The New York Times reports that Michael Flynn was talking with the Russians starting well before the election. The reports say that Flynn wasn’t directly promising that Trump would rescind Obama’s sanctions, but it was a clear implication. Worse, this call was only one of a series of calls and contacts prior to Trump’s inauguration.
The federal Logan act forbids unauthorized citizens from negotiating with foreign governments having a dispute with the U.S. It was intended to prevent the undermining of the government’s position.
The scariest part isn’t Flynn telling the Russian Ambassador not to worry. The scary part is that the Russians clearly acted before that to corrupt the election for Trump’s benefit during the election.
Update: Reporters asked Trump about the Flynn reports. This was already 16 hours after the New York Times published the article. He lied, and claimed he hadn’t heard that news report yet.
OK, so I don’t know if he lied. The options are either that he knew, and hence lied, or that he didn’t know something horribly damaging about his National Security Advisor, published in a major newspaper, most of a day earlier. And, when informed, wasn’t especially interested.
The Washington Post reported that Flynn went down to Florida with Trump. If true, they were on the same plane for many hours after the report was released.
I’d say that ‘lied’ is the kindest option.
