Defense says meeting notes back lawyer
WASHINGTON — Defense attorneys for a Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer charged with lying to the FBI during the Trump-russia probe showed jurors handwritten notes on Wednesday aimed at undercutting allegations that he misled the federal government about his legal work.
Michael Sussmann is on trial in Washington’s federal court, accused of lying to the FBI’S general counsel during a September 2016 meeting in which he presented computer data that purported to show a secret communications backchannel between Donald Trump and Russia. The FBI investigated but determined no link existed between the Trump Organization, the former president’s company, and Russia-based Alfa Bank.
Prosecutors allege he misled the FBI by saying he was not attending the meeting on behalf of a particular client when he was representing the interests of the Clinton campaign and another client — a technology executive who had provided him with the data.
The case was brought by special counsel John Durham, a Justice Department prosecutor appointed in 2019 to investigate potential government misconduct in the early days of the inquiry into potential ties between Russia and Trump’s 2016 campaign. Sussmann is one of three people charged by Durham.
Sussmann’s lawyers deny that he lied. They say that his legal representation of Democratic interests was already well-known to James Baker, the FBI lawyer to whom he made the alleged false statement, and that he came to the FBI to raise concerns about a potential national security threat.
Prosecutors rested their case on Wednesday. It remains unclear if Sussmann will testify in his defense this week.
Defense lawyers called as their first witnesses former Justice Department officials who attended a March 6, 2017, meeting at which FBI leaders briefed them on the status of investigations into potential coordination during the 2016 presidential election between Trump’s successful campaign and Russia. Among the topics that came up at the meeting were the Alfa Bank claims.
One of those ex-officials, Tashina Gauhar, took notes from the meeting in which she wrote that the Alfa Bank allegations were brought to the FBI by an attorney “on behalf of his client.” She said she didn’t recall who at the meeting said that, but said that if she had written that down, then “that’s what I would have heard at the briefing.”