Flynn to make arguments against doing prison time
WASHINGTON — Lawyers for Michael Flynn, President Donald Trump’s former national security adviser, are poised to ask a judge to spare him prison time in a sentencing memorandum due by the end of Tuesday.
Defense lawyers are expected to echo arguments from special counsel Robert Mueller’s office that Flynn has been so cooperative with investigators, meeting with them 19 times, that he is entitled to avoid prison when he is sentenced next week.
Flynn, who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about conversations during the presidential transition period with the then-Russian ambassador to the United States, will become the first White House official punished in the special counsel’s ongoing probe into whether the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia during the 2016 presidential election.
Since his guilty plea a year ago, Flynn, 60, has stayed largely out of the public eye and refrained from discussing the Russia investigation despite encouragement from his supporters to take an aggressive stance.
Tuesday’s filing will be the first opportunity in which Flynn’s attorneys, Robert Kelner and Stephen Anthony, will lay out his side of the story.
The memo is expected to emphasize the retired Army lieutenant general’s three decades in the military, including five years in combat, and his acceptance of responsibility for his actions early on in the Russia investigation.
The memo could also reflect the toll the investigation has taken on Flynn and his family over the past two years. In a public statement after his plea, Flynn has said he+ cooperated with prosecutors because it was in “the best interests of my family and our country.”
In other developments: Trump said in a news interview that he is not concerned about being impeached by Democrats, saying, “I think that the people would revolt if that happened.”
In a Reuters interview, Trump spoke out for the first time about new documents filed by prosecutors detailing the alleged crimes of his former lawyer, Michael Cohen. Cohen has said he made hush payments to two women accusing Trump of infidelity in the waning days of the 2016 campaign.
Asked if he discussed campaign finance law with Cohen, Trump tells Reuters: “Michael Cohen is a lawyer. I assume he would know what he’s doing.”
He adds: “No. 1, it wasn’t a campaign contribution. If it were, it’s only civil, and even if it’s only civil, there was no violation based on what we did. OK?”
In a ruling late Tuesday, a federal judge in Los Angeles ordered porn star Stormy Daniels to pay Trump nearly $293,000 for his attorneys’ fees and another $1,000 in sanctions after her defamation suit against him was dismissed.
Trump’s attorney, Charles Harder, had requested nearly $390,000 in fees and an equal amount in sanctions.
On Wednesday, the moment of reckoning arrives for Michael Cohen, who finds out whether his decision to walk away from Trump after years of unwavering loyalty will spare him from a harsh prison sentence.
A federal judge in New York is set to decide whether Cohen, 52, gets leniency or years in prison for crimes including tax evasion, making illegal hush-money payments to protect Trump during the campaign and lying to Congress about the president’s past business dealings in Russia.