Politico doing it’s best to absolve FBI of blame in Russia Collusion hoax

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A federal prosecutor argued Tuesday that an attorney working for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign sought to use the FBI as a “political pawn” by lying to the law enforcement agency’s top lawyer while passing off information damaging to then-candidate Donald Trump just before the 2016 election. Assistant Special Counsel Deborah Shaw told jurors that Sussmann took advantage of his relationships with the FBI and its then-general counsel James Baker to plant data about a potential Trump tie to Russia while hiding the fact that Sussmann was acting on behalf of the Clinton campaign. “This is a case about privilege ... the privilege of a lawyer who thought that for the powerful the normal rules didn’t apply, that he could use the FBI as a political tool,” Shaw said in her opening statement in U.S. District Court. “The defendant lied to direct the power and resources of the FBI to his own ends and to serve the agendas of his clients.” Shaw said Sussmann and the Clinton campaign hoped that the FBI would jump on Sussmann’s report and launch an investigation that would embarrass Trump as voters prepared to go to the polls. “It was a plan to create an October Surprise on the eve of the presidential election — a plan that used and manipulated the FBI ……a plan that largely succeeded,” Shaw declared. In her opening statement to the 16 jurors and alternates, Shaw called politics “the elephant in the room” and urged jurors to set those issues aside. “We are here because the FBI is our institution. It should not be used as a political tool for anyone … Whatever your political views might be they can’t be brought to the decision that you will be asked to make in this courtroom,” she said.

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