Trump definitely learned his lesson
The lesson is that there are no consequences for obstructing justice – so long as the GOP has at least 1/3 of the Senate.
It gets better. Trump is nominating the current head of the SEC to replace Berman.
It was unclear why Berman was leaving his position after serving more than two years. The announcement was made late Friday and came after Barr visited New York City to meet with local police officials. And Trump is nominating the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission to the job, a lawyer with virutally no experience as a federal prosecutor.
But the departure comes days after allegations surfaced from former Trump national security adviser John Bolton that Trump sought to interfere in an Southern District investigation into the Turkish Halkbank in an effort to cut deals with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
And who is SEC Chairman Jay Clayton? Here’s a New York Times story about Clayton’s conflicts of interest when he was nominated for his current job.
Some of the clients were listed on Sullivan & Cromwell’s website — and Mr. Clayton kept nine others confidential — but the filing reveals a number of previously unadvertised assignments, including work he has done for companies facing intense government scrutiny: Deutsche Bank, UBS and Volkswagen. Other well-known clients represented by Mr. Clayton, whose given name is Walter, include the Japanese conglomerate SoftBank, the film studio the Weinstein Company, Reid Hoffman, a founder of LinkedIn, and William C. Erbey, former head of the mortgage firm Ocwen.
No, it gets even better.
Rank corruption. Abuse of office. Yadda, yadda. Feel free to post updates in the comments.