campaign finance law by using non-campaign funds to avoid having to report a campaign expense. Doing this, ie the bit Trump is confessing to, is the felony bit.
Actually paying the women out of campaign funds and reporting it as a campaign expense would have been legal. But obviously as this was ‘hush’ money, reporting it as a campaign expense would have been self defeating.
At least this is my understanding and it’s possible I am wrong.
Nope, still would have broken the allowed limits for payments to individuals.Actually paying the women out of campaign funds and reporting it as a campaign expense would have been legal.
I was under the impression it was the other way round. Cohen admitted to using Trump’s own money to buy the women’s silence so as not to jeopardise the campaign which made it a campaign related expense. You can’t evade campaign finance law by using non-campaign funds to avoid having to report a campaign expense. Doing this, ie the bit Trump is confessing to, is the felony bit.
Actually paying the women out of campaign funds and reporting it as a campaign expense would have been legal. But obviously as this was ‘hush’ money, reporting it as a campaign expense would have been self defeating.
At least this is my understanding and it’s possible I am wrong.
This is completely separate.So it was Putin, right?
This is completely separate.
There is a possible link between campaign funding and Russian hacking, where The Trump Charitable Foundation listed an expense as "Technical Support", which needs explaining.
Following the money is proving quite fruitful for the Special Councel's team.
I admit I was a bit confused with the clip on the plane where he said he didn't know about the payments, the bit where he told Fox he only knew about the payments later, and his saying he paid them personally rather than out of campaign funds.
You seem to be confused. Several separate things are happening.Oh.
So they went in looking for treason and found some financial irregularities which they're now happy to pursue because they believe it will ultimately serve their end goal of removing the President. Treason was the excuse, removal is the goal.
If only there was a common term for this type of investigation.
You seem to be confused. Several separate things are happening.
The FBI office in the Southern District of NY is looking into illegal payments of hush money in the run up to the election. Everyone including Trump has admitted it happened and Cohen has pleaded guilty to the offence.
The Special Counsel is looking at links between the Trump campaign and Russia and has secured quite a few indictments and convictions already. When other things arise as a result of this investigation they get handed over to other authorities as appropriate.
Meanwhile Trump is spending a lot of time trying to muddy the waters by claiming the whole thing is part of a huge conspiracy and you seem to be falling for it.
The Special Councel, Robert Muller is a Republican, and has no axe to grind with Trump.Oh no, I understand they're classed as separate investigations.
My point here is that all of this is predicated on the idea of removing Trump and that's where these things are going. The accusations about why he's unfit for office move as the evidence does.
Essentially, it's a bad science experiment. They've (The political opponents of Trunp) already determined the conclusion. The hypothesis just changes until they find the right experiment to reproduce the results.
I'm not suggesting some grand conspiracy, I was referring more to his opponents on social media but that certainly seeps into political institutions, of course it does. They're made up of people and people aren't unbiased