The Senate Judiciary Committee released 2,500 pages of congressional testimony today including testimony concerning Donald Trump's 2016 "Russia Meeting" in which he hoped for dirt on Hillary.

WAPO analyzes what it all means.

A question: Who did Trump, Jr. call or get a call from after the meeting? The four minute call is to or from a blocked number. Did he talk to his father? He testified he doesn't know (or remember.)

As to alleged efforts to cover-up the real reason of the meeting and protect Don Jr., I think the account in Michael Wolff's book sounds pretty plausible.

Donald Trump has filed new financial disclosures.

“In 2016 expenses were incurred by one of Donald J. Trump’s attorneys, Michael Cohen,” Trump reported in a footnote of his official Personal Financial Disclosure report, required of top federal officials. “Mr. Cohen sought reimbursement of those expenses and Mr. Trump fully reimbursed Mr. Cohen in 2017. The category of value would be $100,001 — $250,000 and the interest rate would be zero.”

The disclosure is here. The Office of Government Ethics says in a footnote that Trump is required to disclose the payment/liability.

Whatever Donald Trump does, he stirs up a hornest's nest. He's like the bull in the China shop. Moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, is no different.

52 protesters have been killed (some were reportedly putting bombs on the street)

Palestinians now make up 38% of Jerusalem,

The new embassy hasn't even been built.

A small interim embassy will start operating from Monday inside the existing US consulate building in Jerusalem. A larger site will be found later when the rest of the embassy moves from Tel Aviv.

Palestinean leaders say the move dooms any peace prospect: [More...]

Rudy Giuliani and his law firm have parted ways. Rudy says it is because he needs to devote all his time to Donald Trump and the Russia investigation.
His law firm, Greenberg Taurig (once home to Jack Abramoff) adds another reason. It disagrees that using law firm funds to pay off an adult entertainment star who claims to have had an affair with a client is routine procedure, when the client has not approved it. (Trump has publicly said he didn't know of the payment beforehand.) Not only isn't it routine, the firm announced in a statement, it isn't acceptable.

“Speaking for ourselves, we would not condone payments of the nature alleged to have been made or otherwise without the knowledge and direction of a client.”

What does "or otherwise" mean in this context?

The only person striking out more than Rudy this month is Michael Cohen.

I've been waiting for Rudy Giulani and Donald Trump's lawyer troubles to recede from the headlines. I can't think of two people I dislike more.

Today, CNN reports Mueller's team questioned Russian Oligarch Viktor Vekselberg who heads an asset management company called the Renova Group. Vekselberg is reportedly close to Vladimir Putin and made payments to Michael Cohen after the election. According to Stormy Daniels lawyer, $500,000 in payments from a group controlled by Vekselberg were deposited into Cohen's account for his "shell business", Essential Consultants -- the same account he set up to pay Stormy Daniels, between January and August, 2017. [More...]

Melania Trump had a big to-do yesterday announcing her kids' project called "Be Best". Aside from not understanding what that means (why not "Be the Best" or "Be Your Best Self" or something that made grammatical sense) it turns out her project isn't even about empowering kids or encouraging them to strive and succeed -- it's a guide book for parents on ways to restrict their kids' online activity.

But putting all that aside, there's this: New allegations of plagiarism.

Compare Melania's 17 page pamphlet called "Talking with Kids About Being Online"to this 15 page pamphlet written in 2013, NET CETERA: Chatting with Kids About Being Online. Here is the Net Cetera web page which is still up. It's also available on another government website here, from 2014.

So Melania added a page with her photo and a handwritten note, changed the word "chatting" to "talking", and takes credit for a new program on how parents can restrict their kids internet and social media use.

Sorry, Melania, I'm not impressed. [More...]

The New York Times obtained a list of the questions Robert Mueller wants to ask Donald Trump. NPR reports:

Most of the questions The Times printed focus on whether Trump may have obstructed justice or tried to frustrate the FBI's Russia investigation, including whether he asked then-FBI Director James Comey to lay off then-national security adviser Mike Flynn; leaned on others to pressure Comey; why he fired Comey and more.

I like the question about his calls to James Comey in March, 2017: [More...]

Trump attorney Michael Cohen has asked the judge presiding over Stormy Daniels civil lawsuit to stay proceedings in the case because he is the subject of a criminal investigation by the FBI and Southern District of New York, as he would invoke his 5th Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. His Declaration is here.

McClatchy is reporting through unnamed sources that Mueller has evidence Michael Cohen went to Prague. Cohen famously denied the allegation at the time.

Read through the McClatchy article and see what it says the import would be for Trump and Cohen if it turns out that Cohen was untruthful when he denied he went to Prague.

Also, today, Cohen dropped his defamation lawsuit against Buzzfeed.

Here's the latest on the searches of Michael Cohen's law office, hotel room and electronic devices.

Everybody will be back in court Monday. A lawyer for Donald Trump showed up in court today seeking to intervene in the case and the request was granted.

The key takeaway is that Cohen has been under investigation by the US Attorneys office in the Southern District of New York for months for "offenses "which sound in fraud and evidence a lack of truthfulness." (Govt. Brief, Case 18-mj-03161-KMW Document 1, filed today.) The Government believes Trump is Cohen's only client.

[More....]

Update: The New York Times says Trump's personal legal team on Russia is down to one lawyer, and explains why the rest left and others have turned down his overtures.

Joe DiGenova and his partner/wife Victoria Toensing won't be representing Donald Trump regarding Russia after all. They are conflicted out.

The president is disappointed that conflicts prevent Joe diGenova and Victoria Toensing from joining the president’s special counsel legal team,” Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer, Jay Sekulow, said in a statement on Sunday morning. “However, those conflicts do not prevent them from assisting the president in other legal matters. The president looks forward to working with them.”

Victoria represents Mark Corallo, who was spokesman for Trump lawyer Marc Kasowitz and Trump's legal team when Trump, Hicks and others drafted a reply to the NY Times disclosure of Trump Jr.'s Russia meeting, also attended by Manafort, Kushner, Russian lawyer Natalia V. Veselnitskaya, Rob Goldstone and others. The initial media disclosure by the New York Times is here.

No one saw the conflict before this? Toensing's representation of Corallo in relation to the Russia investigation was widely publicized -- as was his reported meeting with Mueller. [More...]

No surprise here. John Dowd has resigned as Trump's main lawyer. Who needs to look at Joe di Genova every day, let alone listen to his thoughts? If he had to bring on one of the DiGenovas, it should have been his wife, Victoria Toensing. She's the better lawyer of the pair, he's just a loud-mouth like Trump. (I spent months if not years arguing against them on Geraldo Live during the Clinton impeachment years.)

Interestingly, or not, Victoria's son Brady Toensing, also a lawyer who works with the family firm, was Vice-Chair of the local Republican party in Burlington, VT and chaired Trump's 2016 Vermont campaign. He is also the lawyer who filed the complaint to have Jane Sanders, wife of Bernie, investigated. Brady was hoping to be nominated by Trump to be U.S. Attorney. But Trump glossed over him and picked a female who has a reputation as being a crusader on opioids. Brady still is still a member of DiGeneva and Toensing. [More...]