What Flynn’s plea means for Trump

AND WHAT IT MEANS FOR THE WHITE HOUSE

Former national security adviser Michael Flynn pleaded guilty Friday to lying to the FBI over his contact with the Russian ambassador. But what does it all mean?

HE’S FLIPPED

Flynn could have been hit with a raft of much more serious charges and prosecutors might even have gone after his family. Special counsel Robert Mueller had convened a grand jury to look at a range of things Flynn had allegedly done wrong. His failure to register his work lobbying for foreign governments is one of the big ones. The special counsel was even looking into Flynn’s son to see whether they could pressure Flynn to talk. By agreeing to a deal, Flynn avoids those charges. But in return he gives prosecutors everything he knows. “(It) suggests a bombshell of a deal with prosecutors,” Jens Ohlin, vice dean of law at Cornell, said in an email to The Washington Post. “The best explanation for why Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III would agree to it is that Flynn has something very valuable to offer in exchange: damaging testimony on someone else.”

WHO ELSE?

Flynn’s guilty plea is alarming news for Donald Trump. But the first person it’s likely to jeopardize will be the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, according to Eli Lake, of Bloomberg News. Lake reported that during the last days of the Obama administration, the retired general was instructed to contact foreign ambassadors and foreign ministers of countries on the UN Security Council, ahead of a vote condemning Israeli settlements.

“One transition official at the time said Kushner called Flynn to tell him he needed to get every foreign minister or ambassador from a country on the UN Security Council to delay or vote against the resolution.” he reported. If true, that could make Kushner a target for Mueller.

Also, earlier this week, it was reported that Kushner met investigators on Mueller’s team for an interview in November.

It is not known what he told them, but it is likely he was asked about events that related to Flynn — before, as Vox news points out, it was known that Flynn was a cooperating witness. And, as Flynn has found out, lying to the FBI is a crime.

WHAT ABOUT TRUMP

“Nothing in the Flynn plea sheds any light on whether the Trump campaign actually colluded with Russia to influence the election,” Lake reported for Bloomberg. “But ABC News reported Friday that Flynn is prepared to tell Mueller’s team that Trump had instructed him to make contact with Russia during the campaign itself.

If those contacts involved the emails the U.S. intelligence community charges Russia stole from leading Democrats, then Mueller will have uncovered evidence of actual collusion between the president and a foreign adversary during the election. Impeachment could then be in the cards.”

WILL HE TESTIFY?

“I am working to set things right,” Flynn said in his statement.

But how far will he go? The stock market dipped instantly on the report from ABC News that Flynn had promised to testify against Trump.

ABC News said Flynn was also ready to testify that Trump directed him to make contact with the Russians, initially as a way to work together to fight the Islamic State group in Syria.

“It was not clear when Mr Trump supposedly told Mr Flynn to contact Russians and whether there would be anything illegal in requesting such contact,” said the report.

WILL TRUMP FIRE MUELLER?

Trump has called the Mueller investigation a “witch hunt” and there have been rumours he would fire the special counsel. However, writing for Bloomberg News, Noah Feldman, a professor of constitutional and international law at Harvard University, said Mueller appeared to be shaping the public narrative so as to avoid being fired.

He said Mueller appeared to have deliberately chosen to charge Flynn with lying about his Russian contacts rather than another felony.

Previously, guilty pleas from people associated with the Trump campaign revealed Russian efforts to connect with the Trump campaign. But now Flynn’s plea revealed official contacts between the Trump team and Russia after the election.

“Mueller must do more than simply prosecute if he doesn’t want to be fired. He must shape public perception of his investigation to reduce the probability — by suggesting that his firing would itself be an act of obstruction of justice by the president,” Feldman wrote.

THE $64,000 QUESTION

“The $64,000 question is, why did he lie?” asked Feldman. “One possibility is that Flynn lied because he was trying to hide a longer course of contacts between the Trump campaign and Russia … The more contacts Mueller can show, the closer he is to a narrative that shows conspiratorial cooperation between Russia and Trump,” said Feldman.