Judge tosses Trump’s Russia probe lawsuit against Clinton, FBI
WASHINGTON — A federal judge in Florida has dismissed Donald Trump’s lawsuit against 2016 Democratic rival Hillary Clinton and former top FBI officials, rejecting the former president’s claims that they and others acted in concert to concoct the Russia investigation that shadowed much of his administration.
U.S. District Judge Donald Middlebrooks said in a sharply worded ruling Thursday that Trump’s lawsuit, filed in March, contained “glaring structural deficiencies” and that many of the “characterizations of events are implausible.”
He dismissed the idea that Trump had sued to correct an actual legal harm, saying that “instead, he is seeking to flaunt a two-hundred-page political manifesto outlining his grievances against those that have opposed him, and this Court is not the appropriate forum.”
The lawsuit had named as defendants Clinton and some of her top advisers, as well as former FBI Director James Comey and other FBI officials involved in the investigation into whether Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign had coordinated with Russia to sway the outcome of the election.
Other defendants include the founders of a political research firm that hired a former British spy to investigate ties between Trump and Russia, and a well-connected Democratic lawyer who was recently acquitted on a charge of lying to the FBI during a 2016 meeting in which he presented the bureau with information it wanted to investigate.
But none of the claims, the judge wrote, supported Trump’s claims of a conspiracy against him.
A 2019 Justice Department
inspector general report did identify certain flaws by the FBI during the Russia investigation, but did not find evidence that the bureau’s leaders were motivated by political bias in opening the probe and said the inquiry was started for a legitimate purpose.
A separate investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller produced criminal charges against nearly three dozen people and entities and found pervasive Russian interference in the election, but did not establish a criminal conspiracy with the Trump campaign.
NKorea nuclear weapons:
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un stressed his country will never abandon the nuclear weapons it needs to counter the United States, which he accused of pushing to weaken the North’s defenses and eventually collapse his government, state media said Friday.
Kim made the comments during a speech Thursday at North Korea’s rubber-stamp parliament, where members passed legislation governing the use of nuclear weapons.
The new law spells out conditions where North would be inclined to use its nuclear weapons, including when it determines that its leadership is facing an imminent “nuclear or non-nuclear attack by hostile forces.” The law requires North Korea’s military to “automatically” execute nuclear strikes against enemy forces if Pyongyang’s leadership comes under attack.
The law also says North Korea could use nukes to prevent an unspecified “catastrophic crisis” to its government and people, a loose definition that experts say reflects an escalatory nuclear doctrine that could create greater concerns for neighbors.
Ga. voting machines: A group of computer and election security experts is urging Georgia election officials to replace the state’s touchscreen voting machines with handmarked paper ballots ahead of the November midterm elections, citing what they say are “serious threats” posed by an apparent breach of voting equipment in Coffee County.
The apparent unauthorized copying of election equipment happened in January 2021. Emails, security camera footage and other records show that a computer forensics team traveled to the rural county about 200 miles southeast of Atlanta to forensically copy voting equipment. Emails show that Sidney Powell and other attorneys allied with former President Donald Trump were involved in arranging the visit.
The 13 experts on Thursday sent a letter to the members of the State Election Board and to Secretary
of State Brad Raffensperger, a non-voting member of the board. It urges them to immediately stop using the state’s Dominion Voting Systems touchscreen voting machines. It also suggests they mandate a particular type of post-election audit on the outcome of all races on the ballot.
The experts include academics and former state election officials and are not associated with efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
UN human rights chief:
A week after Michelle Bachelet stepped down as the United Nations’ high commissioner for human rights, the U.N. has approved Volker Turk, an Austrian and trusted adviser to U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, to take on the notoriously challenging job.
The U.N. General Assembly approved the appointment without a vote Thursday.
Turk, 57, is not widely known outside the United Nations, but in a field of 13 candidates he had the advantage of a long-standing relationship with Guterres.
Among the most visible challenges awaiting Turk is how to follow up on the blistering report Bachelet released minutes before departing last week on China’s mass detention of Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim groups in its western region of Xinjiang.
Capitol riot pleas: The founder of the Hawaii Proud Boys chapter and a Texas man who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and posed for a picture in front a door on which one of them had written “Murder the Media” each pleaded guilty Friday in federal court to a felony charge in connection with the riot.
Nicholas Ochs, founder of the far-right extremist group’s Hawaii chapter and a onetime Republican state House candidate, and Nicholas
DeCarlo, of Fort Worth, Texas, admitted to obstructing the congressional certification of President Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory.
Federal guidelines call for sentences between about 3½ years and four years behind bars.
They are scheduled to be sentenced in December.
Mexico National Guard:
Mexico’s Senate passed a bill early Friday handing control of the country’s recently created National Guard over to the military.
President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador says the guard must be under military command to prevent corruption. The lower house of Congress already approved the measure, and Lopez Obrador is expected to sign it into law.
Opposition parties said late Thursday they will file court appeals, claiming the measure violates a Constitutional guarantee on civilian control.